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Important update from TheSchoolRun

For the past 13 years, TheSchoolRun has been run by a small team of mums working from home, dedicated to providing quality educational resources to primary school parents. Unfortunately, rising supplier costs and falling revenue have made it impossible for us to continue operating, and we’ve had to make the difficult decision to close. The good news: We’ve arranged for another educational provider to take over many of our resources. These will be hosted on a new portal, where the content will be updated and expanded to support your child’s learning.

What this means for subscribers:

  • Your subscription is still active, and for now, you can keep using the website as normal — just log in with your usual details to access all our articles and resources*.
  • In a few months, all resources will move to the new portal. You’ll continue to have access there until your subscription ends. We’ll send you full details nearer the time.
  • As a thank you for your support, we’ll also be sending you 16 primary school eBooks (worth £108.84) to download and keep.

A few changes to be aware of:

  • The Learning Journey weekly email has ended, but your child’s plan will still be updated on your dashboard each Monday. Just log in to see the recommended worksheets.
  • The 11+ weekly emails have now ended. We sent you all the remaining emails in the series at the end of March — please check your inbox (and spam folder) if you haven’t seen them. You can also follow the full programme here: 11+ Learning Journey.

If you have any questions, please contact us at [email protected]. Thank you for being part of our journey it’s been a privilege to support your family’s learning.

*If you need to reset your password, it will still work as usual. Please check your spam folder if the reset email doesn’t appear in your inbox.

What your child learns in Key Stage 3 drama

Girls in fancy dress
Do you have a bright young star in the family? Find out what your child will be taught in drama lessons and how you can extend this learning at home.

In Key Stage 3 drama, your child will be given opportunities to explore, evaluate and challenge ideas and assumptions constructively. They must demonstrate creative thinking by making fresh connections between ideas.

During drama lessons, team work is encouraged, especially as students are often asked to take on different roles in organising, planning and sustaining discussions in a range of formal and informal contexts. They will need to be able to work in groups and to evaluative their own learning.

Lesson examples

Here’s what drama lessons might involve:

  • In year 7, children explore techniques for role play and develop strategies for anticipating, visualising and problem solving in different contexts. They work collaboratively on scripted and unscripted pieces and evaluate their own presentations and those of others.
  • Year 7 pupils brainstorm ways to use their voices to represent pride, abomination, fools and angels following the reading of a story looking at these concepts. They use drama activities by practising walking into the room and saying a proverb in different tones of voice, such as in a stern, pleading, exasperated, cold, shy or friendly manner.
     
  • In year 8, children learn to develop the techniques that enable them to create and sustain a variety of roles. And they learn to collaborate in, and evaluate, the presentation of dramatic performances, scripted and unscripted, which explore character, relationships and issues.
     
  • In year 9, children learn to recognise, evaluate and extend their skills. They use a range of dramatic techniques, including working in role, to explore issues, ideas and meanings. They develop and compare different interpretations of scenes or plays by Shakespeare or other dramatists and they begin to write critical evaluations of performances. In their own scripts and performances, they learn to convey action, character, atmosphere and tension.
     
  • In year 9, pupils may have the opportunity to be the director for class performances, advising on how the text should be read and instructing the actors.

Help your child at home

  • Discuss themes, plots, characters and storylines in TV programmes.
     
  • Your child will be studying at least one Shakespeare play. Look out for books and other resources that present the story in more accessible language to help your child understand what is taking place.