- Definition
Process drama is like playing make-believe where your child acts out different roles and situations to learn and explore ideas, rather than putting on a show for others. It helps them understand people and problems by stepping into different shoes.
Students might act out a scene where characters from a book have a disagreement, to explore how each character feels.
How to teach this in 30 seconds
Try this analogy: Process drama is like a game of make-believe where you act out a situation to understand it, not to put on a show for others.
Ask your child: Let's act out what might have happened before this scene.
Common mix-up: Kids might think drama is always about putting on a play for an audience. Process drama is about exploring a situation for yourselves, without a script or a performance.
Examples
- Pretending to be explorers making a difficult decision on a journey.
- Acting as community members at a town hall meeting to solve a local problem.
- Role-playing how to solve a disagreement on the playground.
process drama is a term used in Ontario’s Kindergarten to Grade 8 curriculum.
Where this shows up
The descriptions on this page are SmartStudy’s own original, plain-language writing — not the Ministry’s wording. They are aligned to the Ontario Curriculum, © King’s Printer for Ontario. For the Ministry’s official wording, see the source link below. SmartStudy is an independent service and is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or sponsored by the Government of Ontario or the Ministry of Education. Ontario Curriculum and Resources ↗
