Drama in Education: Theory and Practice

See also: Theory and Practice Backlist

The New Dramathemes
Larry Swartz
In this new edition, you will find a variety of sources for storytelling, improvisation, interpretation, and movement; guides for planning drama; novel response activities; reproducible blackline masters of sources, assessment profiles, and activities; drama conventions with descriptions; and rubrics for evaluation.
This newly-revised third edition has been written to provide you with an updated version of games, activities, and resources on the ten themes that framed the original two books. They are based on popular thematic explorations in literature for young people: Humour, Mystery, Fantasy, Animals, Relationships, Folklore, Community, The Pastr, The Future, Diversity and Equity. 160 pages Softcover, $18.95.

The RSC Shakespeare Toolkit for Teachers
Royal Shakespeare Company
Based on decades of work by the Royal Shakespeare Company in schools across the UK, this is likely the best book on the market for teaching Shakespeare to children. Focusing on Macbeth, Romeo & Juliet, and A Midsummer Night's Dream, the Toolkit is suitable for grades 3-9. Also included is a CD-Rom with printable worksheets for every activity. Softcover, 304 pp. $100.00.

Gavin Bolton: Essential Writings
Edited by David Davis
For over 40 years, Gavin Bolton has been a leading figure in Drama in Education. His publications cover all aspects of young people's educational drama and this selection of his key writings provides insight into the major areas of his theory and practice. Softcover, 186 pp. $32.95.

Learning to Read with Graphic Power
David Booth & Larry Swartz
Learning to Read with Graphic Power is designed to harness the literacy power of graphic readers in today's elementary classroom. Easy to use and lavishly illustrated, this comprehensive resource for teachers and educators includes an overview of the key features and components of graphic readers; strategies on how graphic readers can connect to the classroom literacy program; and explanations on how this highly visual and accessible format can support guided reading and develop stronger readers who get to read texts they want to read. Softcover, 76 pp. $43.95.

Drama Schemes, Themes & Dreams
Larry Swartz & Debbie Nyman
Drama Schemes, Themes & Dreams offers a comprehensive outline of improvisation and interpretation strategies that teachers can incorporate in classroom instruction. Each chapter is organized around a framework that will engage students as they experience a wealth of dramatic activity. Inside, you will find a host of sources for improving classroom instruction, including scripts, monologues, poetry, novel excerpts, and visual images. New and experienced teachers in all subject areas will find the help they need to create meaningful and innovative learning opportunities for all learners. Softcover, 176 pp. $24.95.

Stages: Creative Ideas for Staging Drama
Talia Pura
Stages is packed with drama exercises and ideas that work, tested on the hardest critics of all -- high school students. The exercises in this book can be used in isolation to simply fill a spare moment of class time, or to create a drama workshop or entire drama course. Suitable for a wide range of ages and abilities, the ideas can be adapted for young children and teenagers as well as experienced actors. Softcover, $19.95.

Schemes for Classroom Drama
Maggie Hulson
The schemes of work in this book provide clear, coherent, thought-provoking opportunities for drama teachers. They outline class lessons rooted in child-centered, humanising theory and practice, to help equip today's young people to respond to the world as it is. Softcover, 160 pp. $32.95.

Edward Bond and the Dramatic Child
David Davis
This unique book discusses all of Bond's important plays for young people and offers case studies of various productions of them. Contributors explore the demands and rewards of acting and staging Bond. Softcover, 224 pp. $36.95.

Real Players? Drama, Technology, and Education
John Carroll, Michael Anderson & David Cameron
Educational drama is being transformed by the technology of our screen-mediated world. The everyday use of computers, mobile phones, videogames and television is changing young people's perceptions of what drama is and how it works. This book brings together the performance world of educational drama and the real world digital environment inhabited by many young people. It illustrates the dramatic conventions drama teachers can bring to using interactive and online performance in their classrooms. Softcover, 181 pp. $39.95.

Young at Art
Christine Hatton & Sarah Lovesy
This is a practical guide to playbuilding for teachers working with students at an upper primary and secondary level. Focusing on an area often neglected in traditional drama textbooks, the book covers the process of devising drama, and the teacher's role in facilitating students to collectively become playwrights, actors, designers, directors and critics of their ensemble work. Softcover, 196 pp. $45.95.

Pupils as Playwrights: Drama, Literacy, and Playwriting
Brian Woolland
This is an innovative and exciting approach to drama and to developing the literacy skills of children from the ages of 6 to 12. The book makes explicit links between literacy, drama, and the development of speaking and listening skills; it also offers extensive practical exercises and activities and suggests models for planning further work. Educators will find this to be a unique and invaluable resource. Softcover, 200 pp. $29.95.

Playing a Part: Drama and Citizenship
Danny Braverman
Drama is direct and immediate and this book shows how effectively it can be used to support Citizenship Education, by putting students in someone else's shoes. It provides inspiration and guidance to teachers and youth groups to develop their skills for democracy: their oracy, non-verbal communication, listening, debating and public speaking. Educators will find this to be a powerful and supportive resource. Softcover, 160 pp. $29.95.

Teaching Fairly in an Unfair World
Kathleen Gould Lundy
This is a ground-breaking book which suggests effective ways teachers can re-define an inclusive curriculum by questioning what is taught, how it is taught, to whom and under what conditions. This powerful book includes a handy summary of 50 strategies, along with re-producible pages for classroom use.
This is an ideal resource that encourages teachers to evaluate their core teaching beliefs, acknowledge the realities of students’ lives, and create respectful, inclusive learning environments where students actively engage in interpreting challenging texts from the “inside out.”  Softcover. $24.95.

The  Novel Experience
Larry Swartz
This flipchart provides a wealth of practical tips and suggestions for using the power of novels to explore the fascinating world of language. The simple and handy book will help students develop confidence in choosing novels that suit their tasts, interests, and abilities. Innovative ways students can share their response and make connections to their own lives are a major focus of The Novel Experience. Softcover, $12.95.

The Picture Book Experience
Larry Swartz
This handy flip book describes how experiencing and responding to picture books can lead you to new understandings, new learnings, and new wonderings. It guides you toward a deeper way of looking at picture books as tools for learning. Softcover, $12.95.

The Poetry Experience
Larry Swartz
This playful flip book explores all aspects of poetry - from guidelines and an overview of poetic forms to Top Ten lists of various poetry favorites. Poetry is a powerful, personal medium and this guide offers strategies for defining poetry so that students can reflect and determine what poetry means to them. Softcover, $12.95.

Creating the Dynamic Classroom
Mindy Pollishuke & Susan Schwartz
Creating the Dynamic Classroom: A Handbook for Teachers, is a valuable resource for both new and experienced teachers. By highlighting their own understandings, the authors help teachers make the necessary links between philosophy and practical application. Softcover, $45.95.

Playdate: A Parent's and Teacher's Guide to Putting on a Play
Cindy Marcus
Play Date tells parents and teachers how to work with children in staging a play step by step and week by week. The process is broken down into twelve chapters, each of which builds on the last in a sequential progression. In all, this is an invaluable resource which ensures a fun learning experience. Softcover, 123 pp. $27.95.

Drama as Therapy
Second Edition
Phil Jones
Phil Jones' second edition of Drama as Therapy is a comprehensive, erudite, and grounded illumination of the field of drama therapy. He brings past, present, and future of the field to life in an active conversation among practitioners, researchers, and theoreticians. Softcover, 345 pp. $42.95.

Introduction to Theatre Arts 2: Teacher's Guide
Suzi Zimmerman
This updated guide makes teaching theatre arts easy and fun for all. It includes extra sammple scripts and scoring rubrics. It also contains chapters entitled The Valuable Theatre Program, Theatre for Unique Learners, Theatre for Students Who Are Learning a New Language, and Guides and Helpers. Softcover, 373 pp. $39.95.

Introduction to Theatre Arts: Student Handbook
Suzi Zimmerman
This sequel edition to the Introduction to Theatre Arts: Student Handbook includes units using theatre for life's lessons, movement, voice, skill-building activities, understanding and writing scripts, theatre behind the scenes and production 101. Softcover, 250 pp. $25.95.

Covering the Curriculum with Stories
Paul Ginnis & Sharon Ginnis
Covering the Curriculum with Stories is an exciting and unique resource, presenting a set of six delightful, cross-curricular play-based projects that deliver outstanding learning experiences. Designed for children aged 3-7, these projects will make major contributions to your pupils literacy and literary skills, teach a whole repertoire of thinking skills and deliver many features of the Foundation and KS1 Curricula in an integrated, cross-curricular way. Softcover, 229 pp. $49.50.

Reading Doesn't Matter Anymore
David Booth
In this book, eminent educator and author David Booth argues that teachers must redefine reading as an activity that embraces the needs and interests of students. Reading isn't just about Dick and Jane or great literature anymore; it's about the internet, comic books, technical manuals, graphic novels, iPods, and much more. Rooted in the real world kids live in today, this book concludes with 101 literacy events that celebrate reading not just in school, but the world. Softcover, 176 pp. $16.95.

Leap Into Literacy
Kathleen Gould Lundy
Leap Into Literacy demonstrates how teachers can nurture classrooms that are active, challenging, safe, and relevant to students. Teachers can find engaging points and a wealth of proven strategies and techniques - from role-playing, moving expressively, and working with art to playing cooperative drama games, presenting tableaux, and interpreting text as Readers Theatre. Softcover, 128 pp. $24.95.

 Back to top

The Theatre of Urban: Youth and Schooling in Dangerous Times
Kathleen Gallagher
Resisting facile comparisons of Canadian and American school systems, Kathleen Gallagher opts instead for a rigorous analysis of the context-specific features of urban cultures and schools in the two countries. An innovative work, The Theatre of Urban not only provides new insights into the conflicts that often erupt in these highly charged school spaces, it also explores the potential of drama as a powerful medium for personal growth and social change. Softcover, 222 pp. $24.95.

The Drama Teacher's Survival Guide
Margaret F. Johnson
This book will serve as an invaluable tool kit of aid and assistance to seasoned drama directors as to beginners. Softcover, 256 pp. $21.95.

Kids Take the Stage: Helping Young People Discover the Creative Outlet of Theater
Lenka Peterson & Dan O'Connor
Here is a completely revised and updated edition of a classic guide to getting young people on stage and helping them create their own shows. Clear, accessible, and fun, Kids Take the Stage is the perfect book to help young people realize their creative potential. Softcover, 255 pp. $24.95.

Games for Language Learning
Andrew Wright, David Betteridge & Michael Buckby
This completely revised edition of the 'classic' title Games for Language Learning has been restructured to enable busy teachers to navigate it with ease and select the activities most suitable for each of their classes. The games can be integrated easily into existing coursework. There is a new section on solo games for independent learners and the games have been selected to cater for a variety of learning styles. Softcover, 193 pp. $28.95.

Theatre for Children and Young People
Stuart Bennett
This publication is a tool to record and stimulate innovation and excellence -- contributing to the long-term stability of the arts. It is the first publication to give the whole story of Theatre for Children and Young People and its development in the UK. This is essential reading for drama and theatre practitioners and for students of contemporary British theatre everywhere. Softcover, 244 pp. $24.95.

A High School Theatre Teacher's Survival Guide
Raina S. Ames
This is a handy reference for high school theatre teachers covering both curricular and extracurricular problems -- everything from how to craft a syllabus for a theatre class to what to say to parents about a student's participation in a school play. In ten concise chapters, Raina Ames lays out a range of issues and situations, and offers practical suggestions for handling them professionally and humanely. Softcover, 186 pp. $54.95.

Beginning Drama 11-14
Jonothan Neelands
The second part to this book series, written by field expert Neelands, focuses on providing a positive and accessible account of what teachers need to know about the field of drama and its function in a school curriculum. Neelands has tackled such topics as Drama and Language Development, Modes of Activity and Assessment, as well as providing a section on the roles and skills of the drama teacher. Further, the book includes examples from the classroom and a series of graduated lesson plans to help teachers develop their own programs. Softcover, 102 pp. $37.95.

Drama and English at the Heart of the Curriculum
Primary and Middle Years
Joe Winston
This book is packed with imaginative activities and offers clear guidance on: teaching techniques, issues of assessment and progression, classroom examples of cross-curricular drama work, and practical issues such as inclusion, citizenship and whole-school approaches. Drama and English at the Heart of the Curriculum makes a major contibution to the growing literature on drama and its place within children's learning. Softcover, $33.95.

Back to top

A Student Guide to Play Analysis
David Rush
With the skills of a playwright, the vision of a producer, and the wisdom of an experienced teacher, David Rush offers a fresh and innovative guide to interpreting drama in A Student Guide to Play Analysis, the first undergraduate teaching tool to address postmodern drama in addition to classic and modern. Covering a wide gamut of texts and genres, this far-reaching and user-friendly volume is easily paired with most anthologies of plays and will accessible to a wide variety of readers. Softcover, 299 pp. $41.95.

The Arts Go To School
David Booth & Masayuki Hachiya
Incorporating the arts in learning opens up new possibilities, expands the mind, creates a thirst for knowledge, and helps students become more open to the world around them. This easy-to-use resource features chapters on each of the major art forms -- music, visual arts, drama, dance, and media -- and shows teachers how to help students meet related curriculum outcomes. Softcover, 160 pp. $24.95.

Drama Techniques
Third Edition
Alan Maley & Alan Duff
Completely revised from the previous edition, this book offers a large selection of drama-based techniques focusing on communicative tasks or activities for learners of English. The techniques are suitable for all levels and involve the whole personality of the learner providing real reasons for expressing feelings and opinions. This book will be of particular interest to teachers looking to inject spontaneity and motivation into their lessons. Softcover, 246 pp. $28.95.

Into The Story: Language in Action Through Drama
Carole Miller & Juliana Saxton
Into the Story is a highly practical resource for language arts and literacy development based on "story drama structures" that have been piloted in elementary and middle school classrooms. Miller and Saxton have created an inviting, nonintimidating, and enticingly available resource in which teachers and students can discover how, by entering the story, drama becomes a compelling medium for learning Softcover, 162 pp. $30.95.

What do I do about the kid who...?
50 Ways to Turn Teaching into Learning
Kathleen Gould Lundy
This practical book shows teachers how to create grade 4 to 12 classrooms where learning is more joyful, exciting, and involving for all students. Based on a wealth of teaching experience, it presents simple and effective activities that teachers can adapt to make learning happen in contextualized, inclusive, respectful, and creative ways. Softcover, 112 pp. $21.95.

Learning Through The Theatre
Edited by Tony Jackson
In this fully updated and revised edition of Learning Through Theatre the contributors chart the development of theatre in education, identifying its strengths and provide vivid and illuminating accounts of its practice around the world. Softcover, 295 pp. $56.95.

Back to top

The Art of Drama Teaching
David Fleming
The Art of Drama Teaching provided a rich variety of practical ideas for teachers and student teachers of drama, as well as for those who are interested in using drama to teach other subjects. The book is practical in orientation, but it has a significant theoretical side to it - providing insight into the close affinity between drama in education and theatre art. Softcover, 188 pp. $93.95.

Classroom Voices
David Booth & Larry Swartz
Classroom Voices uses a structure that can be best decribed as half textbook, half novel. Presenting language arts information in a straightforward, yet engaging manner, it reflects realistically the state of today's classrooms. Author David Booth has compiled an accesible and informative guide that is both enjoyable and educating. Softcover, 398 pp. $89.95.

Drama Education in the Lives of Girls: Imaging Possibilities
Kathleen Gallagher
In this book, Kathleen Gallagher presents a case study that illustrates how drama provides a fertile ground for the intellectual and emotional development of girls. By examining the power and possibility of drama in schools to animate the processes of learning, Gallager's research offers alternatives in what she sees as an increasingly mechanistic a disempowering period in education. Drama Education in the Lives of Girls provides a new lens through which to examine gender, diversity, and schooling. Softcover, 155 pp. $21.95.

Even Hockey Players Read: Boys, Literacy & Learning
David Booth
Drawing upon his background as a parent and a literacy educator, David Booth suggests strategies and techniques for developing the powerful potential of literacy in the lives of boys. This comprehensive overview focuses on the challenging issues around boys and reading and writing, and offers practical advice that will work in any classroom. Softcover, 135 pp. $18.95.

How Theatre Educates: Convergences & Counterpoints
Kathleen Gallagher & David Booth
How Theatre Educates brings together essays and other contributions from members of Canada's diverse theatre and intellectual communities to advocate for a broader and more inclusive understanding of theatre as an educative force. This lively and fascinating inquiry into pedagogy and practice will be relevant to teachers and students of drama, practicing theatre artists, and the theatre-going public. Softcover, 282 pp. $32.95.

Back to top

Poems Please
David Booth & Bill Moore
Poems Please, by two of Canada's leading educators, authors and poets, is full of original ideas to inspire and encourage children of all ages to learn and grow with all forms of poetry. This valuable handbook for reading and writing poetry includes an annotated list of 200 enchanting poetry anthologies. Softcover, 271 pp. $18.95.

Poetry Goes to School
Bob Barton & David Booth
Poetry is a terrific teaching tool, and a gateway activity for dynamic learning. This book examines more than forty forms of poetry, and features the work of eight popular poets. Case studies provide teachers with helpful examples that illustrate the powerful role that poetry can play in student learning. Softcover, 112 pp. $18.95.

Reading and Writing in the Middle Years
David Booth
This comprehensive book is a no-nonsense exploration of the latest and most successful approaches to teaching reading and writing to students in grades four to eight. Inside you will find novel ways to make connections to print texts and students' lives, practical suggestions for expanding and monitoring comprehension, and tips on how to model and demonstrate reading and writing strategies in the classroom. Softcover, 176 pp. $18.95.

Teaching Drama to Young Children
Mem Fox
Teaching Drama to Young Children has been created for teachers of young students who want to teach drama, but are unsure where to start. In this book, Mem Fox instructs you in building a curriculum that can help develop a child's imagination, confidence, and language skills. Overall, it supplies the educator with a basic structure plan so that they can develop their own ideas in response to the needs and interests of their own classes. Softcover, 118 pp. $31.95.

Back to top

Last modified July 18, 2012.
Please note that all prices are in Canadian dollars. All prices are subject to change without notice.