Essentials of Childrens Literature 3 Poetry and Plays Instructor: Presenter: 20978L020 Contents: 1.Section One: Poetry Poetry in the Classroom Choral Poetry.

Essentials of Children’s Literature3 Poetry and Plays

Instructor: 張湘君教授Presenter: 胡美英 20978L020 夜碩一

Contents:

1. Section One: PoetryPoetry in the Classroom Choral Poetry Students’ Reading and Writing Poems

2. Section Two: PlayDefinition and DescriptionEvaluation and Selection of PlaysHistorical Overview Of PlaysTypes of Plays

Choral Poetry

Interpreting and saying a poem

together

Saying and hearing poems over and

over again

How to select poems and teach them to students?

1. Selection 2. Memorization

3. Arrangement4. Performance

Selectionshort, humorous narrative longer

The loserMama said I’d lose my headIt if wasn’t fastened on.Today I guess it wasn’t‘Cause while playing with my cousinIt fell off and rolled awayAnd now it’s gone.

From Where the Side walk Ends

Selectionshort, humorous narrative longer

And I can’t look for it‘Cause my eyes are in it,And I can’t call to it‘Cause my mouth is on it(Couldn’t hear me anyway‘Cause my ears are on it),Can’t even think about it‘Cause my brain is in it.So I guess I’ll sit downOn this rockAnd rest for just a minute …

The Loser

From Where the Side walk Ends

Memorization

1. The teacher select and read aloud a poem that is well liked by the students. Then students repeat each line or pair of lines after the teacher until they know them.

2. Variations can be added for performing the poem.

3. Some longer poems with older students who read well will not be memorized but will be practiced and read together as a group.

Arrangement

-- Learn the poem and recite it together as a group-- Achieve different effects Two-part or three-party choral poetry is usually based on arranging students into voice types (e.g. high, medium, low) and by selecting lines of the poem for each group to recite or read.

solo cumulative simultaneous dramaticunison

Arrangement

Solo can be added to either of these presentations and are sometimes used

for asking a question or making an exclamation.

solo cumulative simultaneous dramaticunison

Arrangement

A cumulative buildup is effected by having, for example, only two voices say the first line,then two more join in on the second, and thentwo more, gradually building to a crescendo

until the entire class says the last line orstanza.

solo cumulative simultaneous dramaticunison

Arrangement

Simultaneous recitationIn this case, group one begin the poem and

recite it all the way through. When group begins the third line, for example, then group two starts the first line, and the two groups

recite simultaneously until the end.Other groups can, of course, be added.

solo cumulative simultaneous dramaticunison

Arrangement

.

simultaneous dramaticsolo cumulativeunison

Paul Fleichman’s Joyful Noise: Poems for TwoVoices and I Am Phoenix: Poems for Two Voices are written to be read aloud by two readers at once, one reading the left half of the page and one reading the right half, as well as certin lines simultaneously

Arrangement

Let be your guide.As soon as children learn that poems do nothave to be read sedately through exactly as

written, they will begin to find excitement and deeper meaning in poetry.

simultaneous dramaticsolo cumulativeunison

imagination

Performance• Action, gestures, body movements, and

finger plays

• Remember the best audiences are close by – the class next door, the principal, the librarian, the custodian, or a visiting parent.

Poetry in the ClassroomConclusion

In addition to the group activity, teachers can encourage an individual student to learn

poetry by heart, voluntarily, and then to recite a poem in a small group or as a part of

a group performance, perhaps around a theme.Jane Yolen’s collection of weather poems,

Weather Report, could be a resource for thisactivity.

Students’ Reading and Writing Poems

Learning to Write Poetry

Read Silently

TheClassroomLibrary

1.Comprehensive poetry anthologies2. Specialized collections by a single poet.3. Books of poem on a single topic

Students’Activities

1. Making copies of their favorite Poems2. Illustrating and arranging the poems in new and inventive ways.3. Rotating the poetry books

Learning to Read Poetry

Students’ Reading and Writing Poems

Learning to Write PoetryLearning to Read Poetry

Other activities:

1. Pair reading / making videotapes or audiotapes of their readings

2. Selecting three poems by one poet and finding something out about the poet; group discussing and reading three poems aloud.

3. Finding three poems on the same topic; then reading them aloud in small groups.

4. Finding poems of the same poetic form/similar poetic elements/slow or fast rhythms.

Students’ Reading and Writing Poems

Learning to Read Poetry Learning to Write Poetry

Suggestive books to start with: Poems on Poetry, Sunrises and Songs, Reading and Writing Poetry in an Elementary Classroom

Group Writing

Brain-storming

Composing poemsIn pairs

Composing

individualpoems

Students’ Reading and Writing Poems

Learning to Read Poetry Learning to Write Poetry

Children should be reminded:

1. Poetry is a form of communication.2. Children should think of an idea, feeling, or event to write about in their poems.3. Poetry does not have to rhyme. Children may write something of interest to them.

Students’ Reading and Writing Poems

Other suggestions:

1. Personal and class anthologies2. Bulletin board3. Modeling the works of professional poets4. Reading aloud many poems of one poetic form; analyzing the form with the students to reveal the characteristics of its structure

Learning to Read Poetry Learning to Write Poetry

Reasons to include plays in school curriculum

1. Children often dramatize their daily lives and fantasies.2. In playacting, children can give expression to hidden feelings.3. Children’s linguistic abilities can improve.4. Children delight in plays and playacting.5. In a play and in a child’s own play, imagination transforms reality and endows ordinary objects with fantastic quality.

Section Two: Plays

Section Two: Plays

Reasons to include plays in school curriculum

6. Students enjoy reading plays and are able to experience a story vicariously quite readily through the play form.

7. Reading plays aloud and performing plays are natural ways to develop and demonstrate a child’s oral reading fluency.

Section Two: Plays

Definition and Description

Plays refers to written, dramatic compositions orscripts intended to be acted.

Acts A PlayScenes

The script usually has set, costume, and stage directions noted, as well as dialogue provided for

each actor.

Section Two: Plays

Definition and Description

Reader’stheatre

Creative drama

Recreational drama

Children’s theatre

Reader’s theatre

1. Oral presentation of literature by actors – a narrator2. Dramatic reading – voice and gesture to convey additional meaning3. Generally no stage sets, or stage movements

Section Two: Plays

Definition and Description

Reader’stheatre

Creative drama

Recreational drama

Children’s theatre

1. Informal drama – the reenactment of story experiences.2. Spontaneously generated by the participants who compose and act out their parts as the drama progresses. 3. Generally no scripts are developed or lines read or memorized. 4. Process-centered form of drama

Creative drama

Section Two: Plays

Definition and Description

Reader’stheatre

Creative drama

Recreational drama

Children’s theatre

Recreational drama

1. Formal theatrical presentation -- The development and experience of the performers is as important as the the enjoyment by the audience2. School and camp plays -- examples of recreational drama

Section Two: Plays

Definition and Description

Reader’stheatre

Creative drama

Recreational drama

Children’s theatre

Children’s theatre

1. Theatre for young audiences – A formal theatrical experience in which a play is presented for an audience of children2. Usually performers – skilled actors production – overseen by trained directors

Section Two: Plays

Definition and Description

Reader’stheatre

Creative drama

Recreational drama

Children’s theatre

Elementary school years: informal reading of playsMiddle school or older students: recreational and formal plays

The dramatic processes of creative drama and reader’s theatre, discussed in Chapter 12, are also suitable for elementary grade students.

Section Two: Plays

Evaluation and Selection of Plays

1. Subject appealing to children2. An interesting character or two3. A problem that thickens or worsens, but gets

resolved satisfactorily in the end4. Humor5. Conflict between characters6. Natural dialogue reflecting the personality of

the character speaking7. One or more of child-appealing characters

– childlike figures, a personified animal, …

Section Two: Plays

Evaluation and Selection of Plays

1. Children’s Book and Play Review: reviews of ten or twelve children’s playsas well as feature articles occasionally about the publication status of children’s plays.

2. The International Association of Theatre for Children and Young People: bibliographies of plays as well as synopsis of each play, length, types…

3. Anthologies: a good source of plays for children’s reading enjoyment

4. Eleven publishers: see page 63

Section Two: Plays

Evaluation and Selection of Plays

The American Alliance for Theatre and Education (AATE)

The Distinguished Play Award

Best original plays

A: for young people

B: for elementary and middle school age audiences

C: for the best adaptationThe Charlotte B. Chorpenning Playwrig

ht Award

A body of work by a children’s playwright

honors

Section Two: Plays

Historical Overview of Plays

Catholic church: a means of educatinggeneral audiences

1500~

1900~

500~

Middle Age

Church Dramas

1904 J.M. Barrie’s Peter Pan

The most acknowledged classic of the genre of

plays for children

Section Two: Plays

Historical Overview of Plays

Children’s theatre in the United States has generally independent of the adult professional theatre, is community based with substantial contributions by amateurs, has suffered from limited budgets, and yet has tenaciously survived.

Children’s Educational Theatre was founded in 1903 in New York.

Section Two: Plays

Historical Overview of Plays

With the spread of children’s theatre groups there was an increase in the number of published script:

1. 1921 A Treasure of Plays for Children by Montrose J. Moses

Section Two: Plays

Historical Overview of Plays

2. Exceptional note: Charlotte B. Chorpenning (1872-1955) Anchorage Press Plays The Artistic director of the Goodman Children’s Theatre of the Art Institute of Chicago from 1931 until her death. Her contributions to juvenile dramatic literature were outstanding for both quality and quantity. Her observations of children’s interests at each age level are still useful to playwrights (McCaslin, 1971)

Section Two: Plays

Historical Overview of Plays

During the 1960s and 1970s professional theatre companies for young audiences began to appear.

Extremely limited body of

children’s plays suitable to their needs

A rapid increase in children’s play

publishing (Oaks, 1997)

Section Two: Plays

Historical Overview of Plays

Aurand Harris, an outstanding children’s playwright, 1945-1996, left behind a rich legacy of published plays that include original works as well as adaptations of folktales and modern literature. He is particularly noted for exploring different styles for children’s theatre.

A vaudevillian show ( The Toby Show)A melodrama ( Rags to Riches), A serious drama that treats the topic of death (The Arkansaw Bear)

The first winner of the Charlotte B. Chorpenning Award and the only playwright to win it twice, in 1967 and in 1985.

Section Two: Plays

Types of Plays

Traditional: drama, comedy, farce, melodrama, and tragedy

Most common types

Participation plays – a drama with an established story line constructed to involve structured opportunities for active involvement by the audience.

Adaptation plays – traditional literature, folktales, fables, Bibles stories, and modern children’s literature are available from most of the children’s play publishers.

Section Two: Plays

Types of Plays

Original plays, stories originating in play form – fewer than one third of the new plays published annually.

A preferencefor plays with stories never heard before

A preferencefor plays with stories never heard before

The publication

of children play growing rapidly

Early 1960: 10 –12 a year21th century:200 a year

Early 1960: 10 –12 a year21th century:200 a year

Section Two: Plays

Types of Plays

The natural play of children and the theatre are

To make concrete the intangibleTo make explicable the inexplicable

To make accessible the incomprehensibleTo make memorable the significant

(Davis, 1981, p.14)

Section Two: Plays

Types of Plays

Plays help children come to terms with the unknown and the threatening and help to

heighten their appreciation of the actual and enjoyment of the human comedy.