Teaching Staff

Curriculum Intent 

We believe that students deserve a broad, balanced and ambitious Drama curriculum, rich in skills and knowledge. Drama is an important component in educating a well-rounded individual, giving essential opportunities for growth and challenge beyond the mere subject content. Our Performing Arts Department has a firm philosophy founded on preparing the minds of young people to cope with the outside world as well as educating students about theatre and its history.  This serves to enhance their emotional and social development as well as offering them cultural capital. Our knowledge and skill driven curriculum builds personal competences which can be relied upon to succeed, not only in drama lessons, but beyond school life and in future employment. Drama promotes self-esteem and provides pupils with a sense of achievement regardless of academic ability. We aim to develop pupils’ interpersonal skills and to stimulate their imaginations to explore issues beyond their own experience, in a safe and supportive environment. 

The Drama curriculum is successfully adapted and developed to be as ambitious as possible, and to meet the needs of SEND pupils. It centres on social and communication skills which enable pupils to enjoy and achieve. Drama is the inspiring, rigorous and practical subject which prepares all young people to live and work with confidence in the wider world. The creative arts industry is growing faster than any other sector in the UK and the Drama curriculum at The Academy of St Francis of Assisi is designed to promote the creativity, empathy and problem solving skills needed for careers in this sector. 

Drama places unique demands upon the critical thinking and emotional engagement of participants. It challenges pupils to move from a superficial response to texts and situations, to a more sophisticated response. When pupils are emotionally engaged they experience for themselves roles, tensions and dilemmas while being able to step outside a text or situation to gain an additional perspective. Developing this ability to participate and observe means that, given a new situation, text or dilemma, pupils are able to transfer their analytical skills to them. 

 We intend for pupils at The Academy of St Francis of Assisi to explore, experiment and express themselves in a safe and non-judgmental environment. In Drama, pupils can expand their thought processes and learn to articulate their ideas, opinions and feelings. Because of the variety of options within the subject (performance, design, director, writer) all pupils have the opportunity to thrive, mastering the knowledge and skills and becoming autonomous, creative and critical thinkers. 

The strategically planned Drama curriculum is sequenced from Y7 to Y9 to ensure all students have sufficient knowledge and skills, preparing them for a culturally rich life outside of school, but also for GCSE Drama and beyond. Knowledge based learning gives everyone in KS3 the opportunity to gain cultural capital and an appreciation of the rich influence of Drama in society, as well as practical skill-based assessments.   

We believe that being able to study and perform characters that look like and reflect the lived experience of students raises self-esteem and aspiration and so we are building our curriculum to ensure the majority of our students leave school having studied a play or novel that includes a character that is relevant to and representative of who they are.