In Spring this year, I was delighted to find out that nearly 60% of the boys in Year 8 had selected Drama as an option for Year 9. At that point it also looked like we were heading towards an all-boy A Level class too! From our student voice survey, feedback at parent’s evenings and the reaction of the boys in lessons, I’m sure that the engaging drama sessions, opportunity for challenge, and of course their teachers will have played a part in encouraging this!
This year we have classes across year groups 8 to 13, and our A Level lesson, which is shared with LHS, totalling 41 periods at the Grammar School overall. When I started ten years ago, we had three classes in Year 9 and only one in Years 10, 11, 12 and 13, 26 periods in total. I am really proud that despite facing some difficulties along the way, we have made a really positive impact on the boys. Alongside staff members at LHS, we’re a thriving department who create high-quality productions, deliver top A Level and GCSE results, and that engages with a range of boys and parents.
The staff and boys throw themselves into the warm-ups, activities and discussions. When everyone involved enjoys what they are doing, the impact on motivation and learning are clear. As staff, we love to review where we can develop lessons; tweaking, adding to and adapting our plans to suit individual interests and the classes’ engagement.
Whilst we love to create classes full of boys who go onto stage or screen and into theatrical design or tech, the reality is that what we are instilling in the boys are the skills they need to navigate the wider world and their work. Confidence, creativity in problem solving, initiative, communication, compromise and negotiation skills are all part of the drama toolkit in lessons. We want our boys to be able to look their clients, patients, line managers, bank managers, legal colleagues and pupils in the eye as they speak, and to understand how to deliver a message effectively.
We have had many success stories over the years. Last Christmas three of our boys in Years 9 and 10 auditioned for the professional production of Evita at the Curve Theatre in Leicester. This year, two of them were once again successful and will be appearing in My Fair Lady as part of the professional show. In 2023, one of our former pupils Olly H visited the School to talk in assembly about his career in radio, the highlight of which was doing the Top 40 countdown on Radio 1 at New Years Eve. Another LGS Alum, Ollie C, arrived in Year 6 already a lover of drama. Over his time here he appeared in a pilot for Sky One with Greg Davies, national advertising campaigns for Sony, another campaign in Greece for schools, a horror film called The Dare, Doctors and most notably is now a regular character in CBBC’s Silverpoint.
It is always a proud moment to see the boys making a success in any career, and to see them using the skills they learnt in the Drama classroom to do so is even more rewarding!
