Most students would rather watch a story unfold on a movie or television screen rather than read it in a book. What many kids don't realize, however, is that every movie and television show they watch on the screen started on the printed page with the written word. Use screen villians like Darth Vader to help teach your students the art of dramatic storytelling. You can do it by incorporating screenplays into your English and literature units. The simple truth is that there would be no movies without writers.
Screenwriters give birth to the stories that eventually unfold on the movie screen.
Written in the timeless three-act structure, a good screenplay can show students how master storytellers introduce characters and use fiction and literary techniques to create dramatic tension between them. Movie scripts are a good way to teach the basics of good story telling techniques because screenplays rely heavily on dramatic structure to move the plot line and story forward. It's a Wonderful Life is just one of the hundreds of scripts your students can download from the Internet. It's a Wonderful Life to recent releases such as the horror film Scream . Movie scripts sometimes contain language that may be inappropriate for some students.