DRAMA PROGRAMS FOR CHILDREN AND YOUTH

1. Drama promotes empathy.

In drama classes, children often adopt characters. Those characters may be good, evil, or somewhere in between. Those characters may be animal, vegetable, human, sci-fi, or just about any category you can dream up.

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When a child is playing a role different to themselves, they are walking in the shoes of someone else.

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They are finding out on some level what it’s like to be someone who might be different, but similar, to themselves. They have to think about their character and why that character is doing what they do and saying what they say. 

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2. Drama promotes play

A play is called ‘a play’ for a reason. It’s playful! When you put on a play you are creating an imaginary world - sometimes it may resemble our real world, and sometimes it may not.

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The importance of play in healthy childhood development - even for teenagers - has been widely recognised. Play between a parent and child can help build healthy bonds, while a child’s free playtime allows them to explore their world and their own imaginations. Not enough play has been associated with an increase in anxiety and depression in children.

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3. Drama promotes both independence and interdependence

Staging a play or being involved in making a film is a collaborative exercise. But within that collaboration there is also space for independence. Students of drama must of necessity be able to work with others - for example, they must respond to cues, conduct dialogue with a scene partner, or in a musical theatre context, must sing and dance with others in an ensemble.

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4. Drama helps kids make friends

The collaborative nature of the art form often means kids form friendships with their drama classmates and look forward to seeing them every week!​

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What your child learns about responsibility from drama class

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• An actor must learn their own lines. Although others may help in the process, a young performer learns the discipline of committing words to memory. 

• An actor must take care of their own script. It's not only about remembering to bring what's needed to class, it's also about managing their workload - highlighting their own lines in the script, taking notes that the director gives them about which side of the stage to come in on, and so on.

• An actor learns when to be audience, and when to be performer. In a drama class, there will be times when a student is going to be watching their fellow classmates perform the day’s work, and times when they will be up in front themselves. Students learn audience etiquette and respect for others. 

• An actor learns how to articulate a respectful critique. Feedback is frequently used in drama. Often, after an in-class improvisation or work on a script, a drama teacher will invite feedback from the children - with questions like, “What did you like about the performance?” or “What would you like to see more of?” Children learn to express and justify an opinion in a respectful way. These are the beginning of personal analytical skills. Students of drama learn how to bolster a team with encouragement and independent thought.

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