Educational Theories

There are many theories that can be applied to teaching drama with any group. These theories not only inform your practice, but hopefully are visible in your classroom!

Scroll down to find information on:

1. Learner's Theory - Dwyer, 1996
2. Multiple Intelligences Theory - Gardner, 1983
3. Bloom's Taxonomy - Bloom, 1959

Learner's Theory

Students remember....  

20% of what they HEAR
30% of what they SEE
50% of what they READ/WRITE
70% of what they DISCUSS
80% of what they DO/EXPERIENCE
90% of what they TEACH

Learner's theory helps demonstrate that the best way for students to learn is through experience and teaching others. This is essential for lesson planning, classroom management, and student success. Within a junior drama classroom, students could be responsible for researching a drama strategy, learning about it and practicing it, and finally teaching their class the strategy. An activity such as this would provide students with the highest likelihood of remembering what they have learned.

Multiple Intelligences Theory

The Multiple Intelligences Theory demonstrates the variety of intelligences within a classroom and the need to cater to all of them. Traditionally, lessons cater to verbal-linguistic and logical-mathematical students. It is important to not only alter your teaching so that all intelligences are engaged in lessons, but it is also important to accept many different expressions of knowledge since not all may be able to put pen-to-paper to explain their understanding.

Bloom's Taxonomy

Bloom's Taxonomy is a classification of ways and levels of learning. This classification distinguishes between the levels and deepness of learning, understanding and expression of information. The lowest and most often accessed level is knowledge, otherwise known as remembering. This level requires students to recall, recount memorize, and think back. As you move up the pyramid to the more narrow parts, the expression of information grows in difficulty and complexity. The parts near the top of the pyramid are the deeper levels of thinking and expression. Evaluation, also known as re-create, is the highest level of the pyramid. This highest level of thinking requires that students invent, construct, compare, and evaluate ideas. When teaching, you should aim to have students working in the higher levels of the pyramid as these levels deepen their understanding and likely lead in lasting knowledge.