Arts Education Lesson Plan
| Subject/Grade: Arts Ed (Gr.7/8) Lesson Title: Developing Dramatic Characters Teacher: Lila Gaertner | |
| Stage 1: Identify Desired Results | |
| Outcome(s)/Indicator(s)/Treaty Outcomes and Indicators:
CP7.4 Investigate how dramatic character develops from role. a. Demonstrate confidence and imagination when working in various roles. b. Investigate when in role how character may be expressed through actions. c. Use language with purpose to develop character and achieve dramatic intent when speaking and writing in role. d. Discuss own roles and analyze contributions to the work. e. Demonstrate when in role how characters use actions or interact with others for different purposes. g. Identify how roles and drama work can contribute to deeper understanding of self and others. |
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| Modified Indicator:
a. Demonstrate confidence and imagination when acting out various character roles. b. Investigate when in role how you can express your character through actions. c. Use language with purpose to develop character and achieve dramatic intent when speaking. d. Discuss own roles and analyze contributions to the work. e. Demonstrate when in role how characters use actions or interact with others for different purposes. g. Identify how roles and drama work can contribute to deeper understanding of themselves and others. Key Understandings: (I Can Statements) * Show confidence and imagination when acting as different characters. * Investigate relationship between characters and actions. * Use language with purpose to develop character and achieve dramatic intent. * Discuss/ analyze own character roles and contribution. * In role – show how characters use actions to interact with others. * Investigate link between drama and understanding of themselves and others in society. |
Essential Questions:
1. How can pretending help us learn about the real world? 2. How is character revealed in drama (when you don’t know what characters are thinking or feeling)? 3. How can you tell how characters feel about each other? 4. How can you express a relationship dramatically? 5. How can you get improve? 6. How can you tell a story through actions? |
| Stage 2: Determine Evidence for Assessing Learning | |
| – While teaching the lesson, observe and watch for students understanding and ability to act out a character not only with words, but emotions, facial expressions and actions.
– Watch for their ability to strongly develop their character role throughout their dramatic presentation. – Make sure the students pay attention to their own character’s actions and how they interacted with others. – Watch for their willingness to take risks and their ability to be engaged in their character and make it interesting. At the end of the lesson, hand out an Exit Slip to each student. You will be able to check for understanding by getting the students to answer the questions below. This slip is important for everyone, but is beneficial even for the students that choose not to participate. Using this slip will allow you to check to see if the students are actively listening and understanding the main concepts of the lesson even if they do not participate in acting out a character. Give them 5 minutes to complete the questions: 1. What character(s) did you act out today? 2. How can you show what your character is thinking and feeling? 3. How can pretending help you learn about the real world? 4. What was your favorite part about this lesson? This will let you know what they are taking away from this lesson. |
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| Stage 3: Build Learning Plan | |
| Set (Warm-up, Focusing the learning): Time: 5-10 mins
Ask: Who has participated in drama (acted) before? Who has acted like someone else? Ex. Play, musical, dressed up like a different character, etc. (This gives you an idea on how much you will have to explain to your students and what their experiences are) Say: Today we are working on developing dramatic characters. We will be focusing on our actions, voice, language, and relationships between characters. Explain and Play: a warm up game called “Whoosh!” This is a game to get the student’s voices warmed up, acting as different characters, working on dramatic expression/actions, voice, etc. Procedure: – Everybody stands in a circle. – Start with one person, who waves both hands to his/her neighbor, saying “Whoosh”. – The next person passes the Whoosh to their neighbor, and that way the Whoosh is passed around the circle. – There are other sounds/movements that can be made: 1. “Whoa!” indicated by saying “whoa”, and holding up both hands in a stop motion. A “Whoa” changes the direction of the Whoosh. 2. “Zap”: instead of passing the Whoosh to your neighbor, it gets zapped to the person you point to with your hands clapped together. The receiver continues with either a Whoosh to his neighbor, or another Zap to another person. A “Whoa” after a Zap returns to the Zapper. 3. “Groooooooovelicious”: for this one the whole group bends down and up again in a kinda groovy way, all saying Groooooooovelicious. Afterwards, the person who started the Groovelicious sets the Whoosh in motion again, in any direction. 4. “Freakout” or “Chaos”: indicated by waving both hands in the air. Everybody starts screaming and moves to the center of the circle. When everybody`s freaked out a new circle is formed, and the starter of the Freakout sets the Whoosh in motion again. 5. “Jackie Chan” – do a karate chop or kick the air while saying “hiii-ya!”. 6. “Drop Ball” – One person drops a pretend ball and rolls it on the ground in the direction that they choose. Then the people proceed to jump over the ball until someone (anyone) picks up the ball and laughs. Then everyone must repeat or replicate that laugh. Then the woosh proceeds to be passed around the circle. 7. “I’m a Banana” – Neighbors must bend outwards and say “Peel”. 8. “Beyoncé” – they sing “All the single ladies, all the single ladies” neighbors must sing “Woa O O oh!” to the tune of her song. Variations: 1. You can invent other sounds and gestures. 2. Begin an elimination mode in which kids that make a mistake must sit down, till there are only two people left standing. Development: Time: 30 mins Transition to another Drama game called “Who am I?” This game will help students to develop and act out different characters and interact with other characters within a scene. Explain and Play: “Who Am I?” Game – Two people will act out a scene as two different characters. (They can decide their own character, or draw a character from a hat). – Students will also act out the scene with a prompt that is given to them by the teacher. The prompt will be a place or action that must be included in their scene. (Ex. Coffee shop, ice cream, swimming, etc.). – If the two students were Mickey mouse and Justin Bieber and they got “bowling” as their prompt, they would have to act out a scene as those two characters bowling until the audience is able to guess which characters they are acting out. – The audience members must raise their hand to make a guess. They can only guess one character at a time. – The whole class will know the prompt given to the two students before they start acting, but they will not know their characters, so they will have to guess the two characters that they are acting out. – Tell the students that they must let the two people acting act out their scene for at least 15 seconds before they can make a guess. – If the students guess the wrong characters, let the group of two continue acting until someone else is able to guess the correct characters. – Once the two characters have been guessed, let another two students come up and choose two new characters and receive a new prompt. ASK: Once the students are done acting, ask the students how they knew what character they were acting out. Ask them what gave it away? Was it their actions? Their voices? their language? Etc. Ask if some characters were easier to guess and why? List of Possible Characters: – James Bond – Dog walker – A Dog – Muscle Man – A Cat – Girly Girl – Oprah Winfrey – Lost Child – Carrie Underwood – Clown – Justin Bieber – Finding Nemo – Dory – Sponge Bob – Mickey Mouse – Minnie Mouse – Football player – Hockey player – Donald Trump – Hilary Clinton – Bob Marley – Katniss Everdeen – Iron Man – The Hulk – Spiderman – Superman – A Snake – A Bear – Bart Simpson – Doctor – The Joker – Batman – Gollum (From The Lord of the Rings) – Frodo Baggins (The Ring Bearer) – Gandalf – Samwise Gamgee – Harry Potter – Ron Weasley Possible prompts: (Places to set the scene or activity or prompt that has to be included) – Bowling Ally – Stretching – Movie Theater – Cooking – Coffee shop – Packing – Park – Shopping – Bathroom (routine) – Spying – Break up scene – Swimming – Dancing to your favorite music – Ice cream – Classroom – Yoga – Jogging – Hunting – Skipping Learning Closure: Exit Slip Time: 5 mins Hand out an Exit Slip to each student. Tell them to write their name on the top of the slip. Give them 5 minutes to complete the following questions: 1. What character(s) did you act out today? 2. How can you show what your character is thinking and feeling? 3. How can pretending help you learn about the real world? 4. What was your favorite part about this lesson? Once they are finished they can hand it in to you. This exit slip will let you know what they are taking away from this lesson. |
Materials/Equipment:
– The ideal space to play these educational drama games would be in an open space. – If you cannot book an open room, you can still play these games in your classroom around your desks and by using the front of your classroom as the “stage”. – Bring pieces of paper with examples of characters written on them for students to use as a prompt if they cannot think of a character on their own. – Bring a bucket or hat to put the characters in. Management Strategies: – Explain to the students that it is important to be actively listening to the other students who are actively participating. Safety Considerations: – Make sure the students are aware of their personal space and their movements/actions while others are close to them. – Make sure students do not accidentally hit the other students while they are acting. Possible Adaptations/ Differentiation: – Students who are very shy can decide if they wish to participate or not. If they come to you and ask to sit out you can let them. – Some students will have their own characters that they will want to act out, so you can give them the option of either coming up with their own character or choosing one from the bucket/hat that you have provided them with. – If you run out of prompts or characters, you can ask they students for ideas and they can write them down and give them to you to use. – Students will take turns at the front of the class, but if they need more time to develop a scene you can put the into pairs, hand out characters to all of the pairs at the same time and tell them a prompt. Then give them all 2-3 minutes to come up with a scene before they present it to the class. |
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