In my last blog, I shared tips on how to stage a Reader’s Theater performance. Here are some suggestions on how to enhance your production and involve your students in the work needed to create a “Broadway” play. Lighting/Music/Sound lights go off and then on again to show the beginning of the play and/or scene changes spotlights focused on the speaker bells or whistles for cueing scene changes background music that sets the mood of the script specific sounds that relate to the play TV Production Students can work with school facilities or use their own equipment. Personnel can include: a camera person to record the...
Read More Post a comment (0)Performances of a Reader’s Theater script need not involve props or costumes. However, there may be times when you and your students wish to stage a more elaborate production (for example, as the culminating event in a thematic unit of study), or as part of a multi-class assembly. Here are some ideas for getting everyone in the class “into the act,” not just those students who are reading the script. Scenery Scenery can be as simple as an old sheet or a large piece of fabric taped to a wall, or as complicated as you want to...
Read More Post a comment (0)Reader’s theater often creates a buzz of extra excitement for your students. But if they have not learned how to channel their excitement, it can lead to behavior problems. Before using a script, explain your expectations to students, model correct behaviors, and provide opportunities for students to practice correct behaviors in a controlled environment. You can observe and make notes to provide feedback during these times. Provide independent practice time for students to demonstrate correct behaviors. For a student who has behavior problems, provide guidelines that explain the consequences of not behaving. Monitor the student’s success. Privately acknowledge the student’s accomplishment. Several...
Read More Post a comment (0)It’s showtime! Everyone’s hard work during the past few days has led up to a performance. Since performers frequently do their best work in front of a live audience, invite students to present the script to their classmates, schoolmates, teachers, parents/guardians, office staff and principal, and other members of the community. Remember, however, that reader’s theater scripts are NOT to be memorized. Performance is done “book in hand,” as when actors do a staged reading of a play. Still, it is a live performance. And the same performing-without-a-net energy that makes live theater so vital can turn into an actor’s nightmare. Here are...
Read More Post a comment (0)A choral-read is a group read-aloud. Students get to practice a range of expressiveness, pausing, pacing, and other aspects of fluency. A table read is the first time students sit down together to read their individual parts. Reading pedagogy refers to this initial practice session as the first repeated reading; I prefer the term "table read" as that is what professional theater people call it the first time actors sit down to read their parts. (And it sounds more fun, too!) Enjoy this brief clip that demonstrates choral-reading: Have you been following our Reader's Theater blog series? In case you missed it, here are the previous...
Read More Post a comment (1)In my last blog, I introduced Day One from a Five-Day Lesson Plan in Reader’s Theater. During this blog, I would like to focus on Day Two. As I mentioned previously, Day Two focuses on echo-reading. During echo-reading the teacher reads the script out loud, again, stopping after each time a character speaks. I call this an exchange: It can be a one-word response to a few-sentence monologue. The students repeat each exchange, hopefully mimicking (echoing) the dramatic expression, etc. Day Two in a Reader’s Theater lesson can also include opportunity to focus on other parts of the script. Pointing out any stage directions...
Read More Post a comment (1)As I have discussed previously, the “secret” to reader’s theater success as a reading strategy is that it gets students reading—and rereading—willingly. At Benchmark Education Company, we advocate for a five-day lesson plan with Reader’s Theater. Using one Reader's Theater script during the daily literacy block over the course of a week gives students multiple opportunities to read and reread the same material, with a specific purpose. These multiple reading opportunities can, and should, take different approaches, which helps keep the students engaged and focused, while effectively developing their reading fluency. For the next few entries, I will discuss five different reading...
Read More Post a comment (0)After reading this title you might be thinking: "punctuation" and "engaging" in the same sentence? Think about it: Punctuation, after all, is really just one way that readers and writers control the pace of a text. Periods, commas, semicolons, and especially those specialty punctuation marks ellipsis and em-dash all denote a specific amount of time in which the reader pauses. How these punctuation marks differ (and the pause-time that corresponds to each) is best understood through the rhythms and cadences of natural speech, i.e., dialogue. And what reading format is exclusively dialogue? Reader’s Theater! Allow me to demonstrate how you can use...
Read More Post a comment (9)Here is a typical scenario when it comes to using Reader’s Theater in the elementary school classroom: It’s Friday afternoon, your students are restless, and you are working with one particular reading group on a strategy they haven’t quite grasped. What to do with your other reading groups? Give them Reader’s Theater scripts and let them have fun while they practice reading, rereading, and building fluency skills. Win-win, right? Well, yes; but there are so many more ways to “keep winning” with Reader’s Theater throughout the week. Which is not to say it ISN’T a fine Friday afternoon activity; it’s just that...
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