Lesson Plan

Theme: Superheroes – The Super In You Subject: Drama

Lesson: 1 of 6 Cross Curricular: Literacy, Dance

Students & Space Resources Learning Styles

Key Stage: 2 • Draw string bag with • Linguistic words and language
Year: 3/4/5/6 varying super hero • Logical-Mathematical logic and numbers
No in Group: 30 props/costume items • Musical music, sound, rhythm
Space Req’d: Classroom or • Superheroes Slides • Bodily-Kinaesthetic body movement control
Drama Studio [provided] • Spatial-Visual images and space
• Interpersonal other people's feelings
• Intrapersonal self-awareness
Learning Objectives
By the end of the lesson the students will be able to:

• To adopt the role of a super hero and show how they might move
• To use our own bodies and voices to show the character we make in a ‘real’ way

Drama Strategies Literacy Focus – key vocabulary

• Role • Cape • Disguise
• Action • Hero/heroine • Powers
• Character • Mask • Strength
• Identity • Alias
Differentiation Strategies – G&T and SEN Homework

• Group/pair work Design your own super hero

• Teacher modelling TIR
• Student demonstration
• Language and visuals on board

Notes
This symbol indicates there are further resources or explanations available on the Drama Toolkit website.

This is the first lesson in the unit The Super in You. You can use it as a stand alone superhero lesson, use it to kick
start your own scheme or download the rest of the unit from the site. It has been written with key stage 2 in mind but
it could be appropriately adjusted to be taught with a year 7/8 class too.

Additional external resources:

Make a superhero with the online machine (could also help with homework):
http://www.ugo.com/games/superhero-generator-heromachine-2-5

Interactive games/ideas you could use with your whiteboard:

http://learnenglishkids.britishcouncil.org/en/category/topics/superheroes

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Copyright © 2010-2011 www.dramatoolkit.co.uk

Lesson Plan
Theme: Superheroes – The Super In You Subject: Drama
Lesson: 1 of 6 Cross Curricular: Literacy, Dance

Activities

Warm-up/ Starter Physically warm-up the class and get them ready for the session:

8 count shake
Students are in a circle and you all count 1-8 whilst shaking your left hand, then right hand, then left foot, then right
foot e.g. Left hand shake - "1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8," Right hand shake - "1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8"...then left foot and right foot
You do the sequence again but this time count down from 7. You repeat this decreasing every time and on the last
set of 1 you jump up and shout something like ‘ready!’

Name shape shifter

Get the students to write their initials in the air with their finger. Explore dynamics and try it in a really huge/small,
slow/fast way etc. Now ask them to choose a different body part (the teacher modelling as you go). Now they
choose the body part and the dynamic they both preferred and in pairs they teach their partner the way they’ve
chosen.

Introduction
Now our minds and bodies are ready to start the lesson. Bring the class together sat in a Drama circle. The teacher
has already prepared a simple string bag with some clues for the class about what you’re about to begin looking at.
This is a good hook for a lesson, can build anticipation and can be adapted for lots of different lessons. In the string
bag pull out relevant clues for a super hero. This could be:
glasses, a cape, a speech bubble with the word Kapow, an eye mask, comic book, utility belt etc
Remember that the order and gradual reveal is important here.

Questions: Who could this belong to? How do you know? Etc Get the students to justify and modify their decisions
as the items leave the bag. Hopefully, the class will guess super hero and you can explain the focus.
[Resource: Slide 2]

Development

Traffic lights adaptation: Instead of Red you say Mr Freeze, instead of green you say fly and instead of amber
you say kapow and the students have to make up their own action that goes along with the word.

Discussion: hold the game and discuss with the students what other appropriate super hero words they can think
of. Record them on paper or whiteboard. [Resource: Slide 3]

Put the students into pairs and ask them to choose 3 of the words from the discussion (written on board). If it’s
appropriate the teacher may decide to use added support by allowing students to use the word kapow but then they
must think of 2 of their own.
Task: they will need to create an action that goes with each of their chosen words Then they will have to decide
how their super heroes sound when saying their words. When they perform the pairs will say the word together (in a
choral way) and the action they’ve created– model this.

Give the students a set time to create.

Plenary
Remind the students of the first learning objective ‘To adopt the role of…’ Explain to students that they will watch
the pairs and then judge how well they have done in achieving the objective. Once the student pairs have
performed ask them:
Thumbometer [Resource: Slide 4]
Q: Did they move like a super hero?
• Thumbs up means yes it was very good
• Thumbs wobbling in the middle means ok
• Thumbs down means no they didn’t

Perform to each other

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