Story Drama: Reading, Writing and Roleplaying Across the Curriculum

David E. Kemp is chair of the Drama Department at Queen’s University
and the author of The Pleasures and Treasures of the United Kingdom.

David Booth has for three decades been the most significant voice in the
Drama in Education movement in Canada. As a classroom teacher and a
professor of education, he has single-handedly changed perceptions of
drama’s place in the curriculum, of what makes good children’s
literature, and of the role of the teacher in the creative arts
classroom.

In this book, Booth examines in a clear and insightful way how natural
roleplaying can serve as a conduit through which young people can
explore and learn about the world in which they live. He begins with
simple storytelling and moves through different kinds of playing to an
in-depth examination of literacy, writing, problem solving, and
decisionmaking. At the same time, he discusses the teacher’s role in
this process and how, in order for the work to be really meaningful and
significant for the student, he or she needs to create within the
classroom a nonthreatening and sympathetic sense of community.

At a time when the artistic and aesthetic educational model is under
attack from all quarters, this wonderful book provides a rallying point
for the many thousands of educators who believe that differences are
more important than similarities and that learning is a co-operative act
between teachers and students. Story Drama should be in the library of
every education faculty and school resource centre.