Features of Drama
Objective: SWBAT: identify the features of a play and apply them by transforming a poem into a play.
Big Idea: In this collaborative lesson, groups will take a cute poem, and transform it into a funny play.
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Guiding Question
This Guiding Question is attempting to get students to begin thinking about features of a play or script. Because the assignment for the day is going to ask them to transform a poem into a play, they need to understand how the two formats differ. Some examples of the differences are: descriptions are relayed to the actor, rather than embedded in a narrative. There are not quotes, rather lines that someone speaks.
Lesson
For this activity, students read Footwear Follies and worked together at their tables to transform it into a script. I talked to them about how many scriptwriters take existing texts (like books, or plays) and transform them into movie manuscripts.
I really kind of rushed the kids through this process. I wanted them to take away the major points: the exposition is going to move into stage directions, and character's dialogue is really important.
When we were finished (or not, because I really rushed them), we worked on watching two interpretations of the poem and talked about what worked and what didn't work with each one. What do you think?
