Curated OER
Exploring the Expository Scenes in Macbeth
Students examine the function of exposition in play structure. They will be able to develop multiple interpretations and visual and aural production choices for Shakespearean scenes and choose those that are most interesting.
Curated OER
Following the Blood
Students rehearse a scene from Julius Caesar and analyze how the physical aspects of stage direction impact the audience. In this Julius Caesar lesson plan, students use blood in the scene and analyze the direction and where the blood is...
Curated OER
Characters in Live Performance
Your intermediate or advanced thespians choose dramatic scenes to perform in duos, small groups, or solo to demonstrate vocal and physical characterization. Use class time to prepare and rehearse. Detailed rubrics work for peer assessment.
Curated OER
King Lear- Cut a Scene
Students determine the most critical elements of King Lear, Act I using a Silent Scene Model. In this King Lear lesson, students will create a silent scene based on a scene from Act I of King Lear and act out their scenes for the class.
Curated OER
Introduction to Drama
Introduce your class to drama! You cast each pupil as a different character from a story you have read. They are given a general outline of the scene, act out the scene multiple times, then discuss the weak and strong aspects of each...
Curated OER
Rather Cut a Little
Students create podcasts of Measure for Measure. In this Measure for Measure activity, students decide which lines are the most important and edit scenes to create a shorter version of the play that includes the important concepts. ...
Curated OER
Literature Through Silent Movies
Students watch Charlie Chaplin films and discuss film elements. They select a story written by Edgar Allen Poe to write and produce a movie of. They film scenes, edit, and create a final iMovie project.
Curated OER
Shakespeare Was A Black Woman
"I all alone beweep my outcast state." After a discussion of the "Shakespeare in American Life" segment in which Maya Angelou's relates her reaction to Sonnet 29, class groups create and perform a scene about an outcast that includes the...
Curated OER
Introduction to melodrama
Students, in groups, read a melodrama and rehearse their scenes to perform in front of the rest of the class.
Curated OER
Taming of the Shrew: Updated, Translated, and Performed
Make The Taming of the Shrew modern and relevant with this outline. Small groups can choose from a list of suggested scenes and update with modern language and settings before acting them out. Great questions refine writing and...
Curated OER
Creating and Using a Checklist of Performance Techniques to Critique and Find the "Message" in Mass Media Performances
Students analyze and critique theater events by evaluating and constructing meanings from improvised and scripted scenes and from theater, film, television, and electronic media productions.
Curated OER
"I am Not Well": Unspoken Endings and Unscripted Scenes
Pupils analyze Act 4, scene 1 from the play, Merchant of Venice. They hypothesize the content of an unscripted moment and response, look for evidence in the text to support their hypothesis, rewrite the scene, and perform it for the class.
Curated OER
MACBETH and the Themes of Ambition,
Learners describe and compare characters and situations in dramas from and about cultures and historical periods, illustrate in improvised or scripted scenes, and discuss how theater reflects a culture.
Curated OER
Change slander to remorse: Unscripted Scenes
Students hypothesize about the content of unscripted moments, search for evidence in the actual text to support their hypothesis, and explore how this hypothesis would affect characterization.
Curated OER
Shakespeare in Parts
Students examine primary source manuscript fragments, discuss differences in performing a play without the entire script, and perform a scene from Twelfth Night with no preparation.
Curated OER
Historical Episodes
Students choose a historical book set in the Civil War. They create a flow chart of the steps involved in producing a film. They select one scene and prepare props, costumes and setting for the scene.
Curated OER
Shadow Puppetry in South India
Students read a variety of literature from India, including folktales and fables. They then select a scene or story to script, work together to design and craft shadow puppets of characters and scenery, narrate a story, manipulate the...
Curated OER
The Box
Students react to a planned dramatic scenario in which someone is caught red-handed and then they improvise a similar scene based on wither guilt or innocence.
Curated OER
"Such Affection Move": Finding Staging Clues in A Midsummer Night's Dream
High schoolers perform various scenes from the play, A Midsummer Night's Dream. They examine and discuss the text and stage directions, then perform their scenes in small groups for the class.
Curated OER
Measure for Measure: Are You Talkin' to Me?
Students rehearse and perform an exchange from act three, scene two of the play, Measure for Measure, in pairs. They read the lines from the point of view of a different character in the play, and perform for the class.
Curated OER
Showtime Jobs
Students plan and present a play or puppet show. In this artistic lesson plan, students practice organizational and communication skills to put on a performance. The task should focus on the many jobs that take place "behind the scenes."
Curated OER
Literature Through Silent Movies
Students participate in an engaging, alternative assessment activity: making a silent film of an Edgar Allen Poe story. This project offers them an additional way to demonstrate their mastery of the topic.
Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
One Land, Many Trails: Challenge Activities (Theme 5)
Bring history to life through literature. The first in a series of three challenge activities designed to accompany Theme 5: One Land, Many Trails does just that through unique projects connected to historical fiction and nonfiction...
Teaching Tolerance
Act Up! Drama for Justice
A lesson turns young historians into playwrights to understand and speak out against social injustice. Pupils work individually or in groups to write and perform monologues that deliver personal messages on social justice. Writers then...