Drama
Drama is part of the Performing Arts faculty along with Music.
We have built a vibrant, dynamic and creative department which has a key role to play in our students’ personal development through classroom lesson and school wide extra-curricular activities.
In Key Stage 3 students are beginning to address the world with a growing capacity for reflective thinking and learning, this is met with a progressive Drama curriculum covering both performance and theatre design. Students will explore both factual and fictional texts that help to broaden their understanding of different social, cultural, moral and historical contexts and situations. Drama at this stage also promotes the development of the individual in a group context: roles and ideas are negotiated, problems solved and decisions made together. Drama often leads to a performance and creates opportunities for students to demonstrate their understanding, as well as promoting deeper levels of analysis as they evaluate the work of others.
curriculum journey drama updated july 24.pdf
At GCSE, students follow the OCR specification for Drama where they will study performance, the role of the director and technical disciplines such as set and costume design. The curriculum at KS4 is designed to ignite and engage students’ creativity, passion and interests. It also provides freedom for them to experiment and take risks with their work. The exam components focus on analysis and responding to text and performance, devising theatre from stimuli and performing existing texts.
Topics Covered this Academic Year
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Year 7
Developing basic skills and exploring methods of devising.
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Year 8
This year focuses on the creation of mood and atmosphere through acting, devising and technical skills
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Year 9 Building on our understanding of genre, style and exploring further techniques to create engaging theatre |
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Autumn Term |
Silent Movies: An introduction to basic drama skills and the conventions of Silent Movies. Students will explore mime, improvisation, slapstick and stock characters.
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Gothic Horror: Students will explore the genre and conventions of Gothic Horror, taking inspiration from famous literature e.g. Frankenstein and the poetry of Edgar Allen Poe.
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Devising and Performance Styles
Students will create their own pieces of physical theatre based on the devising techniques of Frantic Assembly.
Students will learn the building box of devising including pair work and group lifts. |
| Spring Term |
Storytelling: A unit focused on the creation of plot, structure and the use of basic theatrical devices.
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Theatre Design: Students will explore how to enhance theatre production through theatre design, planning lighting, set and costume for previous devised work.
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Puppetry: An introduction to different style of puppetry in modern theatre. |
| Summer Term |
Assessing Performance Skills: A short unit on how to prepare devised theatre for performance Physical Theatre: This unit focuses on the genre of physical theatre and theatre practitioners. Students will explore how to convey narrative through movement.
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A Midsummer Night’s Dream:
Students will look in depth at how to convey characters emotion through their acting skills, they will look at extracts from A Midsummer Night’s Dream looking at comedy and conflict. |
Find Me: Students will be given a play text which they will study and prepare an extract for performance. They will draw on the skills and knowledge they have gained to create an engaging piece of theatre in their own style. Within this module they will work as an ensemble, choosing to work as an actor or designer for the performance. |
Last Updated: September 2024
