90/22/4 – The Drama in Education Days 2020 were a success!

Over 90 participants from 22 countries meeting over 4 consecutive days to talk about their research and best practice, experiment with online drama methods in various workshops and listen to three diverse and engaging keynotes. These were the Drama in Education Days  2020, held completely online this year, with asynchronous elements (watch videos of presentations) and synchronous events (live discussions, live keynote talks  and workshops).

Given the virtual setting and fitting with current teaching challenges, keynote speaker Dr. Nicola Abraham of CSSD London suggested ways to adapt conventional drama in education methodologies to work online (#TheWaterMethodology), while keynote speaker Dr. Erika Piazzoli (Trinity College Dublin) discussed “Resilience and Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge in post COVID-19 Education”.

As the conference has always been bilingual, the third keynote was held in German and speaker Manfred Schewe (Prof. em. Cork University College and co-founder of Scenario) shared his personal journey towards teaching literature performatively.

The Drama in Education Days provide a platform for language teachers of all levels, who are interested in teaching and learning through drama and theatre. In light of the current Covid-19 induced travel restrictions and lockdowns, organisers Eva Göksel and Stefanie Giebert had decided to reorganize their annual ‘Drama in Education Days’ conference as an online event. This had seemed quite experimental at the beginning, however – as participant numbers and the positive feedback from conference attendees suggest – it turned out to be a success.

The conference programme with links to abstracts: https://dramapaedagogik.de/en/conference-schedule-zeitplan/