Susan ~ Theater/Readers Theater

http://www.proteacher.com/070173.shtml
This website was helpful because it had other resources on it to explain and help create Readers Theater. The main resource off this page was under the Aaron Shepard’s link. Under this link he has also made a list of resources to check out. They include FREE SCRIPTS from his three books; Readers Theater, Story plays, and Folktale plays. He also has a link with helpful tips for the teacher when starting their Readers Theater project. Once back on the main page the other links help you compose a script with their outlined format. The main page also has another tip for teachers’ link that will take the teacher step by step in planning process. The best part is the link for an already made assessment/ Evaluation form for grading. Basically, there is a lot of great information and resources for a teacher trying to put together their own Reader’s Theater.

http://www.creativedrama.com/plays.htm
After looking at this website the top four links to look at are Classroom ideas, Theater games, Plays for Performance, and Books. Classroom ideas, is actually only one idea but it’s pretty good. It is an activity to use whenever there is free moment inside the classroom to help the students’ creativity. Theater games, are to help increase performance and creativity skills with a list of different games. It’s great because all the games have the grade level written on them. Plays for Performance, is a long list of different plays that can be used for performances. The tope of the list states the author, performance rights, ages, characters, format, censorship warnings, cultural indication, time period, and synopsis. Books, is a teacher resource listing all the different books that will be helpful in creating performances inside the classroom.

http://www.storyarts.org/lessonplans/lessonideas/index.html#hunt
I liked this website because it was simple and easy to follow. The whole site was a bunch of different theater activities to help students continue their development in Theater. My three favorite activities are Story Circle, Family Stories, and Puzzle Tale. Story Circle has everyone participating with the creations of a class story. This activity is helpful because it makes the students think about the different phases inside a play; the beginning, middle, and end. Family Stories connects to social studies because the students has to research about a certain time period and then create a skit to explain what they discovered. Puzzle Tale has the teacher pre-read a Folktale and then have different cards spread around the room. Each student will have a card and will have to listen to know when their card needs to be read. After reading their card the student then has to summarize the story up to their card. This helps the students with comprehension and order/sequencing.

http://pirate.shu.edu/~depierjo/dramatics_and_role_playing.htm
The goal of this website is help students get into the mind and heart of their characters along with developing a sense of empathy. These activities are not to help students memorize lines, work on sets, and think about costumes. They are to help with role playing to create an energetic and lively experience that will completely engages the viewers. Basically, it will help the students stay in character when performing.

http://teachers.net/lessons/posts/400.html
There is nothing really special about this website only that it shows how simple it can be to create Readers Theater inside the classroom. With this script it gave me hope in being able to create scripts that cross over into other subjects to help students better understand the material at hand.