Lesson 15 (Student Book pages 153–160) Analyzing the Structure of Drama Theme: Anne Frank: Diary to Drama LESSON OBJECTIVES TAP STUDENTS’ PRIOR KNOWLEDGE • Develop an understanding of the structure and elements of • Tell students that they will work on a lesson about analyzing the drama, including acts, scenes, characterization, dialogue, and structure of drama. Explain that a drama, or play, has other story stage directions. elements as well as characters, setting, and plot. Drama contains dialogue, or characters’ spoken words, and stage directions, • Analyze the ways in which a drama’s structure helps an author information about how characters speak or move and organize ideas and convey meaning. descriptions of setting. Dramas are divided into acts that are further divided into scenes. THE LEARNING PROGRESSION • Display this sentence: Mr. Davidson spoke out loudly at the • Grade 6: MS CCRS RL.6.5 has students consider form as it meeting, voicing his concerns about the proposed sports stadium. pertains to prose texts as well as poetry or drama, allowing students to focus on how chapters, scenes, and so on contribute • Ask students what character traits might describe Mr. Davidson. to theme, setting, and plot. (outspoken, confident, community-minded) • Grade 7: MS CCRS RL.7.5 emphasizes drama and poetry, • Display this dialogue: Mr. Davidson (fervently): A stadium of this having students consider how form impacts meaning in size will bring increased traffic to our neighborhood, negatively genres that use forms with which they might be less familiar. affecting our quality of life! Moderator: Your comments will be included in our community • Grade 8: MS CCRS RL.8.5 has students deepen their response, Mr. Davidson. understanding of form and its impact by comparing texts and considering how form contributes to the meaning of each. • Have students identify the tone of voice used by Mr. Davidson (fervently) and words that show his level of concern (negatively PREREQUISITE SKILLS affecting our quality of life). • Identify a text’s setting, characters, plot, and theme. • Discuss how stage directions, dialogue, and setting contribute to an understanding of events. Analyzing these elements of a play • Recognize the general structure of a text. will help students picture the events being described. • Explain how a particular act, scene, set of stage directions, or line of dialogue functions within a larger text. Teacher Toolbox teacher-toolbox.com • Describe how a particular act, scene, set of stage directions, or Prerequisite line of dialogue contributes to a text’s setting, characters, plot, Skills RL.7.5 or theme. Ready Lessons ✓ ✓ Tools for Instruction ✓ Interactive Tutorials ✓ MS CCRS Focus RL.7.5 Analyze how a drama’s … form or structure (e.g., soliloquy …) contributes to its meaning. ADDITIONAL STANDARDS: RL.7.1, RL.7.2, RL.7.3, RL.7.4, RL.7.7, RL.7.9; L.7.1, L.7.1c, L.7.4a, L.7.4d; W.7.2, W.7.5, W.7.8, W.7.9a; SL.7.1, SL.7.5, SL.7.6 (See page A35 for full text.) L#: Lesson Name 145 Part 1: Introduction Lesson 15 AT A GLANCE By reading a scene in a play, students learn how stage Lesson 15 Part 1: Introduction MS CCRS RL.7.5: Analyze how a drama’s . directions and dialogue contribute to their understanding form or structure (e.g., soliloquy . .) contributes to its meaning. of characters, setting, and plot. Analyzing the Structure of Drama STEP BY STEP Theme: Anne Frank: Diary to Drama • Read aloud the description of a drama’s elements. There are many ways to tell a story. For example, a story can be told in a book, in a movie, or Have students read the first scene fromThe Diary of through a play. All of these forms contain characters, setting, and plot, but a play has some special characteristics. First of all, a play, or drama, relies on dialogue, the characters’ words, Anne Frank, underlining details about setting and to move the plot forward. Dramas also contain stage directions, which describe the setting characters. Remind them that details can be found in and explain what the actors should do or how they should speak or behave. Dramas are both the stage directions and the dialogue. organized into scenes, which are like chapters in a book, and scenes are grouped into acts. Read the beginning of The Diary of Anne Frank by Frances Goodrich and Albert Hackett. The • Explain that the chart shows details about the play is based on a young Jewish girl’s diary, which details struggles endured by her family setting, characters, and plot in this scene. and friends when they had to go into hiding in an attic in Amsterdam during World War II. • Read the first detail in the Setting column. Ask Act 1, Scene 1 students to find this detail in the text. Discuss how The curtain rises on an empty stage. It is late afternoon November, 1945. The rooms are the second detail is not stated directly but can be dusty, the curtains in rags. Chairs and tables are overturned. inferred from stage directions: The door at the foot of the small stairwell swings open. MR. FRANK comes up the steps into The rooms are dusty, view. He stands looking slowly around, making a supreme effort at self-control. He is weak, ill. the curtains in rags. Chairs and tables are overturned. His eye is caught by something lying on the floor. It is a woman’s white glove. He holds it in his hand and suddenly all of his self-control is gone. He breaks down, crying. • Read the details in the Characters column. Have We hear footsteps on the stairs. MIEP GIES comes up, looking for MR. FRANK. MIEP is a Dutch students identify text they underlined that tells about girl of about twenty-two. She is pregnant. Her attitude toward MR. FRANK is protective, these details. Then read the Plot details and have compassionate. MIEP: Are you all right, MR. FRANK? students identify “finding the glove makes Mr. Frank MR. FRANK: (Quickly controlling himself.) Yes, Miep, yes . cry” as a stated detail, while “something tragic happened” is an inference. Have students share other Underline details in the stage directions and dialogue that tell you something about the setting and characters. Compare what you learned to the information in the chart. details they underlined. Setting Characters Plot • Mr. Frank: ill, sad • Discuss how stage directions and dialogue help • November, 1945 • Finding the glove makes Mr. • Miep: pregnant Dutch • No one has lived in the Frank cry. Something tragic students understand the play as though they were woman who is protective rooms for a long time. must have happened here. watching it performed on stage. of Mr. Frank When you read a play, imagine it is being performed with actors on a stage. If you are not actually watching a play, the stage directions and the dialogue help you visualize what’s going on, so be sure to read them both very carefully. L15: Analyzing the Structure of Drama 153 ©Curriculum Associates, LLC Copying is not permitted. Genre Focus Literary Texts: Drama directions describe the setting and tell the actors how to speak, move, or behave on the stage. Tell students that in this lesson they will read a type of literature called drama. A drama, or play, is a story to be acted out on a stage. Ask students to name dramas they have read. What were the plays A drama has a script with dialogue and stage directions. about? What did they learn about the settings and characters from the dialogue and stage directions? Students may mention plays A drama’s script tells each character, or actor, what to say. The such as Annie. dialogue is presented with the character’s name followed by a colon. The text after the colon contains the words that the Explain that in this lesson, students will read scenes from The character speaks. A script may include a monologue, or a speech Diary of Anne Frank, a drama based on real-life twentieth century that one character says to other characters. Or it may include a events, which has multiple acts and scenes. The script provides the soliloquy, which is a speech that a character directs to the audience dialogue between the characters and stage directions, which that reveals the character’s feelings. Stage directions are often describe setting, actions, and emotions. shown in a separate format, such as in an italicized font. The stage 146 L15: Analyzing the Structure of Drama ©Curriculum Associates, LLC Copying is not permitted. Part 2: Modeled Instruction Lesson 15 AT A GLANCE Students read Act 1, Scene 2 in The Diary of Anne Frank, Part 2: Modeled Instruction Lesson 15 which contains only stage directions. Students use the stage directions to understand when and where the Read the beginning of Act 1, Scene 2, which introduces the Van Daan family. scene takes place and who the characters are. Genre: Drama The Diary of Anne Frank, Act 1, Scene 2 STEP BY STEP by Frances Goodrich and Albert Hackett • Ask volunteers to tell what they learned on the prior It is early morning, July, 1942. The rooms are bare, as before, but they are now clean and orderly. page about how stage directions and dialogue give MR. VAN DAAN, a tall, portly man in his late forties, is in the main room, pacing up and down, nervous. information about setting and characters. His clothes and overcoat are expensive and well cut. MRS. VAN DAAN sits on the couch, clutching her possessions, a hatbox, bags, etc.