PRIVAS-BRÉAUTÉ, Virginie – Drama activities to create a positive language learning environment...
Para lá da tarefa: implicar os estudantes na aprendizagem de línguas estrangeiras no ensino superior.
Porto: FLUP, 2019, pp. 292-309
DOI: https://doi.org/10.21747/9789898969217/paraa16

Drama activities to create a positive language learning
environment in higher education

Virginie Privas-Bréauté
ATILF – University of Lorraine / CNRS (UMR 7118), Nancy, France
virginie.privas-breaute@univ-lorraine.fr

Abstract
In Freedom to learn, Rogers (1969) presents the results of studies that shed light on
the positive effects of teachers’ empathy on learning environments. Rogers explains thatin providing a positive learning environment by being emotionally involved, teachers
invite their students to learn better and be more motivated. The empathetic attitude ofteachers is one of the conditions that motivates students, but it is not enough (Viau,
2009). Relying on the neuroscientific enaction paradigm (Varela, 1993, 1996), Aden
(2017) studies the pedagogical value of drama in language learning and shows how
emotions, body and mind all contribute to language acquisition through the emergenceof empathy among the participants. Further research on the cognitive development oflanguage learners in higher education shows that drama facilitates the development of
linguistic and general competences. In this paper, we aim to demonstrate how, frompsychological and neuroscientific standpoints, drama activities can create positive
language learning environments and facilitate learning.

Keywords:

drama,

embodied

cognition,

emotions,

enaction,

Englishlearning/teaching, neuroscience

Resumé
Dans Liberté pour apprendre, Rogers (1969) présente les résultats d’études mettant
au jour les effets bénéfiques de l’empathie des enseignants sur les environnements
d’apprentissage. L’auteur explique qu’en étant impliqués émotionnellement, lesenseignants créent des environnements propices aux apprentissages et permettent aux
apprenants d’être plus motivés, et ainsi de mieux apprendre. L’attitude empathique desenseignants est un facteur de motivation pour les apprenants mais il n’est pas suffisantpour optimiser l’apprentissage (Viau, 2009). Aden (2017) s’est appuyée sur le paradigme
neuroscientifique de l’enaction (Varela, 1993, 1996) et a étudié l’empathie ressentie par292

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DOI: https://doi.org/10.21747/9789898969217/paraa16

les apprenants lors de séances pédagogiques impliquant des jeux théâtraux au sein deleurs cours de langue. Elle montre à quel point les émotions et le corps accompagnent
l’esprit lorsqu’il s’agit de l’acquisition/ apprentissage d’une langue. De plus amples
recherches scientifiques portant sur le développement cognitif d’apprenants de langues
dans l’enseignement supérieur témoignent de la valeur pédagogique du jeu théâtral
lorsqu’il s’agit de faire acquérir des compétences langagières et générales. Cet article
propose d’adopter une approche psychologique et neuroscientifique pour démontrer que
les activités théâtrales peuvent créer des environnements d’apprentissage bienveillants
et faciliter l’apprentissage des langues.
Mots-clés: apprentissage/enseignement de l’anglais, bienveillance, cognition
incarnée, émotions, enaction, jeu théâtral, neurosciences

1 – Introduction
The Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEFR, 2001)
recommends language learners to be at the center of their learning. It puts the stress on
inviting students to learn autonomously, complete tasks and encourages teachers to letlearners become actors in their own learning. These indications have led language
teachers to introduce drama and drama activities to teach English and consider them as
valuable pedagogical devices so that learners progressively become actors in theirEnglish learning. Drama and drama activities facilitate learning in so much as they enable
the accomplishment of tasks and resolution of problems. Yet, if we think about how to“go beyond the task” in class, we can reflect not only upon all the elements that comebefore and after the activities but also upon the relationship between students andteachers and among students themselves. This is how the question as to what extent
introducing drama in the language class can create a positive language learning
atmosphere has arisen.
After explaining how, from both psychological and neuroscientific complementarystandpoints, empathy and embodied cognition help understand why drama can create
positive language learning environments, two experiments carried out with different
profiles of French students learning English will be described. Through thesedescriptions, we will underline the impact of drama activities on the development as wellas the improvement of linguistic and general competences of language learners andsuggest a model of learning/teaching languages based on drama. Eventually,293

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DOI: https://doi.org/10.21747/9789898969217/paraa16

observations on the ground as well as the opinions of students conveyed throughquestionnaires will enable us to pinpoint the strengths and weaknesses of this device.

2 – Research aims
One of the main challenges of foreign language teachers is to have their students
speak the target language spontaneously. Very often, only the best students and theones who feel more at ease with oral communication in a foreign language end up
speaking naturally. Unfortunately, this even happens in English for specific purposes(ESP) classes where the foreign language they are taught is meant to train them to speak
foreign languages at work, which should give the language course a supplementary
motivational objective. Among the reasons why students dare not communicate orally islinked to negative emotions they feel such as stress, anxiety, fear. In Principles andPractice in Second Language Acquisition, Krashen insists on the impact of the context
and situations on the affective filter when processing the input of the target language:
Those whose attitudes are not optimal for second language acquisition will not
only tend to seek less input, but they will also have a high or strong affective filter– even if they understand the message, the input will not reach the part of thebrain responsible for language acquisition, or the language acquisition device.
(Krashen, 1982, p. 31)

Based on this, studies (Horwitz, Horwitz & Cope, 1986; Arnold, 1999; Schumann,
1994) have shown that bad emotions felt within the class hinder language acquisition.
On the contrary, positive emotions facilitate language learning. Therefore, a teacher’s
aim should be to help students relax and lessen the bad feelings and emotions they feel
when they must learn and speak English. Drama activities have thus been introduced so
as to try to create a positive atmosphere within the classroom and permit learners to
overcome any bad feelings and emotions they might have. We assumed that introducing
this device will then facilitate speaking and learning the foreign language. Our researchthus aims to demonstrate that drama and drama activities introduced in the language
classroom in higher education is a device that creates a positive language learning
atmosphere and facilitates English learning. Not only does it rely on a psychologicalapproach underlining the crucial role of the teacher in impacting the emotions andfeelings of their students but it also falls within the paradigm of enaction inscribed in thetheories of embodied cognition.

294

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3 – Theoretical framework
3.1 – Psychological approach
In Freedom to learn, the American psychologist Carl R. Rogers presents the resultsof studies that shed light on the positive effects of teachers’ attitudes on learning
environments. The author explains that creating a positive learning environment by being
emotionally involved, teachers invite their students to learn better and be more
motivated.
Rogers trusts humanity, especially when men – and women – can be free andcreative. These are two conditions that, to him, can enable teachers to develop theirpersonality and then help students develop on their own and be self-confident. As for thelearning environment, the author then asserts that there should exist an excellent qualityof interpersonal relationships based on the behavior of teachers, whom he calls“facilitators”, and gives a list of what teachers should be and how they should behave.
He first says that teachers should be real/congruent (that is to say “be themselves”) andalways bear a positive outlook (which he calls “prizing”) on their students, care for them,be confident in who they are and what they can achieve and respect them (Rogers, 1969,
p.184). Confidence based on empathetic listening is what teachers should bring to thegroup of students they have in front of them so as to enable them to develop and freetheir potential. This is what creates a good learning environment.
However, such an environment also relies on the degree of agentivity of the students,
especially in the context of student-oriented approaches to language learning/ teaching.
The benevolent attitude of teachers is one of the conditions that motivates students tolearn, but it is not the only one (Viau, 2009). Students should also prove to be motivated,
involved, concerned and willing to progress. These are emotional conditions to create apositive learning atmosphere and, subsequently, to facilitate learning.
Neuroscience and neurolinguistics (Paradis, 1994) have recently shed the light on
discoveries that have come to scientifically confirm the intuitions teachers had about thereasons why positive emotions are closely linked to better language learning.

3.2 – Neuroscientific standpoint
The neuro-biologist Francisco Varela focuses on the ways human beings accesscognition and studies the place of language in this context. He writes that languages are
the tools that lead people to meet so as to make meaning emerge. His scientific researchin neuroscience has led him to develop the paradigm of enaction, falling within thetheories of embodied cognition and relying upon three cornerstones: participatory

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structural coupling, individual learning paths, and emergence of meaning. For Varela,people possess autopoietic individual strategies to acquire and learn languages, andwhen they meet, they make meaning emerge (Varela, 1993, p. 91). The context has animportant role to play in this emergence of meaning as he writes in Invitation auxsciences cognitives:
La plus importante faculté de toute cognition vivante est précisément dans unelarge mesure, de poser les questions pertinentes qui surgissent à chaquemoment de notre vie. Elles ne sont pas prédéfinies mais enactées, on les faitémerger sur un arrière-plan et les critères de pertinence sont dictés par notre
sens commun, d’une manière toujours contextuelle. (Varela, 1993, p.91)

For the scientist, languages are not merely used to pass on information. They are ameans to couple (Varela’s word) individuals from a same species for action coordination.
Varela says that pure reasoning does not exist and explains that one of the pitfalls inwhich people lure themselves when it comes to language acquisition – among othertypes of learning – is to think that reason and emotions are two separate entities. On thecontrary he asserts that emotions – including the hormonal system – and reasoning areconstitutive of the structure of a body. Reasoning is always affected by emotions. For
Varela, emotions are part and parcel of the learning process:L’intervention de l’implication du corporel et de l’émotionnel dans lesprocessus d’apprentissage qui fait justement l’émergence du nouveau, c’est
essentiel parce que sinon ça ne s’enracine pas dans un travail à dimension
structurelle du corps et donc c’est un apprentissage superficiel (qui) passe trèsvite à une espèce de classement d’oubli d’abstraction. (Trocmé-Fabre, 1994)
Along those lines, he considers that the body/mind continuum in learning – including
language learning – enables long-term memorization. If thought is not separated fromthe body and emotions, then thought and speech are incorporated, they are incarnated,and cognition is enacted.
In Drama Techniques in Language Learning, Maley and Duff explain that language
acquisition involves body, emotions and mind to show that drama activities facilitate
learning:
Language is not purely an intellectual matter. Our minds are attached to ourbodies, and our bodies to our minds. The intellect rarely functions without anelement of emotion, yet it is so often just this element that is lacking in teaching296

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material. Drama attempts to put back some of this forgotten emotional content
into language – and to put the body back too. (Maley & Duff, 1994, p.7)
Aden, a Professor in language sciences, has long studied Varela’s research,experimented drama in language classes and examined the cognitive development oflanguage learners through drama within an enactive paradigm. She writes:
Le passage par le jeu théâtral (…) permet notamment d’associer les langues
apprises à des coordinations d’actions. En effet, la perception d’un nouveau sensn’est pas simplement mentale, elle est rendue possible par la collaboration ducorps et du cerveau en action : le local et le global sont inséparables. (Aden,
2017, p.5)
After thoroughly analyzing Varela’s conception of language acquisition, she has
concluded that interaction is the place where knowledge emerges.
Varela puts forward the creation of the world through the double flow ofaction/perception of the subject and his/her environment. This is what he calls “structural
coupling”. Varela subsequently ventures that if knowledge emerges in the sensorimotor
interaction of the subject with his/her environment, it is not pre-determined but it emerges
in interaction. Therefore, for Aden, drawing on Varela’s theories, the language helps
people to determine themselves and others at the same time: it helps people codetermine themselves (Aden, 2017, p.7). Interactions – which trigger socio-cognitive
conflicts –, be they oral, physical or both, are thus at the heart of learning and teaching,even when it comes to languages, and drama is a device that provides such interactions.
Aden relies on the neuroscientific theory of embodied cognition to study the didactic
value of drama in language learning to show how body, mind and emotions all contributeto language acquisition as well as language learning.
More recently, the discovery of mirror neurons by two Italian researchers (Rizzolatti &Sinigaglia, 2008) has shed light on the capacity of humans to enter into motor resonanceand determined how they feel empathy for each other. Aden considers drama as apedagogical device that permits students and teachers to enter into motor resonance inthe classroom and thus makes the feeling of empathy emerge, ultimately creating a
positive learning atmosphere.
Following the experiments of Aden in France based on Varela’s theories inneuroscience, we decided to verify the impact of drama on language learning and297

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introduced drama and drama activities to stimulate our students through the creation ofa positive learning atmosphere.

4 – Experiments
Experiments with several profiles of French students studying English were carriedout from 2013, the two major ones being a) 30 students completing a bachelor’s degree
in a Business school in 2015 and b) 45 Masters’ degree students in a Department of
Languages and Cultures in 2017.

4.1 – Research Methods
Both of the experiments presented in this article follow the same researchmethodology, including respecting the phases when introducing drama in a language
lesson. Indeed, three phases should be observed. The first phase is called “thepreparation phase” and comprises a) warm-up activities to waken all the senses of thestudents, b) cohesion games to stimulate students to speak and create a playful
atmosphere and interaction among students, c) discovery activities defined as any
activity that promotes verbal exchange without interpreting a role, a character, and d)
preparatory tasks to prepare the performance phase. Teachers need to devote a longtime to these activities to get ready to play. The preparation phase is crucial in that
respect: it enables students to become aware of their bodies and their emotions, and to
get to know each other from perspectives others than scholarly ones. Moreover, carefully
following these activities one week after another helps create some kind of ritual withwhich students become progressively familiar and confident, which leads to establishinga positive and welcoming atmosphere.
The second phase is known as “the performance phase” which consists of playing
roles, embodying characters and being immersed in communication situations in front of
the rest of the class. The long preparation phases, offering activities which are different
from one week to another, enable students to then act more freely, to be more confident,
to trust the others and be free and creative when they play during the performancephases. One of the goals is also to deter fears of judgement by involving every student.
The last phase is “the exploitation phase”: students and teacher go back to thesketches they have seen and played and say to the performers what was positive andwhat was negative, what they liked, what they did not like and justify their comments.
This step is important if students want to improve their competences. This is always donein a benevolent atmosphere, the goal being to be constructive and not judge the others298

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or laugh at them as is explained to them. This step aims at transforming feedback (whatstudents receive) into feedforward (raising awareness about what students need toconsolidate to improve). The following model (Figure1) gives a comprehensive outlook
at how drama activities can be introduced progressively.

1.
Wam upactivities

Cohesion activities

Non-verbal
Breathing exercises
Physical awakening

Preparation phase
Discovery
games

Preparatory activities and tasks(in a traditional classroom)competences to acquire,

Articulation of theverbal and non-verbal

including language skills

Observing emotions

2.

Performance phaseknowledgeknow-howCommunicational
competences

3.

Soft skills

General /transversal
competences

Exploitation phase

Feedback

Feedforward

Figure 1. Suggested model of drama activities in language classes. This figure illustrates thesteps to introduce drama activities in language classes progressively.

To collect data, our experiments relied on observations of the students during thethree phases above mentioned as well as photos and video-recordings of some of theperformances of a few students after asking their permission to use them for research
purposes. We are still working on the transcriptions of the performances. We also
distributed questionnaires after all the courses to get some feedback from the students
since we aimed at knowing whether they felt drama activities create a positive learning
atmosphere and promote language learning.

4.2 – Business school students
The first experiment carried out fell within a pedagogical unit entitled “advertising”,
covering 14 hours (9 lessons) from January to March 2015. 30 B2 students in a French
Business school learning English for specific purposes, that of working in Human
Resources, marketing and management, were required to play roles of professional
advertising agents. The first 11 hours were spent in a traditional classroom using two299

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textbooks: New Insights into Business (Pearson-Longman, 2001) and English formarketing and advertising (Oxford University Press, 2009). For the remaining threehours, a specific room for artistic rehearsals (dance, drama, music) without furniture was
required.
4.2.1 – The preparation phase
Our main pedagogical objective was to train students in the five language skills(reading, listening, writing, speaking, interacting) through various activities and tasks
such as: brainstorming about advertising; differentiating product, service and corporate
advertising; studying slogans and cultural references in slogans (and the problem oftranslating them); learning about the AIDA strategy (catch the audience’s Attention/
make them Interested/ create Desire/ and state the Action the audience should take);creating ads; discovering two companies (Red Arrow and Joys of Germany); placing anorder; creating a new ad to attract British people to Germany for their holidays;
commissioning a new ad campaign to promote a product; writing an email to let
consultants know the decision of the Red Arrow advertising agency; establishing abudget and choosing the right medium to advertise (from a bill of specifications). Thispreparation phase had thus to do with learning and enriching specific vocabulary,differentiating the methods of advertising and the types of adverts, raising awareness onintercultural differences, mobilizing and reactivating the grammatical structures theyknow, learning new marketing strategies, pronouncing new words and learning how towrite emails and bills of specifications.
The course started with warm-up exercises so as to wake the students’ bodies andvocal cords up. After a first series of exercises (walking, stretching and preparing their
voices), the students had to engage in cohesion activities. One example of the cohesion
activities is given in photograph 1. For this activity, they had to think about the productthey had to advertise and pass it along from one student to the next. The productnecessarily changed aspects, weights, sizes, which gave rise to a lot of funnytransmissions – as the smiles on the students’ faces can be seen in photo 1 – andcreated a relaxed atmosphere.

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Photo 1. Cohesion activity, passing on the objects. This photo illustrates how to ease theatmosphere.

The last activity falling within the preparation phase had to do with each grouppreparing their bill of specifications.
4.2.2 – The performance phase
Once all the students and groups finished writing their bills of specifications, they
approached an advertising agency (the roles and matches were given by the teacher)and placed their order for a new advert either for a product or for a service. When they
played the role of the advertising agency, they had to follow the AIDA model. For thisphase, they mobilised and reactivated the vocabulary, grammar and methodologies theylearnt previously, and they had to use their creativity skills. Once the students had all
played the roles both of the clients and of the advertising agents, they had to find thebest advert for their clients and make suggestions. For this occasion, the room wasequipped with a desk and a few chairs so as to help the students pretend they were
professionals working in offices. This task was presented in front of all the other students,
who listened carefully to the proposals, checked if the AIDA model was respected andtook notes on the attitudes of the professionals-to-be.
4.2.3 – The feedback phase
Following the performances of all the groups, the students gave their opinions on the
proposals. The teacher remained in the background so as to note down the phonological,
grammatical and lexical quality of the students’ spoken English and video-tape somepresentations. Feedback came from the teacher but also from the other students. It wasthen possible for two groups to watch the videos (only two groups could be recorded)
and become aware of their strengths and weaknesses in light of what the teacher andthe other students suggested. From that, students were expected to take a step backfrom the decisions and proposals they presented (the teacher wrote advice on linguistic
improvement for some students) and develop cognitive and metacognitive competences

301

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from their performances. A questionnaire was then sent to all of them to collect andanalyse their impressions on drama as a device to support language learning in apositive learning atmosphere.

4.3 – Master’s degree students
Another experiment was carried out in 2017 with students from a Department of
Languages and Cultures. This group was composed of 45 learners with levels ranging
from B2 to C2 due to their various curricula. Their average age was 25. A third of thestudents were in-service teachers, the second third was interested in working in tourism,
culture, and translation, when the last third was more focused on scientific research in
English. All of them were on this course to improve their oral skills in English. They wererequired to learn and play scenes from a Northern Irish theater play after becoming
aware of drama activities to facilitate speaking and listening skills, over a three-month
period, comprising six lessons of two hours each. The three phases above mentioned
were also respected.
After the course, we received some feedback from students about a) this project, b)
what they thought they had learnt and c) how they did so, thanks to a questionnaire we
required them to fill in.
4.3.1 – Preparation phase
The students discovered the preparation phase through lessons 1 to 4. After a courseon the geographical situation and history of Northern Ireland, we started to create a classritual with breathing exercises so as to help students concentrate and create a relaxing
atmosphere (photo 2), and warm-up activities linked to voice training (such as tonguetwisters) and cohesion activities.

Photo 2. Breathing exercises. This photo illustrates how to concentrate through breathing
exercises.

The second lesson had to do with the study of the song “Zombie” by the Cranberries
and the analysis of its video clip. This course was focused on the pronunciation of vowels
when they are sung or spoken and the difference between Irish and English accents that302

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the students had to identify. The students were then required to sing the song all
together.
The third lesson had to do with getting to know drama techniques. We first presented
the pedagogical value of drama and drama techniques on linguistic, general andprofessional competences before doing more warm-up exercises, cohesion activities
and improvisation role-plays in teams (choosing a topic from the news and interpretingit) requiring them to be creative in communication situations.
The last course of the preparation phase consisted in studying the play. The students
discovered the author of the play chosen by the teacher – Ourselves Alone by Anne
Devlin (1941) –. Then we introduced a methodology about how to study a play. Students
had to pick and analyse a theme (characters, place, time, props, stage directions) before
giving oral presentations in groups in front of the class. The teams had to get used to the
new space (which was not a traditional classroom) and occupy it all as can be seen in
photo 3.

Photo 3. Analysing one theme from a play. This photo illustrates how students managed tooccupy the whole unusual space in groups.

4.3.2 – Performance phase
After more warm-up, cohesion and preparatory activities in the last two courses, thestudents had to play scenes from both acts of the play (photo 4).

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Photo 4. The performance phase. This photo illustrates students playing a scene from
Ourselves Alone.

4.3.3 – Feedback phase
Since this unit was meant to help students improve their oral skills in English, theteacher as well as the students/ spectators provided feedback after each lesson where
the students had to present their work and perform the scenes. The focus was on
linguistic, i.e. pronunciation, grammar, vocabulary, but also pragmatic and sociolinguisticcompetences, and comments were designed to permit learners understand their
mistakes and correct them. In parallel, the questionnaire students were given provided
the teacher with some information on whether they considered drama and drama
techniques as a useful pedagogical device.

5 – Results
5.1 – Observations of the teacher
From what we observed during the performances and in the films taken, we can saythat immersing learners in contextualized communicational situations and inviting themto interact in groups led them to dare to speak English.
All the students of both experiments were willing to participate in the drama activities
and prepared all the tasks they were assigned. When it was time for them to speak infront of the whole group, no one complained. On the contrary, they showed motivation inplaying the roles they were given. Even if some of them were not confident with theirlevel in English, they relied on the other team members to help them correct their
mistakes or find the words they lacked. We think that the position of the teacher in such
pedagogical situations, that is to say, remaining in the background, listening without

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interrupting the role-plays and ensuring the “well-learning1” of the students, encouraged
the learners to correct one another and themselves.
Likewise, we noticed that when they worked in groups, even the shiest students
participated in the projects. Students seemed to feel more confident and better equipped
linguistically when they worked together.
Then, the use of their bodies came to complete what they said. Not only did students
exemplify what they meant, what they said through gestures and facial expressions, butthey also dared to mime what they could not express because they lacked words orwanted to express emotions without saying them (being impatient for instance). So, their
non-verbal and co-verbal competences were also trained.
A master’s degree student told us before the course started that he was too shy to
speak in front of a group and that he suffered from a feeling of inferiority, so he was notready to perform in front of the whole class. We reassured him saying that if he did notwant to speak, he could either stay in the background and watch the performances ofthe other groups, or try to participate and mime his role. However, he tried to embody acharacter and managed to speak English. We noticed that he was very proud of himself.

5.2 – Questionnaires
The questionnaires that the students involved in both experiments filled in after thecourses were designed to collect their feelings about drama activities so as to improve
language learning and the creation of a positive atmosphere facilitating language
learning. The different formats of both questionnaires (one for Business students andanother for master’s degree students) do not allow us to present quantitative results; yet,their similarity in term of contents provides a closer look at the strengths and weaknessesof drama as a pedagogical device in language classes, with the emphasis on the positive
facilitating atmosphere conveyed and the subsequent problems encountered.
5.2.1 – Strengths of the device
The first type of advantages that drama brings relates to emotions. A lot of students
stated how motivated they felt particularly when the drama games were close to real-lifesituations (which Viau considers as a criterion of motivation, 2009). They admitted they
were enthusiastic (“I am keen on speaking English more from now on2”) and could becreative (Aden, 2009, writes that the more creative you can be, the more you speak, and1 This is a word that we are deliberately inventing.
2 Translated from their comments in French.

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PRIVAS-BRÉAUTÉ, Virginie – Drama activities to create a positive language learning environment...
Para lá da tarefa: implicar os estudantes na aprendizagem de línguas estrangeiras no ensino superior.
Porto: FLUP, 2019, pp. 292-309
DOI: https://doi.org/10.21747/9789898969217/paraa16

the more you speak, the more creative you are). There was no pressure put upon them(no mark) and the breathing exercises to control stress and concentration helped thementer the activities (André, 2017).
The second type has to do with the use of the language itself. The students said thatinteractions, be they verbal, non-verbal or co-verbal, encouraged them to engage in theactivity, and ultimately, speak more. They also emphasized the absence of precise
directions (like in grammar activities for example) which helped them say what theywanted and interpret the roles as they wished. They felt reassured when they could relyon gestures and mimes when no word came (“when we are out of words, we can mime
what we want to say”) so involving their bodies in the conversations helped themcommunicate.
The final set of advantages is linked to the environment. Many students realized how
the activities were student-centered and some said “usually, we have lessons onphonetics in which we just have to repeat words, sentences, so we are not required toparticipate so actively” and “we had a lot of practice in real-life situations”. They werealso pleasantly surprised by the unusual classroom, with very little furniture. One student
admitted: “I have been able to improve my ease when speaking English and using
space”.
5.2.2 – Weaknesses
The questionnaires have also thrown some light on the weaknesses that the
introduction of drama activities in language classes presents. The most recurring one islinked to emotions. Many students confessed that they felt they were too shy or
introverted to participate and speak in front of a group from scratch. Others were not atease and felt “a lot of stress”. This device was too unusual for them and they said they
were “not at ease with drama”.
Other weaknesses fall within the realm of the use of the language. Some students felt
they had not enough creativity while others not enough guidance, so, they did not talkenough or did not feel confident with their level of English. They admitted they shouldhave spoken more since it was an opportunity for them to do so.
Finally, weaknesses linked to the environment highlight the excess of autonomy thatsome students did not enjoy. All the students complained about the high number ofstudents (many advised to keep the device but to keep the number of students down),
about the heterogeneous levels of language proficiency. Some were bothered by the fact
these drama activities did not lead to any mark, which can be considered as both a306

PRIVAS-BRÉAUTÉ, Virginie – Drama activities to create a positive language learning environment...
Para lá da tarefa: implicar os estudantes na aprendizagem de línguas estrangeiras no ensino superior.
Porto: FLUP, 2019, pp. 292-309
DOI: https://doi.org/10.21747/9789898969217/paraa16

strength and a weakness depending on the importance we give to quantity over quality
or vice versa (see above). Most of them had the impression they did not improve theiroral ability because the lessons were too short.

6 – Discussion
The positive learning environment created by drama activities seems to facilitate
language learning and promote speaking.
Playing roles in teams helps learners consolidate their lexical, grammatical andphonological skills. Students often rely on the other team members to help themovercome linguistic obstacles. Verbal, non-verbal and co-verbal interactions among
them, studied in light of the body/mind continuum as presented by Varela, lead us tobecome aware of the cognitive development of the students in language classes. In Le
corps dans la langue, les techniques dramatiques dans l’enseignement/apprentissage
des langues, Cormanski (1993) writes that the body has such a memory involving
emotions and senses that the cognitive function is fully implicated. This leads to learning
being retained more, which also echoes the theory of Varela about long-term
memorization.
Thanks to the individual comments and advice on the quality of their spoken Englishthat the teacher told them, students are now expected to focus on their personal
weaknesses so as to reach communicative autonomy.
In the questionnaires, a few students pointed out the “enthusiasm” and “dynamism”
of the teacher animating the drama activities, even if no student wrote the word
“empathy”, be it in reference to the attitude of the facilitator or to the other learners, andno one hinted at the participation of all the students. This nonetheless shows that someof them – if not all of them – could feel the positive environment that the teacher aimed
at creating, which leads us to assert that this contributed to motivating them, facilitating
and strengthening their learning.
If drama activities help learners consolidate their communicative competences andimprove general competences (they train to be more at ease, they speak freely, learn tomanage space and time and to control their bodies and emotions), they must also
facilitate the acquisition of professional competences and prepare students for the worldof work (Privas-Bréauté, 2016, 2018). The Business students could realise this because
their role-plays were in line with their training, yet, many master’s degree students did
not see the professionalizing dimension of the drama activities and techniques since theytended to focus on the content and not the form of the tasks they were given.

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PRIVAS-BRÉAUTÉ, Virginie – Drama activities to create a positive language learning environment...
Para lá da tarefa: implicar os estudantes na aprendizagem de línguas estrangeiras no ensino superior.
Porto: FLUP, 2019, pp. 292-309
DOI: https://doi.org/10.21747/9789898969217/paraa16

7 – Conclusion
These experiments have enabled us to demonstrate that drama activities set up a
positive learning environment through the empathy and benevolence of both the teacher
and the students (supported by psychological and neuroscientific theories) and ensure
their “well-learning”. Introducing drama and drama activities in the language classroom
can be viewed as a work in progress (Cormanski, 1993), which reflects the absence of
linearity in language learning and permits the segmentation of competences that can bebuilt progressively and reactivated constantly. Drama activities foster both linguistic andgeneral competences since learners must complete tasks and communicate more andbetter. Role-plays and drama techniques also progressively lead them to build
professional abilities that can be then transferred to real life and real situations. Training
learners speak English through drama activities eventually helps them lessen the
anxiety, stress and fear they may feel when they must express themselves in this foreign
language.
However, in light of the weaknesses put forward by the students, we would
recommend primary school and secondary school teachers to start introducing drama
and role-play in primary schools in France so as to help pupils get used to performing infront of an audience and gain self-confidence very early on: speaking a language is not
only about knowing how to complete tasks successfully, it also has to do with learning
how to relate to other human beings and interact.

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