Time to Deck the Halls with RT!

Posted on November 13, 2020 by Mackowiecki

One of the department stores in my area pushed out their holiday inventory well before Halloween, which seem mighty early to me. But now is certainly not too early to be pushing out the holiday plays. While there may not be any Christmas pageants this year, reader’s theater is well-suited to remote instruction. Because kids have clearly-identified parts to read, your Zoom calls or Teams sessions can proceed fairly smoothly (bandwidth issues aside!). You can send students a hard copy of the script via email, or simply share your screen. Have kids practice their lines and rehearse in Zoom two or three times a week. When they’re finally reading the play smoothly, record it and share the recordings in your secure online environment. Add another layer of fun by encouraging kids to dress in costume!

I have a number of splendid RT scripts for the holidays, including my latest release, The Gift of the Magi. Originally published in the Nov. 2001 issue of Scholastic’s Storyworks magazine, it includes a comprehension activity that can be downloaded as a Google Form for free. That means in your secure Google Classroom environment you can post a PDF of the script as well as the interactive quiz!

I also have some wonderful Charles Dickens’ plays including A Christmas Carol, Gabriel Grub (the spookiest of Dickens’ holiday stories), and Pip & the Prisoner (from Great Expectations). You can check all of them out on my TeachersPayTeachers storefront. Happy directing!

Have a Dickens of a Christmas!

Posted on November 23, 2019 by Mackowiecki

We all know that last week before Christmas vacation can be a real bugger in the classroom. The kids get so worked up about yule logs and gingerbread houses (or, more truly, about the L.O.L. Doll Box or Nintendo Switch under the tree), they’re no longer able to see straight, let alone sit still for a geometry test. You can have one Dickens of a Christmas, though, by adding a couple holiday plays to your Santa letters and holiday art projects.

Charles Dickens, of course, is the undisputed master of Christmas-oriented literature, so allow me to share with you three nifty class plays based on his work.

Whether you plan to fully enact it or just play around with it during language arts class, my traditional, kid-friendly version of A Christmas Carol is a great place to start—and it’s just three bucks for a full class set. Challenging for 3rd, but great for 4th-6th graders. If you want to take things a bit further, consider creating a movie version, or merely having your students adapt the play to their liking. A few years ago my fifth graders added extra dialogue, a few additional scenes, and a contemporary setting to my “Elenora Scrooge” female-lead version and ended up with this lovely sixteen minute film. Use it as an introduction to your work on the play (it’ll really motivate your students) or as a follow-up compare and contrast activity.

Also consider pairing ol’ Scrooge with ol’ Gabriel Grub. This script is a spooky, Christmas tale about a grumpy grave digger who is dragged away on Christmas Eve by a group of wretched goblins. It’ll scare the dickens out of the younger kids, but your fourth through eighth graders will find it a fun and fascinating comparison to Scrooge. You can check out a radio pod cast my students created by clicking here.

Another Dickens classic comes from his novel, Great Expectations. My original Pip & the Prisoner play depicts the opening chapters. Though not explicitly about Christmas, it takes place on Christmas Eve when the orphaned Pip encounters an escaped convict on the marshes. It’s full of angst and adventure, but best suited for 6th through 9th graders (though a talented or motivated group of 5th graders could probably handle it, too).

So if you want to have a great week before the vacation, put away that geometry test. Show your Christmas spirit with some holiday plays.

Happy directing!

Here’s Help for that Pre-Holiday Chaos!

Posted on November 24, 2018 by Mackowiecki

That last week before Christmas vacation can be a real doozy. While thoughts of sugar plums may not derail that lesson you’ve been planning on verb gerunds, knowing there are new gaming systems, cell phones, and hoverboards under the tree certainly will. There’s no doubt about it: this time of year the kids are all a twitter, prompting many a teacher to set aside serious content in favor of coloring pages featuring Rudolph, Frosty, or an occasional dreidel. But it needn’t be so. This is a great time to stage a play! In so doing your students will get some quality fluency practice, partake in some interesting literary discussions, and, depending on how far you want to take it, occupy themselves with meaningful work creating sets, props, and costumes. Here are four classroom reader’s theater scripts ideal for the next few weeks.

“Ebenezer Scrooge” is a traditional retelling of the Dickens classic. This age-appropriate version from the Dec. 1998 issue of Storyworks is available on TeachersPayTeachers only during December. It includes roles for fourteen students (though some can be doubled-up) as well as two or more non-speaking extras. I also have a version of this play in which Scrooge is cast as a woman, available in my book, Read Aloud Plays: Classic Short Stories.

Long before Scrooge there was “Gabriel Grub,” the gravedigger. From Dickens’ The Pickwick Papers, this eerie adaption is a perfect complement to “A Christmas Carol” or a wonderful stand-alone Gothic holiday play. Gabriel is the sullen sexton who scowls at holiday mirth. He goes to the churchyard on Christmas eve to dig a grave and there encounters the Goblin King and a chorus of imps. It’s Dickens’ at his best! It includes enough parts for an entire class, or double up roles and stage it with as few as twelve. (Warning: it may be too scary for younger students, so use it with grades 5 and up).

The Gift of the Magi is the endearing story of a husband and wife who pawn their most precious things in order to buy gifts for one another, only to discover the gifts are no longer needed. This O.Henry classic originally appeared in the Nov./Dec. 2001 issue of Storyworks, and is currently available for immediate download through Scholastic Teacher Express. Students will likely be familiar with the plot because it’s been so readily adapted everywhere from Sesame Street to the Simpson’s to Walt Disney. Parts for nine students in grades 4 through 8.

Maupassant the Cat and Flaubert the Mouse tell the exasperating tale of the discontented Matilda Loisel in Guy deMaupassant’s 1884 classic, “The Necklace.” Matilda is a young French woman who takes her happiness for granted and consequently trades it all for a string of false pearls. Students consistently rank this among their favorite plays to perform. Originally published in the Nov./Dec, 2002 issue of Storyworks, it includes parts for eight actors (and numerous non-speaking extras). It isn’t specifically a holiday play, but could be made so simply by referring to “The Ambassador’s Ball” as “The Ambassador’s Christmas Ball.” It’s appropriate for students in grades 4 through 8 and is currently available in Read Aloud Plays: Classic Short Stories on Scholastic Teacher Express.

Happy directing!