How does a School play impact on students and teachers personally and professionally, and in relation to the school community?
Keywords: MLT2020
MLT

Throughout the early stages of my teaching career my school have been seeking to improve GCSE attainment and progress eight scores. This has been due to a decline in these in comparison with the national average over the past four years. Whilst the initiatives being implemented to try and support this are appropriate and necessary, they have at times been felt to be to the determent of school community and have also pulled focus away from the Arts subjects and extracurricular activities. In order to try and restore these feelings of school community I decided to organise a school play, an activity that students and teachers could work on alongside each other to achieve a common goal. I worked collaboratively on this with the head of Drama, in the hope that we could see an improvement in feelings of school community and connectedness for both teachers and students.
The rehearsal process began in the middle of September and the play was performed in the last week of term in December. Through this project I seek to investigate the impact that participating in a school play has on students and teachers’ feelings of school connectedness and community, and whether participating in an extracurricular Drama group activity has a positive impact on this.
The research in this area generally covers the positive impact that extracurricular Drama has on students’ self-esteem and confidence. It also discusses the rehearsal room being a safe space for students to explore emotions and practise interpersonal skills and communication, as well as the area that I am most interested in understanding, how participating in Drama activities can enhance or support feelings of school community and connectedness.
There was a small number of participants in this study which means that it is difficult to take a broad view. A significant proportion of participants in the play are those that struggle of find acceptance elsewhere in the school community for a number of reasons, so sought this through Drama. After conducting two rounds of qualitative questionnaires and two rounds of individual interviews with a smaller range of students and staff involved some of the most significant findings were that the students confidence grew throughout the rehearsal process, and was sustained even after the play was completed. They also reported increased social interactions and feelings of school connectedness and desire to attend school while the play was being rehearsed, however this decreased after the play was completed. Teachers and students alike commented on viewing each other in a different light after the play and felt that this led to stronger feelings of community. A stronger sense of community was also enhanced by knowing a wider range of people from across year groups.
Overall, the aim of this study was to explore whether participating in a school play could enhance feelings of school connectedness and positively impact on the school community. Taking this research into consideration, it is my desire to endeavour to create and offer a more sustainable way that the feelings of community and connectedness created through the play could be sustained in the long term for both students and teachers.