2. CONTENTS
NO. CONTENTS PAGES
1. Definition of role-playing
2. Application of role-playing in classroom
3. The advantages of role-playing
4. The disadvantages of role-playing
5. Conclusion
6. Reference
4. Definitions
From the Wikipedia, Role-playing refers to the changing of one's behavior to assume a role
either unconsciously to fill a social role, or consciously to act out an adopted role. While
the Oxford English Dictionary offers a definition of role-playing as "the changing of one's
behavior to fulfill a social role", in the field of psychology, the term is used more loosely in four
senses:
To refer to the playing of roles generally such as in a theatre, or educational setting;
To refer to taking a role of an existing character or person and acting it out with a partner
taking someone else's role, often involving different genres of practice;
To refer to a wide range of games including role-playing video game, play-by-mail
games and more;
To refer specifically to role-playing games.[2]
There are numerous definitions of role-playing. The definition used for this study is from
Aronson and Carl smith who “described the role playing study as ‘an |as-if' experiment in which
the subject is asked to behave as if he [or she] were a particular person in a particular situation’
(1968, p. 26). This definition precisely describes what the participants of this study were asked to
do. From the dictionary role-play is defined as an exercise in which you pretend to be in a
particular situation, especially to help you learn a language or deal with problems
Role may be defined as the way one behaves in a given position and situation. In managerial
science, discrepancies in the identification role are referred to as “role conflict”—inconsistent
prescriptions held for a person by himself or by others. Role playing as a teaching methodology
is the conscious acting out and discussion of the role in a group. In the classroom a problem
situation is briefly acted out so that the individual student can identify with the characters. The
learners or participants can act out the assigned roles in order to explore the scenario, apply skills
(maybe communication, negotiation, debate etc.), experience the scenario from another view
point, evoke and understand emotions that maybe alien to them. It helps to make sense of theory
and gathers together the concepts into a practical experience.
6. THE METHOD TO APPLY ROLE PLAYING IN CLASSROOM
1) Define Objectives
What topics do you want the exercise to cover?
How much time do you and your class have to work on it?
What do you expect of your students: research, reports, presentations?
Do you want the students role-playing separately or together?
Do you want to include a challenge or conflict element?
2) Choose Context & Roles
In order to prepare for the exercise:
Decide on a problem related to the chosen topic(s) of study and a setting for the
characters. It is a good idea to make the setting realistic, but not necessarily real.
Consider choosing and adapting material that other instructors have prepared.
-For problems and settings with lots of detail, have a look at examples in the
Starting Point Case Study Module. The module itself contains more information
about using cases to teach.
If the characters(s) used in the exercise are people, define his or her goals and
what happens if the character does not achieve them.
You should work out each character’s background information on the problem or,
better yet, directions on how to collect it through research. If possible, prepare
maps and data for your students to interpret as part of their background
information rather than the conclusions upon which they would ordinarily base
their decisions (especially if the characters are scientists).
7. 3) Introducing the Exercise
Engage the students in the scenario by describing the setting and the problem.
Provide them with the information you have already prepared about their
character(s): the goals and background information. It needs to be clear to the
student how committed a character is to his/her goals and why.
Determine how many of your students have done role-playing before and explain
how it will work for this exercise.
Outline your expectations of them as you would for any assignment and stress
what you expect them to learn in this lesson.
If there is an inquiry element, suggest a general strategy for research/problem
solving.
4) Student Preparation/Research
Even if there is no advance research assigned, students will need a few moments to look
over their characters and get into their roles for the exercise. There may also be additional
questions:
Why they are doing this in character? Why did you decide to make this a role-
playing exercise?
Students may have reservations about the character that they have been assigned
or about their motives. It is good for the instructor to find out about these before
the actual role-play. It can be very difficult for a student to begin researching an
issue from a perspective very different from their own because even apparently
objective data tends to be reinterpreted as support for pre-existing world-views.
If there is an inquiry component (i.e. student-led research), the students may need
help coming up with a research plan and finding resources.
8. 5) The Role-Play
Depending on the assignment, students could be writing papers or participating in
a Model-UN-style summit. For a presentation or interaction, props can liven up
the event, but are not worth a lot of effort as they are usually not important to the
educational goals of the project.
6) Concluding Discussion
Like any inquiry-based exercise, role-playing needs to be followed by a
debriefing for the students to define what they have learned and to reinforce it.
This can be handled in reflective essays, or a concluding paragraph at the end of
an individual written assignment, or in a class discussion. The instructor can take
this opportunity to ask the students if they learned the lessons defined before the
role-play began.
7) Assessment
Generally, grades are given for written projects associated with the role-play, but
presentations and even involvement in interactive exercises can be graded. Special
considerations for grading in role-playing exercises include:
Playing in-character
Working to further the character's goals
Making statements that reflect the character's perspective
In an interactive exercise, being constructive and courteous
For many assignments, being able to step back and look at the character's
situation and statements from the student's own perspective or from another
character's perspective.
8) Further Recommendations
How to Use Individual Role-Playing Projects
How to Use Interactive Role-Playing Exercises
9. THE EXAMPLE OF USING ROLE MODEL IN CLASS SITUATION
Background Information
Mr. Johnson, a 6th grade Social Studies teacher, is presenting a series of lessons to his students
regarding World War II. Mr. Johnson is fixing to talk to his students about the unfair
imprisonment of Japanese Americans during this time period. He wants to do more than simply
present a lesson regarding this injustice. He really wants to get his students involved. He has
decided that role playing will be the best way to accomplish this feat.
Phase One: Define Objectives
In phase one Mr. Johnson wants to identify the problem and make it explicit. He also wants to
interpret the problem and explain how role playing works ((Joyce, Weil, & Calhoun, 2009).
Mr. Johnson: I am really happy to see that each of you remember some of the things we talked
about yesterday during our lesson about Pearl Harbor. Pearl Harbor was a devastating event in
our nation's history and it ultimately led to our involvement in World War II. Tommy pointed out
that it was the Japanese that bombed us during World War II. Do you guys that think that
anything should have been done to the Japanese living in America during this time?
Pupil: I do not think that anything should have been done.
Mr. Johnson: Why not?
Pupil: Because most of them did nothing wrong.
10. Mr. Johnson: Okay, that is a good point. Does anybody have a differing view point?
Pupil: I think they should have been put in jail just in case.
Mr. Johnson: Who knows? You could be right about that. Today, I want to take a deeper look at
this story. We are going to do a role play to learn more about this situation. A role play is when
you take on the responsibilities and actions of someone else.
Phase Two: Choose Context & Roles
In order to prepare for the exercise
In phase two Mr. Johnson will analyze the roles to be played and select role players. With the
help of his students, Mr. Johnson will describe what he is looking for in each role. This might
include a description of how certain people should feel or what actions they might carry out in a
role. Mr. Johnson will then ask for volunteers. (Joyce et al., 2009).
Mr. Johnson: I will need five role players today. One of you will be the president of the United
States and the rest of you will be the president's team. In other words, you help the president
make decisions. There will be four advisors to the president. Two advisors will argue for the
imprisonment of Japanese Americans after Pearl Harbor and the other two advisors will argue
against imprisonment of Japanese Americans. What might be one argument against
imprisonment?
Pupil: People cannot go to jail if they did nothing wrong.
11. Mr. Johnson: Good. That could be one argument. Do I have two volunteers who would like to
argue against imprisonment?
John: I will.
Mr. Johnson: Okay, thank you John.
Jay: I will too.
Mr. Johnson: Okay, great. Who wants to be president? I saw Alison raise her hand first so she is
president. Who wants to argue for imprisonment?
Jason and Sara: I do.
Mr. Johnson: Great, all of our roles are filled now.
Phase Three: Introducing the Exercise
Engage the students in the scenario by describing the setting and the problem
12. The teacher's main responsibility in stage three is setting the stage. The goal is to determine
where the scene is going to take place but the characters do not actually begin their dialogue
(Joyce et al., 2009).
Mr. Johnson: Alright Alison, you are president. Where is thing going to take place?
Alison: How about the White House?
Mr. Johnson: That sounds good too me. Are you in the Oval Office or are you somewhere else?
Alison: How about we are a bunker below the White House?
Mr. Johnson: Good idea. Let's put a table at the front of the classroom and then put chairs around
it so it can look like you guys are having a meeting.
Phase Four: Student Preparation/Research
In phase four Mr. Johnson will assign observation duties and explain to the observers what they
need to look for. It is vital that Mr. Johnson get each observer involved in the role play (Joyce et
al., 2009).
13. Mr. Johnson: Now the rest of your will be observing this role play. This is very important. I need
everybody not doing the role play to get in groups of three (students get in groups). I want the
first group to evaluate how real the role play feels. I want the second group to evaluate which
advisor makes the strongest argument. I want the third group to listen closely and see if any
player leaves anything out of the role play that should be there.
Phase Five: The Role-Play
In phase five the role play will be enacted. The teacher needs to assume up front that this may
not go smoothly and some players may need to be coached (Joyce et al., 2009).
Mr. Johnson: Alright, everybody take your positions and let’s get this thing started. Alison will
get us started off by asking her team what she should do about Japanese Americans after Pearl
Harbor.
Alison: (to her team) I have a very hard decision to make. Many of our citizens are scared to
death after what happened at Pearl Harbor. I am having a hard time trying to determine if I
should put Japanese citizens in prisons or do nothing about the situation.
John: Mr. President, the Japanese living in America have done nothing wrong. Why should we
punish them for no reason?
Jason: Nothing wrong. It may have been their family members who bombed us.
Jay: We have no way of knowing that.
14. Sara: Who cares if we have no way of knowing it. Do we want to take a chance on something
like this happening over here?
Alison: All of you raise good points but I still do not have an answer.
Jay: You cannot put people in jail for no reason.
Sara: You can if you think they might commit crimes.
Alison: I think I agree with Sara and Jason. I do not want to take any chance. I am going to start
putting them in prison. (Mr. Johnson has advised Alison to say this)
Phase Six: Concluding Discussion
In phase six Mr. Johnson will review what took place in the role play and discuss the major focus
of the events. He will also begin to develop the next reenactment (Joyce et al., 2009).
Mr. Johnson: Before moving on I want to ask my groups what they thought about this role play.
Group One: We felt like it was pretty real.
Group Two: We felt like Jay make a really good argument and Sara did too.
Group Three: We felt like the role players should have tried to find a middle ground.
15. Mr. Johnson: Okay role players. I want you to consider all these comments as we move forward.
Phase Seven: Assessment
In phase seven the teacher may feel that roles should be revised. Observers may become role
players or role players and observers may be asked to take on new roles within their groups. It is
vital that during the reenactment the teacher encourage new behaviors and new outcomes. No
actual dialogue will be specified here since reenactments may take place as many times as
possible (Joyce et al., 2009).
Phase Eight: Further Recommendations
This is basically a repeat of phase six. The difference is that the discussion and evaluation will
take into consideration what is hopefully new behaviors that were portrayed in phase seven
(Joyce et al., 2009).
The teacher is going to relate the scenario to a real experience and/or current event. General
principles of behavior should also be explored at this time (Joyce et al., 2009). For our situation
Mr. Johnson may relate the treatment of Japanese Americans to the treatment of Americans of
Middle Eastern descent since 9/11. He can ask students if they see any comparisons in the two
ways these groups of people were treated. He may also wish to do a role play with the president
and his advisors after 9/11 and discuss the possibility of imprisoning Americans of Middle
Eastern descent after 9/11 so that students can see that historical events do have a way of
repeating themselves.
17. Role playing seems to be an educational tool favored by students and instructors alike.
Students or trainees welcome role playing because this activity brings variations, movement, and
most likely, simulated life experience into the classroom or training session. Teachers, trainers or
supervisors favor role playing as a handy means of enlivening the learning content; in particular,
this model brings forth detailed and concrete study materials which are more difficult to pinpoint
by the way of lecture and discussion (Land, 1987). Yet role playing at one point in the seventies
had become so overused that students often loathed it; almost all classroom or training sessions
used this technique. Teachers conceived of it as a safe teaching device because role playing
appeared to be a partial answer to the students’ demands for more personal involvement in their
learning experience. Furthermore, hierarchical levels in the classroom tended to be partially
obliterated by this teaching method and thereby were in tune with the times. Role playing had its
vogue.
Currently, role playing is used for its promise to engage learner and instructor alike in a
specific learning experience. It can be employed for its rich transfer of learning potential to each
participant’s own learning repertoire (Crawley & Gerrand, 1981). Now, with role playing as an
educational device of choice rather than a politicized tool, it can be adopted and effectively
applied so long as the instructing persons are clear about the learning objectives (Maier, 1981,
1985). They need to assess the educational appropriateness of each role playing assignment or
simulated exercise.
Role playing as an effective training tool
The issue, as the writer sees it, is not to engage students, trainees, or supervisees in role
playing per se, but rather to assess what form of learning needs to be achieved, that is, role
playing for what objectives. Is it primarily for the participants’ skill acquisition (behavioral
competence development)? Is it basically to enhance the learners’ cognitive understanding
(information intake and intellectual grasp)? Or is it essentially to enrich the trainees’ affect
experience (their emotional awareness and enrichment)?
Each well-focused learning experience, be it primarily the behavioral, cognitive or
affective domain, will naturally also deal with, and potentially have an impact on, the other two
dimensions of learning; they are intimately related. Nevertheless, for the purpose of effective
18. learning and teaching, instructors have to understand that each of these three human processes
has its own distinct progression of development. (Acknowledgment, conceptualization and
research of these developmental processes are specifically presented in various publications. See
Ivey, 1986; Kegan, 1982; Maier, 1976,1988; and Schuster & Ashburn, 1986.) If we incorporate
the above perspective, the person responsible for the learning content and structure of instruction
has to decide at any particular juncture of learning whether the focus is essentially on having an
impact on a person’s emotional (affective) status, on enhancing each individual’s skills or on
expanding the person’s knowledge base (information and cognition). Role playing structures
would then be selected and devised accordingly.
Role playing for practice skill acquisition
Role playing geared essentially toward the participants’ capacities to expand their
practice skills and techniques demands that the instructor be aware that skills are to be central to
the participants’ learning. Moreover, an instructor has to sort out for him or herself which skills
must be learned first.
Once the skills or techniques to be practiced are firm in the instructor’s mind, she or he
has to specify a role playing situation where such skills are in demand. Let us say, for instance,
that the participants are to learn ways and means of handling children who are abruptly switching
activities because it is time for them to leave for school or some other inflexible time demand.
The participants are then challenged to set up for themselves a child or youth care group situation
where the youngsters are engaged in a variety of activities, none related to readiness for a school
deadline. The nature of such a situation is left entirely to the participants’ creativity, utilizing
their past experience to produce such a simulated situation. Learners are also challenged to
arrange the simulated practice situation within the available space, furniture and other props at
hand. (The instructor may provide them with props such as a bell, a visible clock, or whatever is
in order to enliven the forthcoming role playing situation.)
Prior to the actual role playing, the persons to advance their working skills are coached in
the behavior they should practice and acquire. In other words, the selection of practice situation
is left open to the participants; the interactions for the critical practice situation are closely
19. defined. This delineates the teaching/learning situation which has to be structured; moreover, the
actual behavior to be practiced may have to be learned beforehand. Role playing does not teach
new behaviors or techniques; it teaches their application. It is in the role play where worker and
client(s) face each other that the workers’ critical learning will take place.
Because practice skills are to be learned and not merely illustrated, the instructor or
supervisor has the task of modeling such differentiated skills not merely by description but also
by acting out the differentiated behaviors. The trainee is then asked to practice the skills within
the forthcoming role playing exercise. Important, too, is that the role playing situation be brief
with the focus upon the worker practicing new skills or techniques. The learning requires hands-
on quick practice rather than the extension of any scenario. The learner is immediately briefed
after each try and typically is requested to practice once again. The practice may include
suggestions for changes in his or her care work behavior or an important repeat of the handling
demonstrated by previous students. Effective practice behaviors are mastered by doing them, and
the learning is affirmed with the valid experience of having done so. The experience of one’s
own efficacy solidifies learning (Bandura, 1977).
In brief, when training in interventive behavior is the focus, the trying out, practice, and
refinement of such competence are in order with as little discussion as possible about the many
other situational issues that arise. A role playing of just a minute or so is most effective. The
trainer/educator must be immediately on hand to assist the learner in sharpening the skills to be
mastered. Rather than a generalized evaluation such as "you did well," specific comments on the
learner behavioral actions should be given. The actual satisfaction has to emerge not out of the
trainer’s evaluation but out of the practitioners’ satisfaction based on learning of their effective
interaction within the simulated situation, and subsequent experience of efficacy.
20. Role play for the enhancement of knowledge
When the learners are challenged to enhance their knowledge through the intake of
information and the expansion of their comprehension, role playing exercises can serve as a
powerful device.
Role playing and simulated practice have to be structured; however, quite differently
from the previous skill learning (Maier, 1976). The simulated situation should assist the learner
to understand, to assimilate, and to accommodate cognitively (Maier, 1988; Piaget, 1978). Such
cognitive processes have the best chance when the learners can be set somewhat apart from the
role playing scene in order to witness the actual events in a total context (Maier, 1976). For
instance, when caretakers try to comprehend the pivotal place they assume in their clients’ lives,
they need to witness the totality of the children’s requirements in relation to their caring adults,
and in particular to the subtle and minute worker-child interactions. Role playing for such a
purpose, then, requires that the learners be observers, outside but at the margin of the role-
playing situation as if in the front row of a gripping theatre scene.
Instructors would then structure the critical events, the roles to be played, and in
particular would clarify the finer points to be acted out in order to deal "naturally’ with the
learning content to be witnessed. The role players would subsequently then develop their own
scenario with the instructor only insisting that they weave in the learning points, so that these
occur in the dramatization. This segment demands at least five to ten minutes in order to provide
a reasonable portrayal of the critical material to be comprehended.
A discussion, which would follow, is basic to the learning endeavor, and must focus upon
that which has been observed in the role play and upon what meaning it has toward
comprehension. The objective is to assist trainees with a clearer and more comprehensive or
changed understanding in order to expand, or possibly to change their knowledge screen (Maier,
1985). The actual learners are the viewers. The role players, in contrast to other role playing
structures, are apt to be only marginal recipients of the learning situation.
21. Role playing for a change of affect
Role playing is probably best known for ascertaining feeling levels and possible
validation of emotional experiences. Such experiences can be rich learning events when they
actually relate to the desired educational objectives rather than serving merely as interesting or
emotionally charged occurrences. Affect (emotions) can be changed when participants
experience personally the emotions involved and the efficacy of a different framing of these
emotional energies.
For the focus upon role playing to deal with affect (emotional) processes it is essential
that the role playing and simulated experience are loosely set. The spontaneous interactions of
key role players within a defined context is intended to provide the critical experience. The
instructor, trainer or supervisor has to define specifically beforehand which roles are to be in the
center and which wellspecified circumstances are heeded (context). The learners will determine
their role selection and cast events on the basis of their own experience and intuitive projections.
This kind of role playing experience requires ample latitude in time, space and follow-up
discussion. The actual role playing segment demands at least ten minutes to afford role players
sufficient time to get into the required mood and emotion-evoking role interactions. Equally,
players need ample space to develop and act out their feelings with each other. The non-playing
(but hopefully deeply involved viewers and instructors) must be out of the play scene and
absolutely silent. Laughter and expressions of pain, disgust or whatever, have to be totally
controlled; otherwise role players may partially act in regard to the onlookers’ response.
After completion of the actual role playing, the onus is upon the central role players’
personal experience within the critical role playing events. The players’ discussion about their
affect experience is the essence rather than the onlookers’ observations. Again, time is needed to
get a firm hold on their affect experience, their power bases, and their desires to "tell it all." The
instructor or supervisor has to remain mindful that right after the key players’ powerful
interactions, the players’ experiences have to be identified and discussed. Observations of other
players in the simulation, or onlookers’ observations, including the instructor’s own, have to be
held back (however pertinent or insightful these might be). The focus is upon the ongoing feeling
processes and possible insights of the actors rather than on the astute wisdom (cognition) of the
22. viewing participants. This is true unless they themselves were so deeply drawn-in and involved
that they became partners within the scene. Subsequent deliberations remain centered upon
sorting out and coming to grips with the affective processes, on taking possible steps for creating
effective support and change and determining how such steps can be actualized (Ivey. 1986;
Kegan, 1982; Maier, 1976, 1978).
Before the latter role playing exercise can be terminated, role players as well as
onlooking participants, including the teaching person, all require sufficient opportunity to debrief
as an essential feature of the total exercise. In role playing with much emotional involvement
there are always the risks of stronger than usual personal experience, or misplaced feelings, or a
projection of feelings which belong only to the role and its context. Role playing in relation to
affect expression can be either a futile draining of energy or a powerful tool in learning about the
flow and impact of affect processes.
24. Leader not appreciating its essential nature
It is an improvisational procedure, and improvisation requires a feeling of relative safety.
This must be cultivated in a group, the teacher engaging the students in a "warming-up" process
in which they get to know each other in a more trusting fashion and become involved in the
theme to be learned. Learning how to warm up a class and how to keep the warm-up going is as
much a part of role playing as a surgeon's knowing how to prepare a patient for an operation.
Many people who have had unpleasant experiences with role playing in fact suffered
because the teacher hadn't warmed up the class or those assigned parts to their various roles.
Simply assigning roles, saying to one person, "You're the principal of a school," and to another,
"Okay, and you're a kid who was sent to the principal's office--go!" isn't enough information and
those thrown into this situation in that fashion will feel as if they'd been tossed into a pond and
told to learn to swim. The teacher as dramatic producer needs to talk to each of the players,
interview them "in role," drawing them out regarding their thoughts about associated aspects of
their role, gently involving them imaginatively in the situation.
Teachers gave into their own impulses to "play psychiatrist" and slip from dealing with the group
problem to explore some issu
Another problem with role playing arose when teachers gave into their own impulses to
"play psychiatrist" and slip from dealing with the group problem to explore some issue to
focusing on the real-life personal problems of a given individual. So, for example, if a girl was
having trouble in playing Queen Isabella to another child's "Columbus," giving in too easy to the
latter's entreaties instead of making him really sell his project, it would be inappropriate to shift
into an exploration of why that girl had problems with self-assertion. It's not much harder to
prevent these mistakes than to teach safety procedures for power tools in wood shop, but time
must be taken to explicitly address these issues and these lessons need to be periodically
repeated.
25. Assumtion that interpersonal skills are easier than technical skills
A third problem comes from the common tendency to assume that interpersonal skills are
easier than technical skills--though in fact they are even more difficult--and so people tend to
think they can engage in directing role playing before they've really achieved a level of bare
competence (much less mastery). It's like the way adolescents will say, "oh, yeah, I've got it
now" when they have only acquired the most superficial knowledge, whether it be in driving a
car or doing some household task. Well, sometimes teachers fail to appreciate the complexity of
a skill they're learning, and it's important to emphasize that directing role playing is about as
complex as learning how to deliver a baby. And it helps if the person doing the learning is also
trained in other ways.
The power of role playing is only harnessed when the role player receives expert feedback
Inexpert feedback or feedback from group members who are at the same level of
competence as the role player is often useless, and does not further learning. Unfortunately, most
role plays in training sessions are done in small groups, and most feedback given by other, less
than competent group members. The teacher or trainer will feel give up if they cannot give good
lesson to audience although the lesson session actually the first one.
Teacher do not consider the students background
Different student will have different intelligent. There are students that can get what is
taught in a short time and a few one are vice versa. This is very important situation that
teacherteacher often overlooked. While teachermay like role plays, many students who attend the
class actually hate them and feel exceedingly uncomfortable in roleplay situations. This does not
necessarily mean that people who hate them cannot benefit by them, but trainers need to consider
the tradeoffs between the use of role plays and the discomfort and anxiety they create.
Role playing of highly emotionally charged situations tends to be less effective in large groups
Since the role playing tends to take on the characteristic of acting performances, or, the
performance becomes too artificial and sounds funny. It's hard, for example, for learners to
pretend to be very angry without going over the top or starting to giggle. This is less of a concern
in therapeutic settings, but is a factor in teaching.
27. Role-play is a powerful and effective teaching method for children and adult and can be
adapted to deliver any learning objectives from simple to complex concepts. IT really lends well
to practice communication skills, debate complex ethical issues or explore attitudes and beliefs.
The success lies in the construction and delivery with careful facilitation.
Role-play is a great alternative to increase the understanding of the student as it is an
energizing activity and fun to do. Other than that, it allows the participants to contribute actively
in the activity. We knew that some of the students have different level of understanding in the
class. By using this method, the entire student can easily understand what their teacher wants to
give to them. Besides that, it is more time efficient and what the most important is, it delivers
complex concepts in a simple manner. So, the student does not have problem to understand the
situation given.
