Students and Theater: How Does Theater Help Students in their Educational Process and how has the Covid Pandemic Affected Theater Students?
By: Kristine Thompson
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Explain how theater is a great tool to help students with reading, writing, and prosody.
Describe the following …
How students reading and writing skills have been affected by theater.
How students feel theatre has helped motivate them to work harder.
How Covid has affected theater in their school system.
Introduction
Theater taught in schools is a wonderful tool which helps students to continue learning while having fun and meeting new peers. During the production of a play, the students' parents and friends are able to see how hard the students worked to complete the production of a play and they can be proud of their accomplishments and hard work. However, the Covid pandemic has place all theaters on hold and students are unable to participate in theater at many schools.
Within this lesson, I will discuss how students feel theater helps them with their educational learning and personal life. I will also discuss how theater has been affected by the Covid pandemic.
What skills learned through theater carry across to other subjects?
What do you think is the most important skill students learn in theater?
Do you think that the pandemic cancelling productions could impact student learning?
I interviewed two students who attend school in two different settings.
I interviewed two students who attend school in two different settings.
Meredith Greene
A tenth grader who attends Brunswick Academy and participates in the Brunswick Academy Theatre, which has a yearly production. The production includes acting, singing, and dancing.
Heather Thompson
Participated in the Brunswick Academy Theatre when she was in middle and high school, and she has also taken theatre classes at The University of Virginia.
The COVID - 19 Pandemic
The Covid-19 Pandemic has affected many high school theaters since the closing of schools. Students have not been able to perform due to gathering restrictions. Students at Brunswick Academy were two weeks away from their performance and were shut down completely. Seniors were not able to perform their last year. All of the students' hard work and dreams of performing were crushed by Covid. Students at Brunswick Academy are still not able to preform. Brunswick Academy Theatre is still shut down, just like other theaters around our area.
(M. Greene, person communication, February 12, 2021)
Questions: Theater can motivate students and help them to learn by which of the following?
A. Learning Vocabulary B. Reading C. Writing D. All of the Above
D. All of the Above
In which of the following ways has Covid-19 affected theater?
In which of the following ways has Covid-19 affected theater?
A. Advancing the production of plays B. Helping students work together.
C. Shutting down productions D. None of the above
C: Shutting down productions
Conclusion
Theater can be used in the classroom to help motivate children to...
*Read, Write, Learn New Vocabulary and Prosody
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Students realize theater helps them in their everyday lives.
*Builds confidence
*Communication
*Meet a diverse group of other students
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I believe theater is a great motivation tool which teachers can use to promote educational learning. Students are able to work on their reading and writing skills, prosody, and learn new vocabulary words (Annarella, 1991). Students learn how to work together by learning scripts and working with their peers to complete the task of acting out a play. Theatre helps students learn to work with peers they may not have interacted with in the classroom. Both Heather Thompson and Meredith Greene felt theatre helped introduce them to people of various backgrounds during their years in school who they did not know very well (H. Thompson, personal communication, February 7, 2021; M. Greene, personal communication, February 12, 2021). Theater helps students develop various educational skills, and teaches them to make new connections with their peers. Theater also allows students to gain confidence in themselves, their reading abilities, and their writing skills.
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The Covid-19 pandemic has affected many students. Theaters have been shut down due to covid and students are unable to work together on a production. Covid-19 has shut down the Brunswick Academy theater going on two years. These students are missing out on camarderie and working together on the production of a play.
References
Annarella, L. (1991, November 30). Creative drama in the classroom. Retrieved February 05, 2021, from https://eric.ed.gov/?
Mayes, A. S., Coppola, E. C., & Fa, B. (2020). Using theatre to develop writing skills: The story pirates idea storm. Reading
Teacher, 73(4), 473–483. https://doi.org/10.1002/trtr.1855
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