Core Knowledge Foundation
Unit 5: A Midsummer Night’s Dream
Fifth graders analyze William Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream, paying close attention to character development, plot, and dialogue. With daily reading and thoughtful discussion, scholars take pen to paper to respond to journal...
Denver Art Museum
Lesson: Act 1: Purple Bathrobes Attend and Opera
I really like this idea. Upper graders discover the connection between art and theatre by first analyzing the artists' choices and motivation in creating the installation piece, Four Purple Velvet Bathrobes. In groups, they write one-act...
Curated OER
The Awful 8: The Play
Students perform a play based on pollution. In this pollution science lesson plan, students perform a play about different pollutants and how it effects our daily lives.
Curated OER
Let's Make Play Dough
Students create their own play dough to use for art projects. In this art instructional activity, students measure, pour and mix the ingredients to make their own play dough. Then, students use the clay to create their own sculptures.
Do2Learn
Social Play Action Figures
Three activities stem from one hands-on project designed to explore character traits. Scholars create an action figure that reflects their personality to teach others about themselves and role play conversational skills.
Arbor Day Foundation
Trees: A Joy Forever
This Arbor Day, put on a show! A three-scene play follows a boy and girl that run into Arbor Day founder, J. Sterling Morton. Morton describes how the holiday came to be and discovers how his hard work has grown into a national...
Curated OER
Online —On Stage—and Action
Use your tablets to participate in a culture-sharing project with a class in a foreign country. Your class can communicate and share ideas with a class in another country, swapping information regarding language and culture. Together you...
Orange Public Schools
Stagecraft
The house lights dim, the curtain parts, lights slowly come up, revealing the stage. Before the actors appear, before a word is spoken, the audience is drawn in by the lighting, by the colors, by lines of the set, by the props, and...
Orlando Shakes
The Farndale Avenue Housing Estate Townswomen's Guild Dramatic Society's Production of "A Christmas Carol": Study Guide
What could be better than a play within a play? A study guide for "The Farndale Avenue Housing Estate Townswomen's Guild Dramatic Society's Production of 'A Christmas Carol'" has theater-goers share their thoughts on the comedic...
Orlando Shakes
Twelfth Night: Study Guide
From lonely to luggage, it would be nearly impossible to have a modern-day conversation without using words that William Shakespeare coined. A Twelfth Night study guide introduces individuals to fun Shakespeare facts as they participate...
Orlando Shakes
Merry Wives of Windsor: Study Guide
What does the character Falstaff mean when he says "I was beaten myself into all the colors of the rainbow"? Using the Merry Wives of Windsor curriculum guide, scholars unlock meaning by paraphrasing lines from the play. Pupils also...
Orlando Shakes
It’s a Wonderful Life: Study Guide
George Bailey learns that it truly is a wonderful life when he discovered how many lives he has touched—not to mention how many new generations of lives the story touches every year. A study guide on It's a Wonderful Life introduces...
Curated OER
Play Doh Color Wheel
Students identify primary and secondary colors, and construct color wheels, using Play Doh in the three primary colors.
Shakespeare in American Life
Performing Modernized Shakespeare
“All the world’s a stage…” What do Leonardo DiCaprio, Heath Ledger, and Kenneth Branagh have in common? They have all starred in modern adaptations of Shakespeare’s plays. After viewing a series clips from modern Shakespeare videos,...
Shakespeare Uncovered
“Speak, I Charge You”: Macbeth On Your Feet, Not In Your Seat
“Is this a dagger which I see before me . . .” As part of a study of Macbeth, class members engage in a series of activities that get them up and moving. Individuals practice, then deliver, a line from the Scottish play. The entire class...
Curated OER
Thrilling Information: Music and Reading
Here’s a cross-curricular program music activity that uses Peer Gynt to engage class members. Groups take one section of “In the Hall of the Mountain King,” choreograph their section of the tune to represent the story as they imagine it,...
Broadway GPS
The Lion King—The Broadway Musical Study Guide
Musicals have been adapted from stage plays, novels, and movies. With The Lion King, Disney transforms its animated film into show-stopping, live-action musical theatre. The guide Disney provides to accompany a study of the award-winning...
Curated OER
Creating Plays from Children's Stories
Students explain how individual elements (e.g., plot, theme, character, conflict, etc.) comprise the structure of a play. They write an original one-act play with developed characters, specific setting, conflict, and resolution.
Curated OER
Being in the Noh: An Introduction to Japanese Noh Plays
High schoolers read a Japanese Noh play and discuss its structure and traditional characters. They choose a short myth and write a Noh play based on it.
Curated OER
Die Physiker: German Plays
Students research the life of Friedrich Durrenmatt, a German playwright. They listen to a reading of his play "Die Physiker", define key vocabulary from the play and participate in a class discussion about important sections of the play.
Curated OER
How to Sing and Play Happy Birthday
Here is a clever, and simple, lesson on how play the guitar while singing the Happy Birthday Song. There is media content embedded in the plan that allows learners to see a video of it being played, and to print out tabulature which...
Curated OER
Final Papers: Writing Prompts for Evaluating Team and Individual Performance
To be used in connection with a group project or at the end of a unit, this handout contains two essay writing prompts. The first prompt asks a group of learners to work together to evaluate their groups' performance as well as each...
Orlando Shakes
Richard II: Study Guide
Shakespeare loved to write plays about famous kings. A study guide for Richard II explores the drama surrounding the reign of King Richard while reinforcing important language arts skills. After attending a performance of the play,...
Orlando Shakes
Hamlet: Study Guide
Hopefully, learners do not sleep during a performance of Shakespeare's Hamlet. A helpful study guide introduces theater goers to the popular Shakespearean tragedy and includes activities to accompany a production of the play. Activities...