Shakespeare: Words and Actions - a Calgary Regional Consortium Workshop

On October 19 I attended a session put on by the Calgary Regional Consortium entitled “Shakespeare: Words and Actions”. Michael LoMonico, Senior Consultant on National Education for the Folger Shakespeare Library, facilitated the session. LoMonico’s primary objective was to show how learning through performance can be one of the most effective ways for students to understand the language of Shakespeare. Many adult students (myself included!) may be hesitant to perform in front of the class, but performance does not have to be an elaborate, stressful production. LoMonico shared several simple performance activities with the participants, and even as teachers we could see how our understanding of Shakespeare’s language was deepened from these simple activities:

• Before you begin a Shakespeare text, introduce students to the language by choosing a passage that is full of imagery, not necessarily from the play you will be studying. LoMonico chose the captain’s monologue in Act I Scene ii of Macbeth, and had us read the passage as a class while standing, and acting out the imagery. Reading and acting together took away some of the “fear” and acting out the imagery helped to put meaning to the words.
• Using Friar Laurence’s monologue at the end of Act V in Romeo and Juliet, randomly assign students the names of all the characters that are referenced in this speech. Reading as a class, every time there is a pronoun in the speech, students need to point to the student who have been assigned the character the pronoun is referring to. This really forces students to pay attention to who is being referenced (and you sneak a grammar lesson in, as well).
• Using a scene (we used the Act I Scene ii from Midsummer Night’s Dream) split students into two groups: directors, and actors. The actors are essentially ‘puppets’ in this activity, as the directors will be telling them exactly what they should be doing and how they should be saying their lines. This really forces students to visualize the meaning of the text, while creating their own interpretations. This was by far one of the most surprisingly effective performance activities that we participated in during the session.

We also took part in several language based activities; for example:

• Once students have become more familiar with the language of the text you are studying, give them a scene (we used Act IV Scene ii from Macbeth) and have them work in groups to cut down the lines in the scene by half. This activity allows students to think about what is really important to understanding the scene. We found that the first to go was imagery and characterization, but what we were left with was a very precise interpretation of the plot development in that scene.
• To help students recognize and understand tone and visualize the text, provide them with a scene (we used Act III Scene iv from Romeo and Juliet) and working in groups, have the students distinguish the tone with which each line is said. At the same time, students should be writing their own stage directions for what they imagine the characters are doing.

The Folger Shakespeare Library website has these activities, and many more valuable resources and lesson plan ideas for teachers to access, including resources on how to approach Shakespeare when working with students with an ESL background. LoMonico and the Folger Shakespeare Library were also involved in creating Shakespeare resources for educators for PBS. The interactive approach to Shakespeare presented in this workshop is just one way to counteract the apprehension that many adult students have about studying Shakespeare.