Drama is a practical, effective, and creative tool for developing oracy skills.
It creates a fun space where pupils can experiment with language through improvisations and build confidence through drama games. It also offers a playground to play with speech, and opportunities to talk in front of a group.
Drama gets pupils on their feet, interacting with peers, and using their voices in a way that feels, natural, intuitive, and freeing.
One of the most common instructions in a drama classroom is: “Don’t think – just do!”
This phrase isn’t about abandoning thought but about encouraging pupils to trust their intuition, their voice, and their ideas.
Many children struggle with oracy not because they lack vocabulary or understanding, but because they lack confidence to trust themselves. Drama builds that confidence by shifting the focus from perfection to participation.
Many pupils begin drama feeling shy or hesitant to speak in front of others. Yet, after just a few weeks, teachers and parents often notice remarkable transformations – pupils who once avoided speaking up are contributing with ease.
This change extends beyond the drama classroom: pupils who find their voice in drama often find their voice in other areas of school and life, too. The benefits of drama for oracy include:
- Confidence-building: Speaking as a character or in a role can feel less intimidating than speaking as oneself.
- Listening and turn-taking: Improvisation and group exercises develop active listening skills and the ability to build on other people’s ideas.
- Articulation and clarity: Drama techniques like tongue-twisters, voice exercises, and games improve diction and vocal courage.
And you don’t need to be a drama teacher. One of the biggest misconceptions about drama is that only drama teachers, drama enthusiasts, or extroverts, can teach it. In reality, any teacher, even introverts, can teach drama-based techniques and enjoy them.
How can headteachers support drama for oracy?
As a school leader, you can help embed drama-based oracy work into your school in the first place by simply encouraging your teachers to integrate easy drama techniques to begin with – for example, using drama games for warm-ups, role-plays in history, or hot-seating in English.
More widely, schools can make time for drama-based oracy activities – even 20 minutes of drama work a week can make a difference.
And of course, schools can provide drama teaching materials for teachers (including, ahem, my own books, such as Acting Games for Improv (2024), Acting Exercises for Creative Writing (2024), and Drama Games for Mindfulness and Emotional Health (2025).
Two simple drama activities
To whet your appetite and hopefully prove how easy this work is, here are two easy ideas, the first from Acting Games for Improv and the second from Drama Games for Mindfulness and Emotional Health.
I Found This...
A fun acting game for ages six and upwards. It helps with listening and responding to one another. It requires two or more pupils and five to 15 minutes, depending on the group’s size. You will need a cleared classroom or hall. Pupils sit in a circle (ideally on chairs).
Let’s play! Ask for a volunteer. Approach this volunteer and say, “I found this…” and finish the sentence with a noun. For example, dog, cake, football-sized egg, magic wand, diary, wedding ring,
wallet, alien – all ideas are welcome!
Ask the pupil to react to what you have found. Maybe they are surprised, afraid, in awe, or delighted. Hopefully a conversation will develop. It might go something like this:
- “I found this dragon’s egg.”
- “A dragon’s egg? You should return it, dragons are dangerous!”
- “Oh my goodness, it’s hatching! What shall I do?”
- “Put it down!”
- “I can’t leave it!”
- “What if its mother comes for you?”
- “It’s not an it!”
- “You can’t keep it!”
- “I know, please come with me to take it back.”
In my experience, pupils take this exercise all kinds of places, from the mundane to the magical. Once the improv is over, the person who said, “I found this…” sits down. The other person then approaches another pupil and repeats the exercise with a new object. The game continues until everyone who wants a turn has had one.
You can ask pupils to split into pairs and create their own improvisations with the starting line “I found this…” Some pupils may prefer this over the circle version as they can plan before taking the plunge of performing in front of others.
Once pupils have had a short time to rehearse, the pairs can go up to the front one at a time to show their polished improvisations.
Change Places If...
This is a simple and fun warm-up circle game to help connect the group. The second part of this exercise (labelled “Going further”) is more advanced and can help pupils name their feelings and feel less alone.
Again this game is for pupils aged six and upwards although this time you need at least seven to play. Again, it will take five to 15 minutes and you will need enough room for everyone to sit in a circle on chairs.
Let’s play! Have everyone sit in a circle and you stand in the centre. Explain that the person in the centre is going to say, “Change places if you like…” and then fill in the blank with something they like: strawberry ice cream, spiders, fast cars, or anything else they want (with the exception of other people’s names for obvious reasons). For an older and/or more mischievous class, you might need to remind them to keep their ideas appropriate!
Go first to show them how it works. For example, “Change places if you like reading”. Everyone who likes reading will stand up and swap places, while you sit down in one of their chairs. After, one pupil will be left without a chair. Now it’s their turn and the game continues.
Do this for 10 minutes. If you see pupils purposely trying to be in the middle, ask them not to do this. If the same pupil keeps ending up in the middle, choose someone else to change places with them.
Going further: For this, the person in the middle should say, “Change places if you have ever felt…” and fill in the blank with a feeling: happy, angry, sad, terrified, euphoric, jealous, calm, joyful, proud, confused, grateful, in awe, anxious.
Sometimes children think they’re the only ones experiencing certain emotions, particularly negative ones, and to see that others experience them too can be a relief.
Before you start, lay down the rules: no-one is to judge, laugh, scoff, or say anything mean. This game does require a safe space in your classroom with clear rules and boundaries. Give pupils the option to sit out if they want to. You might need to give definitions of some lesser-known emotions.
Final thoughts
Oracy is a vital skill, and drama provides an engaging, accessible, and highly effective way to develop it. It’s easy to integrate, requires no prior drama experience, and benefits pupils across the board.
- Sam Marsden taught drama full-time for 11 years and still teaches occasionally now alongside her writing. She is the author of Drama Games for Mindfulness and Emotional Health, Acting Games for Improv, Drama Games for Early Years (4 - 7 Years), Acting Exercises for Creative Writing, and 100 Acting Exercises for 8– 18 Year Olds. Visit http://morphopress.com