Secondary School Students’ Opinions About Readers’ Theatre

Abstract

In this article, a teaching strategy which not only blends yesterday and today in a meaningful way but also powerfully integrates literacy and history will be examined. Firstly Readers’ Theatre as a technique will be introduced. Secondly, the usage guidelines of Readers’ Theatre will be presented. Finally the opinions of secondary school students about Readers’ Theatre as an instructional component in history teaching will be discussed. The research was conducted on 72 11th grade students from Deneme Secondary School in Çankaya district in Ankara in the spring term of 2013-2014 school years. For the purpose of the study, students were taught by using Readers’ Theatre technique in history lessons for four weeks and at the end of this implementation, the semi-structured interviews were held to determine the opinions of students about Readers’ Theatre technique. The themes were formed by making content analyze to the collected data. It is concluded that the students mainly have described Readers’ Theatre as “theatre”. They have found Readers’ Theatre useful in many respects as they outline the positive effect of the technique on their reading and obtaining historical information. They like most the cooperation with their peers and acting. The vast majority of students have not mentioned any dislikes and a few of them have difficulties to follow the script. Finally, the answers of the majority of the students on the implementation of Readers’ Theatre again are “positive” and their suggestions for better implementation are “on stage”, “the same way” and “using visuals”.

Keywords

• Instructional readers’ theatre technique, history teaching, reading, skill

References

1. Barchers, S. I. (1993). Readers’ theatre for beginning readers. Englewood, NJ: Teacher Ideas Press.
2. Beck, R.A. (1984) Group reading: readers’ theatre. Lincolnwood, IL: National Textbook.
3. Bell, S. K., Wideroff, M., & Gaufberg, L. (2010). Student voices in readers’ theater: exploring communication in the hidden curriculum. Patient Education and Counseling, 80(3), 354-357.
4. Clarck, R. (2006). Readers’ theater: a key to fluency development (Unpublished master’s thesis). Brigham Young University, Utah, USA.
5. Cornett, C.E. (1999). The arts as meaning makers. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall.
6. Demircioglu, I.H. (2000). Tarih ogretiminde ogrenci merkezli yaklasimlar [The student centered approaches in history teaching]. Ankara, Turkey: Ani.
7. Demircioglu, I. H. (2009). Tarih ogretmenlerinin tarihsel dusunme becerilerine yonelik gorusleri [Views of historical teachers on historical thinking skills]. Milli Egitim Dergisi [Journal of National Education], (184), 228-239.
8. Dick, L.A. (000). “Are we doing readers’ theatre today?” The implementation of readers’ theatre exploring social studies theme (Unpublished master’s thesis). The University of Regina, Regina, Canada.

9. Dilek, D. (2007). Tarih derslerinde ogrenme ve dusunce gelisimi [Learning and development in history courses]. Ankara, Turkey: Nobel.
10. Dinc, E. (2009). Etkili tarih ogretimi [Effective history teaching]. Gazi University Journal of Gazi Educational Faculty, (29), 1427-1451.
11. Flynn, R. M. (2004). Curriculum-based readers’ theatre: setting the stage for reading and retention. The Reading Teacher, 58(4), 360-365.
12. Fredericks, A. D. (2000). Silly salamanders and other slightly stupid stuff for readers theatre. Englewood, CO: Teacher Ideas Press.
13. Fredericks, A.D. (2009). Fairy tales readers’ theatre. Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO.
14. Gunning, T. G. (2000). Creating literacy instruction for all students. Boston, MA: Pearson Education Inc.
15. Guven, I., Bikmaz, F, Demirhan-Iscan, C., & Kelesoglu, S. (2014). Tarih ogretimi kuram ve uygulama [History teaching theory and practice]. Ankara: PegemA.
16. Hsui, V. Y. (1994). Integrating language processes through readers’ theater. Teaching and Learning, 14(2), 30-42.
17. Keehn, S. (2003). The effect of instruction and practice through readers theatre on young readers’ oral reading fluency. Reading Research and Instruction, 42(4), 40-61.
18. Laughlin, M. K., & Latrobe, K. H. (1990). Readers’ theatre for children: scripts and script development. Englewood, CO: Teacher Ideas Press.
19. Laughlin, M. K., Black P. T., & Loberg, M. K. (1991). Social studies readers’ theatre for children scripts and script development. Englewood, CO: Teacher Ideas Press.
20. Martinez, M., Roser, N. L., & Strecker, S. (1998). “I never thought I could be a star”: A readers’ theatre ticket to fluency. The Reading Teacher, 52(4), 326-334.
21. Moon, C. (2009). Using readers’ theater to help children read fluently (Unpublished master’s thesis). Sierra Nevada College, Nevada, USA.
22. Morri, E. W. (2011). The effects of readers’ theater on reading fluency and attitudes towards reading(Unpublished master’s thesis). Saint Mary’s College of California, CA, USA.
23. Nussbaum, J. L. (2009). Readers’ theater the effects on reading achievement and reading attitude in second graders. Viterbo University, Wisconsin, Unpublished MA Dissertation.
24. Purdy, J. E. (2005). Effects of readers’ theatre on fluency, content mastery, motivation and gender with 9th grade biology students (Unpublished doctoral dissertation). Widener University, Philadelphia, USA.
25. Safran, M. (2002). Orta ogretim kurumlarinda tarih ogretiminin yapi ve sorunlarina iliskin bir arastirma [A research on the structure and problems of history teaching in secondary education institutions]. Turk Yurdu, 22(175), 73-79.
26. Safran, M. (2010). (Ed.) Tarih nasil ogretilir? - Tarih ogretmenleri icin ozel ogretim yontemleri [How is history taught? - Special teaching methods for history teachers]. Istanbul, Turkey: Yeni Insan.
27. Sloyer, S. (1982). Readers’ theater: story dramatization in the classroom. Urbana, III: National Council of Teachers of English.
28. Sloyer, S. (2003). The educator’s complete guide to readers’ theatre. Westport: Teacher Ideas Press.
29. Smith, C.R. (2003). Extraordinary women from U.S. history: readers’ theatre for grades 4-8. Portsmouth: Teacher Ideas Press.
30. Smith, D. M. (2011). Readers’ theatre: its effectiveness in improving reading fluency, student motivation, and attitudes toward reading among second-grade students. The Pennsylvania State University, Pennsylvania, USA. Unpublished PhD Dissertation.
31. Unal, F. T., & Yegen, U. (2013). Turkce ogretmenlerinin okuma yontem-tekniklerini ve arac-gereclerini kullanma durumlari. Turkish Studies. 8 (4), 1351-1365.
32. Uribe, S. N. (2013) Curriculum-based readers’ theatre as an approach to teaching English language learners: teachers’ perceptions after professional development and classroom implementation students (Unpublished doctoral dissertation). Florida Atlantic University, Florida, USA.
33. Wheeler, M. E. (2011). The effects of readers’ theater on reading fluency and attitudes towards reading (Unpublished master’s thesis). Saint Mary’s College of California, CA, USA.
34. Yildirim, A, & Simsek, H. (2005). Sosyal bilimlerde nitel arastirma yontemleri [Qualitative research methods in the social sciences]. Ankara, Turkey: Seckin.