BENEFITS OF DRAMA
- SELF-CONFIDENCE: Taking risks in class and performing for an audience teaches students to trust their ideas and abilities.
- IMAGINATION: Making creative choices, thinking of new ideas and interpreting familiar material in new ways are essential to drama.
- EMPATHY: Performing roles from different situations, cultures and periods of history promotes compassion and tolerance for others.
- COOPERATION: Performance is a cooperative process. Drama is a team activity where there never has to be winners or losers.
- CONCENTRATION: Playing, practicing and performing develop a sustained focus of mind, body and voice.
- COMMUNICATION SKILLS: Drama enhances the verbal and non-verbal expression of ideas. It improves voice projection, articulation, fluency with language and persuasive speech. Listening and observation skills develop by participating in drama activities, being an audience, rehearsing and performing.
- PROBLEM SOLVING: Students learn how to find ways to communicate with the audience. Improvisation fosters quick-thinking.
- FUN: Drama brings play, humour and laughter to learning. This improves motivation and reduces stress.
- EMOTIONAL LITERACY: Drama activities allow students to express a range of emotions. Students become more aware of their feelings and thus more reflective.
- RELAXATION: Many drama activities reduce stress by releasing mental, physical and emotional tension, reducing antisocial behaviour.
- SELF-DISCIPLINE: The process of moving from ideas and actions to performance teaches the value of practice and perseverance.
- TRUST: The social interaction and risk taking in drama develop trust in self, others and in the process.
- PHYSICAL FITNESS: Movement in drama improves flexibility, coordination, balance and control.
- MEMORY: Rehearsing and performing words, movements and cues strengthen memory.
- SOCIAL AWARENESS: Legends, myths, poems, stories, films and plays used in drama teach students about social issues and conflicts from cultures past and present from all over the world.
- AESTHETIC APPRECIATION: Participating in and viewing theatre and film develop an appreciation for the art forms. It is important to raise a generation who understand, value and support the place of film and theatre in society.
