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1. Journal of Research in Childhood Education
2009, Vol. 23, No. 4
Copyright 2009 by the Association for
Childhood Education International
0256-8543/09
489
Early childhood educators commonly teach
all subjects to their students, including
math, science, and the arts. However, not
all teachers are trained in the variety of
subjects they teach. Each subject has its
unique essential forms of cognition and dis-
ciplines (Eland, 1990). Drama education is
no exception, in that the discipline of drama
education consists of extensive specialized
knowledge and holds its own ways of know-
ing. A drama specialist is assumed to have
special knowledge and experience in the ield
of drama that classroom teachers (general-
ists) may not possess, and as a result of this
knowledge, can teach drama in a different
way.
In this educational context, this research
explores what a drama specialist teaches
and how she teaches it at a private school
in a metropolitan area. I highlight the
structure and content of the specialist’s
drama lessons and her specialized knowl-
edge that are not found in the general early
childhood classroom teachers’ practices,
aiming to understand what early childhood
educators can learn from a specialist. Thus,
although the main purpose of this study is
not a comparison between a drama specialist
and general classroom teachers, classroom
teachers’ methods of teaching drama is
juxtaposed to the specialist’s methods, in
order to highlight the specialist’s unique
teaching content and methods. I then
discuss how the drama specialist’s teaching
contributes to children’s learning, and make
suggestions for classroom teacher’s profes-
sional development through collaboration
with specialists to improve drama education
in early childhood programs.
Review of the Literature
Drama Education
Although the terms “drama education” and
“theater education” have been commonly
Abstract. This is a case study of drama education curriculum for young children
taught by a drama specialist. Speciically, to understand unique drama teaching
practices employed by a drama specialist, 9-week-long drama programs for one
kindergarten and two 1st-grade classes were observed and the drama specialist
was interviewed. Regular classroom activities taught by the classroom teachers
were also observed to understand drama taught by the non-specialists. The
indings indicate that the drama specialist’s curriculum highlights specialized
drama techniques and knowledge that the classroom teachers do not address in
their drama activities. Within a well-deined structure of a lesson composed of
warm-up, main activity, and ending segments, children’s kinesthetic exploration
and representation, as well as expressivity, are emphasized. How the drama
specialist’s teaching content and methods contribute to children’s learning and
what is needed for staff development to improve drama education are discussed.
Su Jeong Wee
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
A Case Study of Drama Education Curriculum for
Young Children in Early Childhood Programs
Note:
Su Jeong Wee is ?? University of Illinois at
Urbana-Champaign.

2. WEE
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used interchangeably, there is a technical
difference between them. Theater education
deals with an actor’s formal performance
in front of an audience, whereas drama
education focuses on participants’ process
of exploration and meaning-making (Schon-
mann, 2000).
The definition of drama varies among
scholars, and its curriculum is different
depending on the instructional goals, teach-
ers’ philosophies, cultural and institutional
contexts, and other elements. Types of
drama activities also vary, including extra-
curricular activities in school musicals and
promotional events; in drama clubs, speech
training, self-expression, emotional develop-
ment and conidence building; in the early
childhood play corners; and as a part of syl-
labi in English classes (O’Toole & O’Mara,
2007). Among these diverse types of drama
activities and drama education, this research
focuses on an operational drama curriculum
taught by a drama specialist at a school.
Drama in the Curriculum
Dramaisusuallymarginalizedorabsentfrom
the curriculum (O’Toole & O’Mara, 2007) in
the current school climate that emphasizes
academic accountability. Even when the arts
are included in preschool and kindergarten
classrooms, it is primarily music and visual
arts, although it could be argued that drama
and dance are better suited to the physical
nature of early childhood learning (Cazden,
1981; Kolb, 1984). There is little time allot-
ted in the daily routine for drama in early
childhood education settings, due to the
pressure that many teachers feel to cover
too many materials in too little time (Jones
& Reynolds, 1992). Brown and Pleydell
(1999) argued that age-appropriate drama
experiences would not be guaranteed,
because most drama specialists have not
been trained to work with young children,
and early childhood classroom teachers have
few resources to provide quality drama ex-
periences to their students.
Regarding teachers’ qualiications to teach
drama, McCaslin (2006) stated that the
most important qualities are such personal
attributes as sympathetic leadership,
imagination, and respect for others’ ideas.
Having suficient knowledge, appreciation
of drama as an art form, and familiarity
with techniques are other invaluable assets
(McCaslin, 2006). Successful drama teach-
ers also guide, rather than direct, and are
able to work with others, considerate of oth-
ers’ opinions, and offer their own ideas. Also,
teachers need to invite children to create
and maintain the dramatic world, through
the use of open-ended questions, animated
expressions, and enthusiastic responses to
the children’s ideas (O’Neill, 1994). This
process involves the co-construction of an
emergent story that requires the teacher to
adopt various roles (e.g., motivator, guide,
and artist).
Iwillconsidertheseteachers’qualiications
in teaching drama when examining the
drama specialist’s and the classroom
teachers’ drama instructions.
Method
Case Study Approach
This research is a case study of drama
education conducted in natural settings,
which include a regular classroom for
kindergarten drama and a special drama
classroom for 1st-grade drama. Car-
roll (1996) suggested that the case study
approach is useful in drama when the
researcher is interested in and deeply
involved in the structure, processes, and
outcomes of a project.
It its research on drama education well because
drama is a non-reproducible experience, by its
very nature as a negotiated group art form. The
participants within a drama education session
or series of sessions create a unique set of social
relationships that becomes a single unit of
experience capable of analysis and study. (Car-
roll, 1996, p. 77)
Hartield (1982) and Yin (1991) emphasized
that the complexity of interactions and the
whole creative sequence can be examined
best through a case study methodology.
Thus, the case study method is particu-

3. DRAmA EDuCAtIoN CuRRICulum
491
larly well suited for this research, because
it attempts to understand the complex
instructional processes and the interaction
between the teacher and the students in a
natural classroom and school context in an
open and lexible manner.
Participant
This study has one key participant—the
drama specialist, Ms. White (a pseudonym).
The drama specialist for this research was
chosen carefully, because she or he has to
have extensive knowledge and experience
in the ield of drama that regular classroom
teachers may not possess. One of my
colleagues, who is an art specialist and had
taken drama lessons from Ms. White for arts
interdisciplinary curriculum, introduced Ms.
White to me. When I contacted Ms. White,
explaining the purpose of this research and
asking her if she would like to participate,
she willingly agreed to participate, because
she said she wanted more educators to be
interested in drama education and to apply
it in their teaching.
Ms. White is a unique combination
of professional artist and experienced
educator. She holds a B.A. in English lit-
erature and an M.F.A in acting. She has
a total of 24 years of teaching experience,
ranging from teaching pre-kindergarten
children through adults (up to 35 years
old), and she has performed in the opera
and theater as a professional company
member. Based on her educational back-
ground and professional experience as an
actress and as a teacher, she is considered
to have specialized and sophisticated skills
and knowledge of the ield. She has been
a full time drama teacher at the Bailey
school (a pseudonym) for 12 years. Dur-
ing the period when this research was
conducted, Ms. White was teaching one
kindergarten class and two 1st-grade
classes for a 9-week drama program.
Research Site
The data for this study were collected at
the Bailey school, a private school located
in a large metropolitan city, during the
fall of 2006. Although I contacted Ms.
White as a research participant without
knowing where she worked, the research
site was considered carefully to make
sure it satisied several requirements. My
primary requirements were: 1) the school
should provide drama education to young
children in an early childhood program, and
2) drama education should be taught by a
specialist with rich knowledge and experi-
ence. In many cases, drama is not provided
to kindergarten children, which is my
research focus group, and when it is provid-
ed, it is often taught by an artist-in-resident
or classroom teachers, not by experienced
drama specialists. The Bailey school offers
drama education to kindergarten through
6th-grade students. Drama education
is taught by a drama specialist with an
extensive ield experience and educational
background in drama, as discussed in detail
in the participant section. In addition
to these two requirements, the Bailey
school has a rich educational environment,
including low student-to-teacher ratio and
various extra-curricular programs taught
by subject specialists. The ethnic com-
position of the students is 87% white, 7%
Asian, and 5% African American. Most of
the students are from families of middle to
upper-middle socioeconomic status.
Data Sources
Observations
One kindergarten and two 1st-grade drama
classes taught by Ms. White were observed
for 9 weeks. Kindergarten drama was ob-
served once a week, about 30 minutes per
lesson. Each 1st-grade drama class was
observed once a week, about 45-50 minutes
per lesson. In addition, I observed full days
of regular classroom hours led by the re-
spective classroom teachers to understand
how the classroom teachers taught drama
to their students and to highlight the
drama specialist’s teaching. The full-
day observations (8:30 a.m. - 1:30 p.m. for
kindergarten and 8:30 a.m. - 2:30 p.m. for
1st grade) were conducted once or twice a
week for 9 weeks.

4. WEE
492
Interviews
Formal and informal interviews were
conducted with Ms. White to gain a better
understanding of her drama curriculum and
her teaching practice as well as the school
structure and system. Formal interviews
in a semi-structured format were carried
out almost every week, 8 times for 9 weeks,
for about 50 minutes on average, in her
ofice or in the school cafeteria. Informal
interviews were conducted frequently, before
or after her classes, as well as during her
preparation time.
The initial areas of interview questions
with Ms. White included such topics as
her educational background and teaching
experiences, teaching philosophy,
expectations for the students’ progress in
her class, and specific drama activities
and practices. Follow-up interviews were
conducted twice after the drama program
was over. Each follow-up interview lasted
about an hour, centering around her vision
of drama education, long-term and short-
term goals, and her experience of teaching
kindergarten students for the irst time.
Analysis of Documents
In order to understand the school structure,
system, and mission, I also examined school
pamphletsandbrochures. Thenational,state,
and district drama and arts curriculum that
Ms. White referred to was analyzed in order
to understandher dramateaching in general.
The school curriculum map, the teachers’
teaching plans, letters to the parents, and
evaluation forms also were analyzed in order
to understand her speciic drama teaching.
Data Analysis
The data collection and analysis procedures
are based on the “interactive model” (Miles
& Huberman, 1994, p. 12), which refers to
the activity of data collecting and three
types of analysis processes—data deduction
(“the process of selecting, focusing, simpli-
fying, abstracting, and transforming data
that appears in written-up ield notes or
transcriptions” [Miles & Huberman, 1994, p.
10]; data display (“an organized, compressed
assembly of information that permits conclu-
sion drawing and action” [Miles & Huber-
man, 1994, p. 11]), and conclusion (drawing
and verifying conclusion)—that form an
interactive, cyclical process. The interactive
model was used for this research because
it can provide continuous, iterative process
of analysis for better qualitative validity
and credibility, compared to a single, linear
analysis process.
Data were collected through observations,
interviews, and related documents, as
described in the Data Sources section. To
facilitate making direct connections with
the research questions and concepts of
interest, the data codes (with broad but
concrete categories) were created through
the extensive reviews of existing research on
drama education and curriculum. Speciic
examples of the preset categories deined for
this research included drama knowledge,
techniques, skills, body movements, and
vocalization. The preset categories and
sub-categories and their corresponding
codes were developed, expanded on, reined,
and revised multiple times while the study
progressed and as new issues emerged.
While the inquiry was in progress, contact
summary forms were filled out immedi-
ately after completing each ield note, such
that the key points were summarized and
emerging themes were recognized to guide
planning for the next observation. In this
process, data reduction was conducted by
generating a conceptual level of coding sys-
tem (e.g., structure, relection, expressivity,
representation, and imagination).
Data display as well as drawing and
verifying conclusions included follow-ups
with the participants, with emphasis on
their interpretations of the data collected,
the triangulation of information, and the
construction of meaning from the phenomena
observed. Multipleinterimreportsweremade
to identify and develop issues, to audit what is
known, and to substantiate the known with
the data. Each interim paper was shared
with the researcher’s colleagues, who worked
in, studied, and were interested in early
childhood education or arts education.

5. DRAmA EDuCAtIoN CuRRICulum
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Findings
To answer what is taught and how drama
is taught to young children, three special
qualities were found in Ms. White’s drama
education curriculum. The irst section of
the indings discusses Ms. White’s well-
deined lesson structure, and the second
section is devoted to kinesthetic exploration
and representation. The last section centers
around expressiveness.
Structure of Drama Lessons
Ms. White’s drama lesson is composed
of warm-up, main activity, and closing
segments, whereas the classroom teachers
have only a main activity without a warm-
up or closing in their drama activities. Each
segment has its independent role and, at
the same time, interacts with each other as
a whole.
Students’ use of the body is different
between drama and regular academic
classes. Thatis,students’ body movementsin
their homeroom are minimal and primarily
instrumental, but those in drama are
exploratory and expressive. For example,
in the regular class, students walk in order
to reach their desired destination (e.g., the
blackboard, their desks); whereas in drama,
students walk to explore different qualities
in their movements (e.g., light, heavy, slow,
fast) or pretend to walk to express their
ideas. Drama lessons often begin with
warm-up exercises, which help make a
smooth transition from academic subjects.
Speciically, yoga is a part of the warm-up
in Ms. White’s drama instructions. The
following vignette describes the 1st-graders
practicing yoga during the third week of the
drama program.
Ms. White, in her stretchy, tight black
pants and short-sleeve T-shirt, announces
that the class will do yoga as a warm-up.
As the students spread out to have enough
space between each other and sit on the
loor cross-legged, Ms. White plays Deva
Premal’s recordings for yoga with slow and
calm sounds; the music is neutral and luid,
yet still rhythmic. Ms. White turns off the
light in front, but there is still a light at
the back. The room becomes dim, and the
students turn silent. Barefoot, she walks
quickly to the center of the rug and explains
in an unusually soft and composed voice.
Ms. White: We will start to pretend there is
strength in the air, and I will pretend to
pull out that strength, and then you can
feel it. Feel it at the back; there is a bump
right here.
The students try to sit straight, and some
students touch their spines. Ms. White
walks around and if students bend their
backs, she pulls their chests or pushes
their backs gently to help them sit straight.
Then, Ms. White moves into a breathing
exercise. She straightens her knees while
holding her body to the loor with her arms.
The students follow he lead; several raise
their heads to look at her.
Ms. White: Your face is on the ground. Now,
boys and girls! A mad cat. Take a deep
breath in. Watch me irst.
Ms. White rounds her back, making an
arch. She breathes out, making a “Shhhh”
sound, like air escaping from a balloon,
and her arched back goes lat.
Ms. White: And then you breathe in with
your nose. And stick your tongue out,
because you are a doggy now.
Ms. White puffs and blows repeatedly.
The students bend their backs, pufing
and blowing.
Ms. White: Nice job! Eyes up, please. Here
is some work. Watch before you move.
Your one hand lies out, and the other hand
lies out and reaches to the loor. Let’s try
again. It’s a child’s pose. Your hand is
lying out, and the other is lying out, and
take a deep breath in and reach and put
your forehead on the loor. It’s like you
wrap your hands around your knees. You
look like a little, tiny baby. Nice job, boys
and girls.

6. WEE
494
While yoga is typically not considered a
part of traditional drama education, it has
basic and repeated motions shared in com-
mon with other warm-up exercises. Yoga
also possesses its unique features, especial-
ly its mind-body connection. While making
repeated and slow motions and breathing,
Ms. White encourages the students to pay
attention to how their bodies work and what
their bodies can do. During yoga, while in a
meditative atmosphere, the students concen-
trate on their movements without making
any unnecessary sound. Afterwards, the
students are clearly calm and relaxed. Af-
ter the basic, short, and repeated warm-up
movements, the students are mentally and
physically ready for the drama experience.
Ms. White’s main segment for young
children is largely composed of storytelling/
story making and acting it out. In par-
ticular, a well-deined connection between
drama concepts and practice is present in
the main segment. Students learn about
the structure (e.g., beginning, middle, and
ending) and the elements of a dramatic
story (e.g., setting, characters, conlict, plot,
and background) and different genres of
literature (e.g., fable vs. fairy tale). They are
also encouraged to apply specialized drama
vocabulary and techniques they learned in
their acting. Basic skills are emphasized
for clear communication between the actors
and the audience. In addition, students’
exploration and representation of their
ideas, as well as expression of feelings, are
commonly practiced, which will be explored
more in detail in the following sections.
The closing segment mainly constitutes
students’ suggestions or comments on their
activities in an open format. The following
vignette presents a closing session in
kindergarten drama.
Ms. White reads A Rose’s Walk and the
children pretend to be chickens walking
around the classroom.
Ms. White: OK, boys and girls! Before we
end the drama today, it’s very important
for me to hear any questions or things that
you really like today or suggestions that
you have.
Adam: I like to pretend to be a chicken.
Molly: I like the story.
Ms. White: Anything else?
Tess: I like the story.
Ms. White: Before we end, can we do a
criss-cross apple sauce? I will show you
something I like to do when I am tired
and can’t think about what to do, maybe
I feel crabby.
Bryan Let’s go to sleep!
Ms. White: Well, I can’t go to sleep but I close
my eyes, and think about what to do.
Adam Meditate!
Ms. White: Well, kind of. I get quiet. Close
your eyes and put your hands on your
knees, and take three breaths. I will open
my eyes because I want you to be safe.
Sit up, nice and tall. Take a deep breath
in and let it out (repeating three times).
Turn yourself around and look at your
teacher. She is going to tell you something
important.
All the students look at Ms. Anderson (the
regular classroom teacher) silently. Ms.
Anderson talks about the plants that they
planted last week and what they are going
to do during free-choice time.
Guided by Ms. White’s questions, students
answer and relect on what they did, what
they liked the most, or what was the most
interesting to them during the activities.
They mostly list the names of activities they
did or briely describe their experiences and
preferences, but not in depth. Although
connection with students’ experiences and
expression of personal opinions or emotions
are scarce, verbalization about what they
did during relection helps them transform
their kinesthetic experiences into concrete
verbal experiences.
Similar to warm-up, Ms. White’s closing
provides the students with a smooth
transition from drama session to the sub-
sequent session. The opening and closing
of the drama session serve to separate the
fantasy of the drama from the reality of

7. DRAmA EDuCAtIoN CuRRICulum
495
the classroom (Brown & Pleydell, 1999). It
creates a boundary around the event and
enables students to return to the world
of the classroom. Thus, from a technical
standpoint, by wrapping up the lesson,
closing gives the students a signal that a
drama session is over and prepares them
to move onto the next activity.
Kinesthetic Exploration and
Representation
Students’ body movements in Ms.
White’s drama session are explorative
and representative, particularly during
pantomime activities. Pantomime is a
typical primary activity for Ms. White’s
young students. Pantomime is deined as
acting out without words (Rosenberg, 1987),
and inherently it emphasizes the use of
the body more than words. The following
vignette shows a pantomime practice with
the 1st-grade students.
After a brief explanation of pantomime
and improvisation, Ms. White announces
that they will act out The Lion and the
Mouse without words. She then starts
pretending to be a lion.
Ms. White: OK, tell me about how the lion
is different from a person.
The students answer that a lion has
whiskers, furs, and a black nose, and
that it is an animal. The students and
Ms. White continue to talk about the
differences between a lion and a human.
After comparing a lion with a human, Ms.
White asks a question.
Ms. White: Do you know a slow motion? Can
you show me a slow motion?
Sophie stands up and walks slowly, raising
her legs up higher than usual and down
slowly. Sophie walks forward until she
reaches the table at the corner.
Ms. White: Thank you, Sophie. That is a
very nice slow motion!
Ms. White stands up and asks children to
ind an empty spot for pantomime.
Ms. White: Boys and girls, it’s time to
become a lion. How are they different?
They have fur and whiskers, claws. Show
me. You are a big, golden lion. Show me
a soft and sleeping-on-the-grass lion.
The students lie down on the loor. Some
face the loor, and others face the side.
Some stretch their arms and legs, while
others crouch down.
Ms. White: Stretch your beautiful golden
legs. Slo-o-o-o-w motion. Pat your
stomachs quiet. You head through the
jungle. Keep going.
Following Ms. White’s narration, the
students slowly get up and stretch their
bodies, raising their hands.
Ms. White: Show me how a lion moves.
The students crawl around the room in
slow motion.
Ms. White: Stand up for hunting. Are you
ready? Stand up? What do you see?
Justin: A tiny rabbit.
Ms. White: You grasp the tiny rabbit. You
bite juicy, red meat. You throw it. You
toss it to the sun.
The students stretch their bodies by rais-
ing their hands and yawning. They bend
their bodies and crawl around, using their
arms and legs. When grasping the tiny
animal, students change their facial ex-
pression to a more furious one and pretend
to snatch it swiftly.
Ms. White: You are so thirsty after your
dinner. You walk slowly to the lake and
drink water. I want to hear your big lion
roar! Stand up and say, “I am the king
of the jungle!” One more time!
Following Ms. White’s narration in her

8. WEE
496
magniicent voice, the students stand up
and roar in a loud voice, raising both arms
in the air.
The way that Ms. White frames the
activity influences students’ expression
and kinesthetic exploration. Her strategies
include students’ brainstorming about
characteristics of a character in a story,
observation of others’ movements, and
verbalization of their observations prior to
acting. These practices provide students a
chance to think about how to express the
character and perceive subtle differences
in the actor’s movements and expressions.
Then, during pantomime activities, Ms.
White narrates with a wide range of
kinesthetic vocabulary (e.g., “stretch,” “pat,”
“grasp,” and “crawl”). The combination
of movements with vocabulary helps the
students to be more conscious of their
own movements during exploration. In
addition, her narrative—with its dramatic
changes in the speed, volume, and pitch of
her voice—models the students’ ideas and
facilitates their use of imagination. Ms.
White’s encouragement of students’ using
slow motion during pantomime helps them
attend to details and pay attention to their
movements. With Ms. White’s systematic
guidance, students’ movements are not
random actions, but rather represent a state
of consciousness involving full engagement
and awareness. During an interview, Ms.
White emphasized the importance of the
body movements for the young children:
I think using the body more than the word is
what I stress, especially when students are
young, because it’s more universal for the
children. If you take the word away, children
are open and explore more freely. It feels good
and fun. And then in 2nd grade, I add more
words, more narrations, and captions and
subtitles to my lesson. So words kind of melt
with the body.
Ms. White believed that young students
could be more creative and free without
the spoken language. For example, when
the 1st-graders were asked to represent
a “lake” with their bodies, they showed
different ideas: one child lay down on the
loor; another waved his hands; and others
lightly rocked sideways or back and forth.
The body became an expressive drama
medium for telling the story and expressing
the characters’ emotions. Thus, Ms. White
practiced until the young children had
built up a physical vocabulary and felt
comfortable in expressing their ideas with
the body. She then gradually increased the
use of words in her lessons.
Expressivity
Often, the students are asked to express
basic feelings, such as sadness, happiness,
frustration, or embarrassment, with
their bodies and faces while acting out
a story. What the students practice is
not self-expression, which is defined as
expressing one’s inner feelings. Rather,
they are encouraged to express a character’s
emotions and feelings according to the situ-
ation of the story. The following scenario
demonstrates the kindergarten students’
activity that expressed a character’s emo-
tions in a story.
Ms. White, sitting on a chair in front, reads
The Dancing Camel to 13 kindergartners
seated on the rug.
Ms. White: How did the camel feel when her
friends told her she is not a good dancer
and lumpy and bumpy?
Maria: (sitting in front) “She was sad.”
Bryan: (frowning, answers in his husky
and frustrated voice) “She didn’t know
what to do!”
Ms. White: She didn’t know what to do, but
she made a decision, didn’t she? What
did she decide?
Bryan: She danced all by herself.
Ms. White: Did it make her happy?
Bryan: No!
Ms. White: Really? That’s not the story
that I heard. It may be sad because she
decided on dancing all by herself. It’s
okay, even though you heard the story

9. DRAmA EDuCAtIoN CuRRICulum
497
differently. You know what? Let’s do a
ballet. Everybody stands up. Let’s do a
dance around the room. Are you ready?
The students move their bodies to the soft,
slow music, tiptoeing and turning around
with their arms rounded upward. After a
couple of minutes, Ms. White starts retell-
ing The Dancing Camel story, while the
students play and dance along.
Ms. White: This is a story about a dancing
camel. One day, she decided she is going to
have a concert for her friends. Show me her
friends’ faces.
The students stand still in their spots and
make faces that seem to be anticipating
something, with a light smile on their
lips.
Ms. White: They must be curious, right?
Some students stare at an empty space,
while others widen their eyes.
Ms. White: Okay, so she began to dance for
her friends. “She jumps, she turns, and
she skips.” And freeze. “She looked at her
friends’ faces after she took the beautiful
bow.” Her beautiful bow?
The students take a big bow from the waist.
Some of the girls join their hands, put them
over their tummies, and gently bow.
Ms. White: Oh, that’s so nice. You show her
friends’ faces. Look!
Most of the students frown with folding
their arms.
Ms. White: Oh my! You are really telling a
story. What does she look like?
Some of the students look down to the loor
with glum faces.
Presented in the above vignette, Ms.
White’s special guidance helps promote the
students’ expressivity. Prior to acting, she
asks questions or leads a discussion about
how the character feels. While the students
are acting, she invites them to interpret the
situated feelings of the character in the story
by demanding their personal involvement
with imagination. With Ms. White’s
encouragement to use their imagination
and connect their experiences, the students
elaborate their expressions of feelings. They
usually demonstrate mimetic and conven-
tional modes of representation by describing
surface features of the character they employ
(e.g., smiles for happiness, frowns for sad-
ness). However, sometimes they attend to
details, moving slowly and deliberately, in
the expressive mode.
To young children, Ms. White barely
addresses how to express these feeling in a
more sophisticated way, which could have
been achieved by teaching drama acting
skills or techniques. During an interview,
Ms. White reported that she emphasizes
students’ relections on and interpretations
of their own experiences as being more
meaningful than expressing emotions using
drama techniques or skills. She believes
without relection, the students’ understand-
ing and expression of feelings might remain
supericial. Thus, exploration and relection
can contribute to the students’ diverse and
expressive movements as well as building
kinesthetic awareness.
Discussion
Ms. White, with her rich education back-
ground and professional experience, is con-
sidered an insider from the ield of drama.
As an insider, what special qualities does
she possess that general teachers (who may
be categorized as “outsiders” to drama) most
likely do not? What unique drama activities
does she provide and how does she practice
them? What can we, as classroom teach-
ers and outsiders of the drama ield, learn
from Ms. White? In answering these ques-
tions, the structure and content of a drama
specialist’s curriculum, and her teaching
techniques and skills, as well as specialized
knowledge of drama are examined more

10. WEE
498
closely. I will explore here what and how Ms.
White teaches differently from classroom
teachers and what her teachings contribute
to students’ educational experiences.
Having structured segments in Ms.
White’s drama lesson is different from the
classroom teachers’ drama activities, which
consist of only a main activity without
warm-up or closing. How teachers frame
the lesson is known to inluence students’
experience. Speciically, having structure in
lessons helps make the students’ experiences
systematic and organized (Stinson, 2002) as
well as helping students predict the low of
the lesson. That is, the ixed structure be-
comes a routine for children and helps them
feel secure in the learning environment and
organize their experiences systematically.
Another issue addressed is the body and its
movements. Moving the body expressively is
generally not encouraged in school; instead,
academic subjects and cognitive development
are highlighted (Bresler, 2002). However,
drama for young children in an early child-
hood program is an exception, as it places
the body and its movements at the center.
The body is both a subject and an object
and must exist in speciic contexts and in
speciic relation to others (Grumet, 2003). In
drama, students can choose how they move
and what they wish to express, and their
thinking is encouraged to be realized within
the capacities of moving their body. In order
to understand the capacities of the body in
drama education, I will use Osmond’s clas-
siication of “the body as knower” and “the
body as doer” in drama education (Osmond,
2007, p. 1113).
First, regarding the body as knower, dra-
ma education invites a focus upon the body
to act its knowing, to call up in every action
what a body knows (Osmond, 2007). The
concept of body as knower is prevalent in Ms.
Wilson’s pantomime activities. Speciically,
when the students pretend to get ready to
go to school in pantomime, they recall what
they do every morning and represent it with
the body. Each student expresses different
activities, including brushing their teeth,
eating breakfast, packing school bags, and
kissing and waving goodbye to their parents.
What we know is an accumulation of sensory
experiences that bring us to that knowing
as our bodies are developed and shaped by
those experiences that mold it. Grumet
(1988) claimed that all knowledge is ulti-
mately body knowledge, even the knowing
that seems rooted exclusively in language.
Next, the body as doer means that the
body does what it knows by making meaning
the grounds for action in drama education.
When the students pretend to be a lion or a
mouse, their initial expressions are usually
conventional and mimetic. However, as
they are guided by the teacher’s questions
and comments, the students’ knowledge
and ideas about the topic are revealed with
more subtle and detailed expressions. The
introduction of pedagogy that uses drama
into a communal act makes the body as
knower the central igure in the sharing
and the negotiating of meaning, and the
“body-knowers” become “body-doers.” Do-
ing is a necessary consequence of knowing;
it is the action and relection of people upon
their world in order to transform it (Freire,
1972). The relationship between the body as
knower and the body as doer can be achieved
by concentration and memory of emotion
before dramatic action, thus integrating
lived experience naturally (Boleslavsky,
1949). The body must irst be understood
as a site of knowledge that is speciic to the
lived experience of each individual.
Since different forms of representation
develop different skills, the students need
to be provided with multiple choices of forms
of representation to develop diverse skills
(Fyfe, 1994). Representing students’ ideas
in various forms, including visual, verbal,
numerical, and auditory, increases the re-
sources available to the student for making
meaning. When resources are rich, the num-
ber of avenues for learning expands. Repre-
sentational media (mostly used in drawings
in Reggio Emilia schools) is known to deepen
the children’s understanding of a theme or a
concept (Forman, 1994). The teachers and
artists actively work with the children to
help them see many possible modes of corre-

11. DRAmA EDuCAtIoN CuRRICulum
499
spondence between them. Like drawing, the
student’s body and its movements are tools
for expressing what she knows and what
she feels. In drama, the body itself is the
medium. The substance of body is molded
through gesture, voice, motion, and pace in
the doing of what is known.
The last issue explored in this section is
an emotional aspect in drama education.
At schools where academics and intellec-
tual growth are generally emphasized, the
emotional aspect of children has too often
been ignored. Furthermore, there has been
a lack of invitation for the students to com-
municate feelings through artistic means
(Bresler, 1998). Although the importance
of expressivity has been highlighted in the
arts education literature as well as in state
goals, expressivity has been rarely a part of
the operational curriculum. Bolton (1977)
suggested that one of the signiicant char-
acteristics of drama is a special quality of
feeling along with a special sense of time and
quality of meaning. That is, drama explores
situated feelings.
Ms. White’s guidance of the students’
interpretation of a character’s feelings, by
having them relect their own experiences,
helps them elaborate their expressions in a
more detailed manner. In order to have a
feeling, one must be able to distinguish one
state of being from another (Eisner, 1982),
and have the requisite imagination and cog-
nitive thinking skills to perceive and articu-
late the ideas of the feelings (Shusterman,
2004). Thus, relection on and connection
with students’ own experiences by perceiv-
ing through their senses and imagination
enables them to be expressive.
Implications for Drama Education
for Young Children
Drama learning experiences for children
are among the most highly praised but the
least practiced of learning experiences in
schools (Dillon, 1988). Even when early
childhood classroom teachers incorporate
drama activities in their classrooms, the way
in which they teach has distinct features
compared to that of the drama specialist.
In this research, the drama specialist
conveys drama knowledge and techniques
and highlights children’s kinesthetic rep-
resentation and expressiveness within a
well-deined structure of the lesson. By
contrast, the classroom teachers frequently
used close-ended questions and prescribed
movements without a structure in their
drama activities. Other researchers (e.g.,
Flynn, 1997; Ross, 1989; Stewig, 1984) also
have pointed out classroom teachers’ lack
of professional development experiences
in drama and insuficient preparation for
drama teaching. Gabb (1994) stated that a
dichotomous framework clearly delineates
between drama specialists’ artistic, in-
formed endeavors and classroom teachers’
unsatisfactory efforts and techniques.
In practice, inservice teachers are typically
provided one-time drama workshops, which
are structured as a pre-packaged lecture and
demonstration without a close connection
to classroom practice or substantial follow-
up. Consequently, teachers’ desires to meet
complicated organizational demands and
diverse students’ needs and interests can
be easily overlooked (Hargreaves & Fullan,
1992). However, in order for classroom
teachers to use drama in their classrooms,
a firm foundation in drama skills and
techniques, as well as in the art form, should
be provided such that the teacher is able to
apply them to address diverse needs in the
classroom and use it as an important part
of her teaching repertoire.
Yaffe (1989) argued that strong
staff development is essential through
collaboration between the drama specialist
and classroom teachers to move from skills
to applications in the ield of drama. Es-
pecially considering the current school
climate, which greatly emphasizes aca-
demic accountability, drama education
integrated with core subjects is strongly
recommended to provide high-quality drama
education and to improve students’ academic
achievements. Thus, if a classroom teacher
provides curriculum content and a drama
specialist focuses drama sessions on those
required learning areas, they can explore

12. WEE
500
ways to merge drama teaching techniques
and curriculum demands together. It is not
necessary for teachers to have a background
or experience in drama to use drama in the
classroom, but it requires staff development
and a willingness to try something new
on the teachers’ part. Cooperation could
reinforce and increase the knowledge and
insight that individual teachers bring to
their work, especially when they are focused
on professional responsibility and the central
tasks of education.
(submitted 8/27/08; accepted 12/31/08)
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