Drama
Drama is above all a creative activity: the turning of text or idea into performance using a whole range of skills, techniques and media. But it is also about operating as a team, sharing ideas, workloads and responsibility, learning about ourselves and about other people while working on a common project with a clear end in mind.
Drama is about exploring ideas and emotions, about investigating important issues and finding out what makes us laugh and cry, and it is about communication. The practical skills learned — speaking in public, performance, presentation, memorising, solving technical problems — are self-evidently important.
GCSE
Some 30–40 pupils each year opt for Drama at GCSE. We follow the Edexcel specification. This places considerable emphasis on the practical exploration of ideas and texts and leaves us as teachers considerable freedom and flexibility to choose materials, text and focus for the work. In the first year of the course, pupils are given a basic grounding in the elements of drama and the drama medium (both from a performance and a technical perspective), in rehearsal strategies and in a wide range of drama texts. We also explore key periods of theatre history as well as investigating the principal genres of theatre. This provides the basis for examined workshop and portfolio work, which begins in the Summer Term of Year 10, and for the practical work to be completed in the second year of the course.
AS and A level
Each year we have one set of around 8–10 students for Theatre Studies AS and A2. We follow the AQA specification which we feel has a rigorous academic structure as well as enabling our students to explore the practical side of the subject with genuine creativity.At AS, the written paper (worth 60%) comprises the study of a text for performance and reviewing live theatre and the practical unit involves studying the work of an established theatre practitioner and staging an extract from a published play text in the light of his/her work. A2 builds on this foundation, but focuses increasingly on the challenges facing a director. The written paper involves the detailed study of two texts from a director’s perspective and the practical is the creation of a wholly original devised piece. We aim to give our pupils a broad experience of a range of theatre styles and practice and part of the course includes anything up to 15 theatre trips per year.
After St Paul’s
Very few Paulines go straight to Drama School after leaving St Paul’s, as the majority wish to gain the security of a university degree. However, many continue their acting or directing at university and in recent years a number have then gone into the profession, as actors, directors, writers, critics, producers. One is an outstanding Olivier-winning lighting designer. Other alumni include the actor Jamie Bamber of Battlestar Galactica fame, and the renowned production designer, Ken Adam.Academic News
International Olympiad in Informatics
Zhaoxin Wang selected for British team. More
National Schools’ French Debating
Dan Moosdeen-Mui and Francis Thomas win this year’s competition. More
Anglo-Japanese International Science Conference
The first such conference for students was held at St Paul’s this month. More
Target Two Point Zero triumphant
St Paul’s wins Bank of England & Times Interest Rate Challenge. More
Hans Woyda, 2012
St Paul’s has again won the final of this London Mathematics competition. More
