Year 7 C1 The Chocolate Factory C2 Story Theatre C3 Scripts – Our Day Out C4 Shrek the Musical C5  Play Review  C6 Performing Arts – Joseph and the Amazing Technicolour Dreamcoat.

Year 8 C1 Runaways C2 Cats the Musical C3 Puppets C4 Stage Combat (Shakespeare) C5 Commedia Dell’arte  C6 Performing Arts. – musicals and exploration of art forms

Year 9 C1 Crime and Punishment C2 Frantic Assembly C3 Scripts – Kes  C4 Farce  C5 Jukebox Musicals C6 Play Review  C7 Macbeth

The drama course at key stage 3 provides students with the necessary knowledge and understanding to progress into Drama GCSE. It covers a wide range of skills and activities for students to become familiar with the subject content. Each key stage reflects the main assessment objectives of the GCSE course as well as the core knowledge of the subject as a whole.

Drama lessons are once a week in key stage 3. Within all three years we cover the same skills. This focus being Teamwork, Rehearsal, Performance and Evaluation. Each component of work will enable these schools to be embedded and part of the assessment and feedback. 

These procedural knowledge-based skills are the core fundamental skills that students develop in and progress throughout all three key stages. The intention being that students are exploring activities and tasks based on these four areas. These being transferable skills as well as an integral part of Drama. 

Each component of work covers a different topic, these will vary from exploring an issue to looking in depth at a theatre style or practitioner. The intention is for students to develop their core knowledge within the different areas through practical tasks and activities. Within these different components, students will gain knowledge of different drama techniques and conventions through practical exploration. These core skills will be developed and explored throughout all key stages with expectation that these are embedded and retained by the end of Y9. 

In each year there is at least one script exploration. Students will explore the fundamental use of a script with this being the basic knowledge within Y7 with progression of the effective use of a script and performance by the end of Y9. 

Students within each key stage also explore design elements such as lighting, sound and costume. The intention of this being part of the curriculum is that students can specialise in design as part of the GCSE curriculum. Students also develop the core knowledge of how to evidence and justify the designs, as well as exploring their symbolic significance within performance. 

Within in key stage 3, students develop written skills by completing reviews of live performances. This part of the curriculum lends itself to the written element of the subject and is assessed as an extended piece of writing. Within this, students will learn how to review by structuring a piece of writing ton reflect their opinion of live performance. The intention of this is for students to develop their skill of structuring a piece of writing in the form of ‘Point, Example, Explanation and Opinion (PEEO). 

Another intention of this part of the curriculum is for this disciplinary knowledge to be transferred to other subjects that require a similar technique. This also enables students to enrich their cultural capital, particularly those with disadvantaged backgrounds and those who have never been to a live theatre performance. 

Within each year group, students take part in team projects where they take on an individual responsibility and build up to a presentation on how they would put on their own productions or gaining core knowledge on theatre genres and styles. Students are required to use research skills, documenting evidence, and working collectively to produce an outcome which they will present to an audience. The clear intention of this part of the curriculum is for students to improve their independent learning skills as well as leadership and time management. Once again, the purpose of these skills is not only to gain core knowledge and show evidence of retention, but also to develop skills which they will take through to beyond the classroom and into the workplace. 

Finally, at the end of each year, students take part in a performing arts unit of work where they explore all three art forms (Music, Dance and Drama). The intention of this is for students to not only study the form at acting, but also choreographed movement and singing within a musical genre. Students start with the basic core knowledge and application in Y7 to creating their own musical scenes in Y9. This is a direct link to GCSE where students explore a musical in more depth. It also links to the Music curriculum (Performing Arts). 

GCSE Drama is guided towards the Eduqas specification. Students begin their C1 assessment in Y10 and will have completed this 40% by the end of Y10. This component is designed for students to develop devising and rehearsal skills within a group specialising in either acting or design. Their development throughout lessons is documented through responses and reviews set as starters and plenaries and written homework activities. These include understanding of chosen theatre style/practitioner and self-reflection. These activities are designed for students to gain core knowledge and application skills when they are eventually writing their Portfolio of Evidence and written self-evaluation of performance/design application at the end of the assessment.

Component 1

Learners will participate in the creation, development and performance of a piece of devised theatre using the techniques of an influential theatre practitioner or genre in response to a stimulus set by the exam board.

Students produce:

·         A realisation of their devised theatre

·         Portfolio of supporting evidence

·         An evaluation of the final performance or design.

Component 2

·         Students study two extracts from the same text

·         Students participate in one performance using the sections of text from both extracts.

Component 3

·         Written exam – Questions on a Set Text and Live Theatre Review.

Year 10 Autumn Term 1 – Script and drama skills exploration introduction. Autumn Term 2 Practitioner Exploration Spring Term 1 Text Exploration (C3) Spring Term 2 Begin Component 1 Summer Term 1 Component 1 (including mock exam) Summer Term 2 Component 1 (Including actual assessment) Evaluation of Component 1

Year 11 Autumn Term 1 C3 Text Exploration  Play Review Autumn Term 2 C2 – Script Performance (starts Nov) Spring Term 1 Component 2 Preparation (C2 Assessment Feb) Spring Term 2 C3 Text Exploration  Play Review Summer Term 1 Component 3 Exam Revision Summer Term 2 Component 3 Exam Revision