English, Language and Literacy 3 to 19: Drama

This booklet welcomes the profound and multi-faceted contribution that drama makes to children’s and young people’s learning and to the life of schools. It is critical of the fact that the UK government has not granted drama official status as a National Curriculum subject in schools in England.The booklet summarises the work of some of the major writers on educational drama. It offers working descriptions of drama for teachers to adapt, and examples of drama in action. It points to a major English-speaking country – Australia – where drama is being introduced as a free-standing subject in the statutory curriculum, and it proposes an outline curriculum for drama from 3 to 16, drawing on work already done in England and Australia.