English Through Drama: Is It Worth It?
Agus Budiawan
When we talk about communication, drama is all communication. We don't talk in pattern practices and drills -we talk in ideas. Through drama, we talk with emotion and feeling to create true communication (Zoebaidah et al, 1991).
Preliminary study of developing students' ability in English through drama has been conducted in LBPP-LIA Bogor, Indonesia since 2001. Teachers assign students to make a script and choose their own role for each member of the group. The role of teacher here is as a language consultant. Another way, is that teachers provide a script and assign each student to playa role in group. Teacher can also support them in developing their acting to motivate them in making conversation in more natural way. To motivate students to perform a competition among classes is held and video-taping is conducted for their self-observation.
The results show that English through drama provides an active approach to the study of English and provides an opportunity for the students to creatively use the English they have already learned. By watching their own performance through video, students also have the opportunity to observe their own progress and enhance their motivation about learning English.
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Budiawan, A. (2005,
April). English through drama: Is it
worth it?. Paper presented at the RELC
International Seminar,
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