Curriculum - Drama

Cultural Capital

The Colne Drama Department aims to enhance students' creativity, appreciation of the arts and achievement. We will do this by offering theatre trips, holding auditions for productions and sourcing local amateur dramatic auditions. This will expose students to the professional industry. The department will source local theatre groups to perform and offer workshops. The aim is for students to become the creators of their culture and broaden their horizons of the arts and the wonderful world of theatre.

Curriculum Journey

This is a map to show the learning journey in Drama from year 6 through to further education and possible careers.

Drama Curriculum Journey.pdf

Knowledge Organisers

These are the knowledge organiser used by students in lessons to support the learning and retrieval of key information.

Overview of the learning journey in Drama

Year 7

The Drama department at The Colne prides itself on meeting the needs of all students and engaging them with a curriculum that is varied, bright and challenging. We start with an introduction to theatre skills and techniques which encourages their performance skills and confidence. As we move to the year students learn about different genres of study from Theatre In Education to physical theatre. Students will learn to perform in a variety of characters which enthuse their interests naturally. We finish the year with a nod to Shakespeare.

Year 8

The term starts with link of genres; murder mystery, comedy, and soap operas. Students engage beautifully with this concept and transpire an air of confidence, expressions and a sense of humour in their performances. In the middle of the year students meet 6 characters for a murder mystery. Each lesson we reveal a drama skill and “who done it?” moment. The mystery, fun and creativity is adored by all. We finish the year by looking at the play The Boy In The Striped P'js by Angus Jackson. We cover sensitive topics and explore the role of director and performer.

Year 9

The start of the year we hook students in with the most prestigious play of Blood Brothers by Willy Russell. Students will explore extracts and learn how to devise scenes in a naturalistic and non naturalistic way. As the curriculum moves on we explore true stories and discuss our rights within the law. This leads to a momentous devised piece that explores different viewpoints. In year 9 we teach students the roles of the performing arts industry. Such as; lighting, set and costume design, marketing and publicity as well as the role of stage manager and director. This is all preparation for GCSE drama or GCSE performing arts. Students then become confident in exploring the roles and work in small groups to devise their own performances as a production team.

Year 10

Students now begin their GCSE. They will be in a class full of ambitious, confident and courageous students. We start the term exploring drama practitioners and learn about their style, history and how to embed their skills into a performance. This then seamlessly takes us through to the first mock exam ( component 1). Students will perform and practice writing a mock portfolio. We finish the year with a live theatre review.

We introduce component 3 and the written paper. Students learn to review and criticise Noughts and Crosses by Dominic Cooke. As the year progresses students learn to perform a short script from any given play set by the exam board. Students finish the year by completing their comp 1 exam of a performance, portfolio and evaluation

Year 11

The final year needs to be taught with care, flair and passion. Students return from the summer holidays in controlled assessment conditions for their comp 1 devising exam. This includes, a devised performance, portfolio work and a written evaluation. Students will protect their information from Hard to Swallow by Mark Wheeler with revision lessons and example exam questions. This will be thread throughout the year finishing in a scripted performance to an examiner.