Drama

To study Drama, students must have a keen interest in the subject. Drama involves both group work and solo performances, so confidence and the ability to work independently is essential. Creativity is one of the key skills students will need, so don’t be afraid to experiment and make mistakes, this is all part of the learning process. Students will need to be resilient and understand it takes hard work and commitment to improve. Drama is a practical course which allows students to learn and develop performance and devising skills, however 70% of the course is written.

 
EXAMINATION BOARD – OCR Drama (9-1)  

SPECIFICATION CODE – J316 

CURRICULUM CONTENT 

  • Devising Drama: Students will research and explore a stimulus, working collaboratively to create their own devised piece.
  • Presenting and performing texts: Students will develop and apply theatrical skills in acting using the scripts ‘Things I know to be true’, ‘Girls like That’ and ‘Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time’.
  • Drama Appreciation: Students will explore and analyse the performance text ‘Blood Brothers’ to demonstrate their knowledge and understanding of drama.

ASSESSMENT

Component 1: Devising Drama = 30% 

  • This unit is broken down in the following way: 20% written portfolio and 10% practical performance.

Component 2: Presenting and performing texts = 30% 

  • This unit is broken down in the following way: 20% practical performance to a visiting examiner and 10% written concept pro forma.

Component 3: Drama Appreciation = 40% (90 minute written paper) 

  • Section A of the paper is marked out of 50. Section B: Is an essay response analysing and evaluating a piece of live theatre. This section of the paper is marked out of 30.

EXTRA-CURRICULAR OPPORTUNITIES 
Students have the opportunity to participate in a wide range of extra-curricular activities. We pride ourselves on the wealth of opportunities the Expressive Arts team offer. We run various trips to the theatre to watch live performances, invite artists into school to run workshops and we collaborate across the Lionheart Trust to widen our offer to students. Alongside all of this we also provide various performance opportunities in our annual Winter and Summer Festivals and our school musical productions.    

PROGRESSION 

Drama GCSE provides the foundations for A-Level Theatre Studies and various level 3 Performing Arts courses. Students who excel at Drama go on to work as performers in television and film however there are a variety of career pathways that drama supports such as theatre design, art