Promoting Quality in Learning - Essay Example

Nor are students coming to the classroom with their minds a tabula rosa, a blank slate on which one must fill their heads with ideas—as John Locke might very well have argued. Instead, students have the knowledge already, prior knowledge that can be tapped into and used in dramatic situations in order to facilitate new learning, weaving what they know in with what they don’t know. Additionally, students have ideas already in their minds about the language they are learning and how exactly they might like to go about learning in their own manner—but, perhaps outside of a drama-inspired French class, they might not receive as many opportunities to be creative in secondary school subjects as they might with a class designed like this one.

Indeed, it is the students who make the classroom setting and the learning fun by adding their own knowledge or surprise “twist” to the subject matter’s material, if you will. . In every truly good drama, there are always elements of serious academic study and research that go behind every academic project worthy of some undertaking. Drama is a way for students to use different kinds of intelligence as defined by Howard Gardner’s Theory Of Multiple Intelligences, which are common knowledge to educators everywhere—the different bits of intelligence being bodily-kinesthetic, interpersonal, intrapersonal, musical, verbal-linguistic, logical, spatial, and naturalist intelligence all combined.

For example, students may use their interpersonal skills to interact with each other as actors and actresses. Intrapersonal—or extremely introverted students—may learn to be more outgoing and even have their own soliloquies. Musical students may choose to sing in their dramatic presentation, in French, as part of their particular project. Verbal-linguistic students might be interested in reciting long monologues or dialogues that they themselves have written in French, and then perform them in a lively and witty verbal discourse.

Students who are visual may use their spatial intelligence in order to draw or design temporary, movable scenery or provide visual imagery for the presentation—which could include technology such as a PowerPoint or a presentation on a SmartBoard (if such technologies are available). Students with bodily-kinesthetic intelligence may be good with activities requiring movement and the proper placement of one’s presence on-stage. Students with naturalistic intelligence may incorporate nature and ethical treatment for animals into their dramatic presentations.