Skip to main content

Learning Through Drama

  • Chapter
  • First Online:
Researching Conflict, Drama and Learning

Abstract

This chapter starts by sketching the historical relationship between drama and learning and defining modern educational drama movements. Introducing the concept of drama as pedagogy, the chapter defines and analyses the key educational components of improvisation and games, role-play, empathy and distance, narrative and tension, reflection, cooperation and trust, language and dialogue, embodiment, imagination and creativity. The focus moves to the use of drama in conflict handling and mediation, with explanations of the central DRACON drama strategies of process drama, theatre-in-education, forum theatre and a detailed outline of the strategy specifically devised for DRACON and used in Brisbane and Sweden, enhanced forum theatre. The chapter concludes by exploring the crossover and synergies between key drama education and applied theatre movements and briefly noting the effects of drama on participating students’ real-life conflicts.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Chapter
USD 29.95
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
eBook
USD 89.00
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as EPUB and PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Hardcover Book
USD 119.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Durable hardcover edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Institutional subscriptions

References

  • Andreasen, N. (2011). A journey into chaos: Creativity and the unconscious. Mens Sana Monographs (pp. 42–53). Medknow Publications.

    Google Scholar 

  • Aristotle. (c.330BC). The art of poetry. Sections 6–11, 13. Variously published.

    Google Scholar 

  • Artaud, Antonin. (1993). The theatre and its double. Montreuil: Calder.

    Google Scholar 

  • Boal, A. (1979). Theatre of the oppressed. London: Pluto.

    Google Scholar 

  • Boal, A. (1995). The rainbow of desire. London: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bolton, G. (1984). Drama as education. London: Longmans.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bolton, G. (1979). Towards a theory of drama in education. London: Longman.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bowell, P., & Heap, B. (2001). Planning process drama. London: David Fulton.

    Google Scholar 

  • Brook, P. (1968). The empty space. London: McGibbon & Kee.

    Google Scholar 

  • Brown, K., Eernstman, N., Huke, A. R., & Reding, N. (2017). The drama of resilience: Learning, doing, and sharing for sustainability. Ecology and Society, 22(2), 8. https://doi.org/10.5751/ES-09145-220208. Accessed June 2, 2018.

  • Bruner, J. (2005). In search of pedagogy: The selected works of Jerome Bruner 1957–1978. London: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Carroll, J. (1988). Terra incognita: Mapping drama talk. NADIE Journal, 12(2), 13–21.

    Google Scholar 

  • Coleman, A. M. (2015). A dictionary of psychology (4th ed.). Oxford: Oxford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Courtney, R. (1968). Play, drama and thought. London: Cassell.

    Google Scholar 

  • Damasio, A. (2018). The strange order of things: Life, feeling, and the making of cultures. New York: Pantheon.

    Google Scholar 

  • Erikson, E. (1965). Childhood and society. Harmondsworth: Penguin.

    Google Scholar 

  • Erikson, E. (1975). Life, history and the historical moment. New York: Norton.

    Google Scholar 

  • Finlay Johnson, H. (1907). The dramatic method of teaching. London: Nisbet.

    Google Scholar 

  • Fleming, M. (2005). Starting drama teaching. London: David Fulton.

    Google Scholar 

  • Freire, P. (1970). Pedagogy of the oppressed. New York: Seabury.

    Google Scholar 

  • Fyfe, H. (1996). Drama in the context of a divided society. In J. O’Toole & K. Donelan (Eds.), Drama, culture and empowerment (pp. 61–69). Brisbane: IDEA Publications.

    Google Scholar 

  • Goffman, E. (1956). The presentation of self in everyday life. New York: Random House.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hagglund, K. (1999). A glimpse into the early days of drama education in Sweden: The work of Ester Boman. Research in Drama Education, 4(1), 85–100.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Hallgren, E. (2018). Clues to aesthetic engagement in process drama—Joint action in a fictive activity (Dissertation). Stockholm University.

    Google Scholar 

  • Haseman, B., & O’Toole, J. (2017). Dramawise reimagined. Sydney: Currency Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Heathcote, D. (1971). Three looms waiting. (Film). Director Richard Eyre. London: BBC Films.

    Google Scholar 

  • Heathcote, D., & Bolton, G. (1995). Drama for learning: Dorothy Heathcote’s mantle of the expert approach to education. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.

    Google Scholar 

  • Johnston, K. (1979). Impro: Improvisation and the theatre. London: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Judson, G., & Egan, K. (2012). Elliot Eisner’s imagination and learning. Journal of Curriculum and Pedagogy, 9(1), 38–41.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Juvenal (c.130). Satires. Variously translated and published.

    Google Scholar 

  • Knezevic, D. (1995). The healing power of theatre. In P. Taylor & C. Hoepper (Eds.), Selected readings in drama and theatre education (pp. 6–13). Brisbane: NADIE Publications.

    Google Scholar 

  • Kuo, P. K. (1996). Uprooted and searching. In J. O’Toole & K. Donelan (Eds.), Drama culture and empowerment (pp. 167–174). Brisbane: IDEA Publications.

    Google Scholar 

  • Moreno, J. (1960). The sociometry reader. New York: Beacon House.

    Google Scholar 

  • Moreno, J. (1946). Psychodrama (Vol. 1). New York: Beacon House.

    Google Scholar 

  • Neville, B. (1989). Educating psyche: Emotion, imagination and the unconscious in learning. Melbourne: Collins Dove.

    Google Scholar 

  • Newell, R. (1992). Anxiety, accuracy and reflection: The limits of professional development. Journal of Advanced Nursing, 17, 1326–1333.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Newman, T. (2017). Creating the role: How dramatherapy can assist in re/creating an identity with recovering addicts. Dramatherapy, 2(3), 106–123.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • New World Encyclopaedia. (2018). Natya Shastra. http://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/Natya_Shastra. Accessed May 9, 2018.

  • O’Connor, P. (Ed.). (2010). Creating democratic citizenship through drama education: The writings of Jonothan Neelands. Stoke on Trent: Trentham Books.

    Google Scholar 

  • O’Toole, J. (1977). Theatre in education: New objectives for theatre, new techniques in education. London: Hodder and Stoughton.

    Google Scholar 

  • Plato. (c.360BC). The republic. Book 3. Variously published.

    Google Scholar 

  • Raffel, S. (2013). The everyday life of the self. Reworking early Goffman. Journal of Classical Sociology, 13, 163–178.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Rifkin, J. (2010). Empathic education: The transformation of learning in an interconnected world by empathic education. The Chronicles of Higher Education, 57, 6.

    Google Scholar 

  • Schonmann, S. (1996). The drama and theatre class battlefield. In J. O’Toole & K. Donelan (Eds.), Drama, culture and empowerment (pp. 70–76). Brisbane: IDEA Publications.

    Google Scholar 

  • Slade, P. (1954). Child drama. London: Cassell.

    Google Scholar 

  • Spolin, V. (1963). Improvisation for the theatre: A handbook of teaching and directing techniques. Evanston, Ill: Northwestern University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Spolin, V. (1986). Theater games for the classroom: A teacher’s handbook. Evanston, Ill: Northwestern University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Vygotsky, L. (1933/1974). Play and its role in the development of the child. In J. S. Bruner, A. Jolly & K. Sylva (Eds.), Play: Its role in development and evolution. London: Penguin.

    Google Scholar 

  • Vine, C., & Jackson, A. (2013). Learning through theatre: The changing face of theatre in education (3rd ed.). New York: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Ward, W. (1930). Creative dramatics. New York: Appleton.

    Google Scholar 

  • Way, B. (1967). Development through drama. London: Longmans.

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Corresponding author

Correspondence to John O’Toole .

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2019 Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd.

About this chapter

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this chapter

O’Toole, J. et al. (2019). Learning Through Drama. In: Researching Conflict, Drama and Learning. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-13-5916-3_3

Download citation

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-13-5916-3_3

  • Published:

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Singapore

  • Print ISBN: 978-981-13-5915-6

  • Online ISBN: 978-981-13-5916-3

  • eBook Packages: EducationEducation (R0)

Publish with us

Policies and ethics