Classroom Teachers' Views on the Use of Drama

Abstract. Drama in education refers to the processing of any content through drama and is the form that sees drama as a teaching method. Although various art techniques/forms are used in drama used in education, the main thing is to provide the participants with real experiences by living/role-playing in a fictional environment and to create new learning with this method. The effective use of drama in educational environments provides multifaceted development of students. One of the main goals of drama studies is to raise students as individuals who are respectful, tolerant, understand each other and empathize. It is extremely important that classroom teachers reveal the effects of such an effective and important subject on students in primary schools, which is one of the first steps of the education and training process. In this context, the aim of this study is to reveal the views of classroom teachers on the use of drama method. Phenomenological design, which is one of the qualitative research designs, was used as a method in the study. The data obtained in the study were collected through semi-structured interviews with classroom teachers. The study group of the research consisted of a total of 30 classroom teachers, 14 female and 16 male, working in Malatya city center in the 2023-2024 academic year. Purposive sampling method, one of the non-random sampling methods, was used in the study. The data obtained in the study were analyzed by content analysis method. According to the research findings, almost all of the classroom teachers stated that drama activities should be added to the curriculum. Although most of the classroom teachers did not receive any drama training, they stated that they considered themselves moderately competent and stated that they used drama activities in their lessons. Teachers stated that they mostly encountered problems such as excessive class size, lack of time and physical deficiencies while using drama method. In addition, they stated that drama activities helped students gain skills such as self-confidence, communication skills and learning by doing and living.