At a glance
Individual · four entries · each one written in class at the end of a unit · one criteria table, used all four times · together they are a quarter of the seventy described in How Marks Work
What you are making
Four pieces of writing, spread across the semester, in which you look back at what you have just made and say honestly what it taught you. They live in your Drama Journal with everything else — same book, same pen — but these four are the ones I mark.
Everything else in the journal is practice: the entry after a workshop day, the letter Writing in Role, the response to something you watched. Practice is not marked, and that is what makes it usable — you can write that a rehearsal fell apart and it costs you nothing. But a milestone entry is built out of that practice. It asks you to quote your earlier self, and there is nothing to quote if the earliest entries say nothing.
The four days
| When | Written after | What it looks back at |
|---|---|---|
| Thread 1, Day 16 | The tableau performance | Frozen pictures, and your first two weeks in an ensemble |
| Thread 2, Day 18 | The improvisation showcase | Offers, status, and playing without a plan |
| Thread 3, Day 22 | The scene study and the teaching presentations | Character, text, and forms that are older than this school |
| Thread 4, Days 21–23 | The culminating performance | The whole course — this one is Final Reflection, and it is longer |
All four are written in class, in the period, with Journal Checklist open beside you. That is deliberate and it is not about trust: work that carries a mark is done here, where I am in the room, where you can ask me something, and where nobody is judged on how much time they had at home.
How to work
- Read backwards before you write forwards. Open the journal at the start of the unit and read to today in one go. Expect to be surprised.
- Flag two entries as you read: one you had forgotten, and one that embarrasses you slightly. The second is usually where the growth is.
- Make a claim about yourself, then prove it the way Showing Growth describes — date it, quote your own words, then show the now.
- Name your own part. Not “we got better at transitions” — what you suggested, tried, avoided, or changed, and what your group needed from you that you had to learn to give.
- Write in the vocabulary of the course. Writing About Drama is the standard: describe, then interpret, then judge.
Success criteria
The same five rows, all four times. You will not be given a new table in the end of the course — you will be given the same one, and by then you will know it.
| Quality | What it looks like |
|---|---|
| Evidence, not claims | Every claim about yourself is paired with a dated entry, quoted in your own words from the time |
| Your own part named | What you suggested, tried, avoided, or changed — not what “we” did |
| Working with others | You name one thing this unit taught you about collaborating, negotiating, or listening, and the moment it happened |
| What travels | One skill or characteristic you have strengthened that would be useful outside this room, and where you would use it |
| Said in drama | The vocabulary is used correctly and where it belongs — tableau, status, focus, subtext — not sprinkled for decoration |
If you cannot find anything to say (click to expand)
That usually means you are looking for a big change. Look for a small one instead: a thing you now notice that was invisible at the start of the course — where the focus of a scene sits, who has the status in a corridor conversation. New noticing is growth, and your earlier entries prove it was not always there.
Why this is worth a quarter of the seventy
Because a third of this course is not making drama at all. Strand B — reflecting, responding, and analysing — is one of the three, and almost everything in it happens in writing rather than on stage: assessing your own role in the work, explaining what the ensemble taught you, naming what you will carry out of this room. A performance cannot show me most of that. These four entries are where it lives, so they are weighted like a strand rather than like a diary.
Curriculum connection
B1.1
use the critical analysis process before and during drama projects to identify and assess individual roles and responsibilities in producing drama works (e.g., use journal writing, teacher-guided reflection, cooperative problem solving, writing in role, and discussion to identify team members’ skills and knowledge and assess their use in project tasks)
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B2.3
explain how dramatic exploration helps develop group skills and appreciation of communal values (e.g., record in a journal what they learned about collaboration, negotiation, mediation, and listening techniques during the rehearsal process; explain how drama can help strengthen community among both presenters and audience)
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B3.2
identify specific social skills and personal characteristics they have acquired or strengthened through drama work that can help them succeed in other areas of life (e.g., describe their personal development in areas such as risk taking, self-confidence, self-awareness, listening, questioning, negotiating, consensus building)
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