Drama Activities In A Mixed Ability Class

While traditional language exercises entail students offering specific answers, drama activities focus on the importance of individual differences, allowing each student to take part in the task at a different level. (Breen & Candlin, 1980: 89). Here, the role of the teacher is to provide students with open-ended tasks, so that each student can achieve the challenge at his/her own pace and ability. As Piepho (1981: 12) states, "if students are to be successful in communication, the teacher must be aware of and design open-ended challenges". At this regard Glock (1993: 111) adds that "in a truly open-ended challenge students should be able to express themselves within the limits of their linguistic competency, and still feel that they have successfully completed a worthwhile task". This can be achieved only if the atmosphere created in the classroom is a non-threatening one, where all students feel enough free and confident to contribute as much as they can and drama activities lend themselves very much to the creation of this type of less formal learning environment. First of all, drama activities are not carried out using a formal sitting plan, but usually they allow students to stay in a circle, face each other and therefore get used to eye contact. Secondly, initial drama activities, involving mime or voice exercises, consent students to relax and communicate not only verbally but also physically, making up for the unknown words. Furthermore, since drama activities are carried out in pair or groups and the communication generally takes place between students, the less able ones are not put on the spot and they thus feel more free to express themselves not worrying too much about making errors. This also allows students to take more responsibility for their learning and increase their confidence and motivation, with the teacher emphasising the importance of accepting "ongoing success and failure as necessary prerequisites towards some ultimate achievement" (Breen & Candlin, 1980: 101). Students' focus is therefore not on accuracy anymore, but on the ability to put their message across, even if with some grammatical mistakes, which should not be corrected immediately. At this regard, Murphy (1986: 146) and Finocchiaro/Brumfit (1983: 100) sustain that "there is no value in interrupting an activity to correct mistakes when they can be corrected afterwards", with Murphy (1986: 146) who adds that "there has been no evidence which demonstrates that correction of mistakes has to be given immediately." In real life communication, the feedback we receive from others tells us whether we have put out message across or not and the same can happen during experiential drama activities. (Glock, C. 1993).

If in the traditional classroom the teacher is external to the activities students carry out and the relationship between teacher and students is a vertical one, in the classroom where experiential drama is used the teacher can actively participate and be in role. He/she is no longer "the source of knowledge nor the sole arbiter of what is right and wrong, good or bad." (Maley/Duff, 1978: 17).

Moreover, drama facilitates more interactive questioning, which vary according to whether the teacher is in-role or out-of-role and are used to help low-intermediate students. (Kao/Carkin/Hsu, 2011: 489-515). Through questions teachers "establish atmosphere, feed in information, seek out the interests of the group, determine the direction of the drama, give status to the participants, draw the group together to confront specific problems, (and) challenge superficial thinking" (O'Neill/Lambert, 1986: 142). The type of questions teachers ask during drama activities do not just verify knowledge and understanding, but, more importantly, seek new information and therefore students focus on the message and not on the form of the language, which is exactly what happens in real life interactions.

Another way of bridging the gap between the real world and the classroom is by presenting students with authentic materials, which can be photos, realia, commercially-produced auditory and other written materials, since "a communicative approach to second language learning proposes to present learners with images which represent the real world within which they will practise their newly acquired" (Glock, 1993: 113). At this regard, Prodromou (1988: 79) suggests that as teachers "we often behave as our students, on entering our little EFL (English as a Foreign Language) world change: change utterly into little John Smiths or Janet Smiths; that, coming to learn English, they leave their three dimensional humanity outside and enter the plastic world of EFL book'. Obviously this statement can be applied to the MFL classroom, where as well it is necessary to "reconcile the conflict between the real world on the one hand and the all too often 'imaginary' classroom world on the other." (Prodromou, 1988: 77).

But how exactly can drama activities be designed in order to meet all students' needs and involve them all, regardless of their ability? Barrie Hawkins (1993) shows how different needs and levels of competency can be targeted by presenting different types of drama exercises in a ladder of increasing difficulty which takes into account two factors: the length and the timescale the teacher offers. At the very bottom of the scale are physical and vocal games; students are presented with a short-term goal, such as informing and/or questioning and they set their own limits according to their level of competency: if low ability they can practise one single grammatical structures, if high ability more than one structure. (Hawkins, 1993). The second next step forward towards a more complex drama activity is called "functional or transactional exercises" (Hawkins, 1993: 65). These involve the use of authentic materials and of predictable vocabulary in some short familiar interactions, which can last longer than the initial exercise, as they entail creating a strong emotional context and a conflict. The example Hawkins uses is that of a removal man who has to make a list of all the items in different rooms. Again, this activity can be differentiated, at a lower level, by focusing only on the items of one of the rooms and, at a higher level, by asking the client to "invent a special hobby which made moving house very awkward and thus change the level of difficulty, extending it vertically." (Hawkins, 1993: 68). The next step involves reaching more complex open-ended objectives in a longer interaction (for example complaining about damaged furniture). The relationship between participants also becomes more complicated and the level of emotional engagement increases. The difference between this and a full scale drama, which is at the top of the difficulty ladder, consists in the type of outcome (in this case there is a predictable outcome) and in the fact that full scale drama involves both preparation and rehearsal of different separate scenes, which together construct a plot. (Hawkins, 1993).

In conclusion, what we can take out from Hawckins' scale of drama activities is that these have to be introduced progressively and always have a purpose; if communication is to take place students need an objective. Moreover, at every level, challenges need to be open, so that participants are able to complete the same task at their own pace and ability and this definitely fosters pupils' engagement, sense of achievement and motivation.

One fundamental part of drama-based language lessons is evaluation and reflection. At the end of an activity the teacher should have a discussion with the students on what they think about the activity, if and how this has helped them build on their confidence and knowledge. This is also an opportunity to correct possible mistakes and, more importantly, discuss alternative language structures/vocabulary to those used by the students during the activity. By doing so, students can constantly improve the way they express themselves in the target language and widen their vocabulary.

Bibliography

Austin, J. L. (1962) How to do things with words Oxford: Clarendon Press

Bolton, G. (1993) A brief history of classroom drama. In Schewe, M. & Shaw, P. (Eds.) Towards drama as a method in the foreign language classroom. Peter Lang

Breen, M. P. & Candlin, C. N. (1983). The essentials of a communicative curriculum in language teaching. In Applied linguistics. 1, p 89-112

Di Pietro, R. J. (1982b). The open-ended scenario: A new approach to conversation. TESOL Quarterly, 16, 15-20.

Di Pietro, R. J. (1987). Strategic instruction: learning languages through scenarios. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Dougill, J. (1987) Drama activities for language teaching. Macmillan Publishers

Education Department of Tasmania (1980) A framework for speech and drama. An introduction to speech and drama from kindergarten to lower secondary. Hobart: Education Department of Tasmania.

Finocchiaro, M. / Brumfit, C. (1983) The Functional-notional Approach. From theory to practice. New York: Oxford University Press

Glock, C. (1993) A brief history of classroom drama. In Schewe, M. & Shaw, P. (Eds.) Towards drama as a method in the foreign language classroom. Peter Lang

Hawkins, B. (1993) Back to back. Drama techniques and second language acquisition. In Schewe, M. & Shaw, P. (Eds.) Towards drama as a method in the foreign language classroom. Peter Lang

Hayes, S. K. (1984). Drama as a second language. A practical handbook for language teachers. National Extension College Trust Ltd.

Holden, S. (1982) Drama in Language Teaching London. Longman

Johnson, L. and O'Neill, C. (Eds) (1984) Dorothy Heathcote: collected writings on education and drama. Hutchinson

Kao, S. M. / Carkin, G. / Hsu, L. F. (2011) Questioning techniques for promoting language learning with students of limited L2 oral proficiency in a drama-oriented language classroom. In The Journal of Applied Theatre and Performance. Vol. 16, No. 4, November 2011, 489-515

Kao, S. M. & O'Neill, C. (1998). Words into Worlds. Learning a Second Language Through Process Drama. Greenwood Publishing Group.

Malley, A. / Duff, A. (1978, rev. 1982) Drama techniques in language learning. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Maley, A. and Duff, A. (2005) Drama techniques: a resource book of communicative activities for language teachers. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press

Murphy, D. E. (1986) Communication and correction in the classroom. ELT Journal 40, p. 140-151

Nixon, J. (Ed) (1982) Drama and the whole curriculum Hutchinson

O'Neill, C. / Lambert, A. (1986) Drama structure. A practical handbook for teachers. London: Hutchinson

Piepho, H. E. (1981) Establishing objectives in the teaching of English. In: C. Candlin (ed): The communicative teaching of English. Principles and exercise typology. Harlow: Longman

Prodromou, L. (1988) English as cultural action. ELT Journal 42, p. 73-83.

Slade, P (1958) An introduction to child drama. Longman

Stern, H. H. (1981). Focus on Second Language Learning, in J. Atlatis / H. B. Altman / P.E. Atlatis (eds): The second language classroom. Directions for the 1980s. New York: Oxford University Press.

Wessels, C. (1987) Drama. Oxford: Oxford University Press

Winston J. (2012) Second Language Learning through Drama: Practical Techniques and Applications. Routledge