Drama, Oracy and the Power of Performance
Kerry Jackson
Is any other subject doing what drama can do in schools? I don’t think so. Throughout my career as a drama teacher – and now as a university lead tutor – I’ve watched countless students benefit from the knowledge and skills drama equips them with.
Learning how to act – how to talk and connect with an audience, however big or small – is vital for young people. These skills help them be themselves, express their ideas with confidence, overcome their nerves, and adapt to different situations: whether that be a job interview, a presentation, or settling into an unfamiliar environment.
In life we perform many roles, formal and informal, and it’s drama education that is instrumental in giving young people the tools they need for each act they’ll perform. Essentially, as Shakespeare told us many years ago: ‘All the world’s a stage’.
The government’s new oracy framework and Ofsted’s new secondary school toolkit have highlighted the need for subject specialists and the explicit teaching of communication skills. While they do not yet fully recognise the value of drama in the way many teachers like me have understood for decades, they have clearly spotlighted key areas for development. Drama teachers are waiting in the wings, with the skills and tools required to meet these key performance indicators.
When it comes to communicating effectively, articulating ideas and engaging with others, the subject has a powerful role to play. I would argue that it’s a support our young people need now more than ever.
A launchpad for the future
The latest Pearson School Report 2025[1] found that as many as a third of students feel that the skill of ‘speaking confidently in front of others’ is missing from their learning and would help them later in life.
At the same time, almost three in ten say their learning lacks job-seeking, workplace or interview skills, while over a quarter feel they’re missing ‘communication skills and how to interact with others’. That’s a huge number of students feeling under-equipped for the next stage of their lives and future careers.
When taught well by specialist teachers, drama has everything students need to fill these kinds of gaps. We know that EAL learners (those with English as an additional language) benefit massively from drama pedagogies[2], and the same is true for pupil premium learners[3].
But the truth is that in many schools – especially those that are state-funded – the curriculum time for drama may be as little as an hour a fortnight. Time is tight, funding is limited, and it can be very hard to find specialist teachers who scaffold the subject without sparking anxiety.
A non-specialist teacher telling a student to “perform” in front of their peers because school has a “no opt out” policy can do more harm than good. Giving a young person the tools and confidence to perform is not something that can be done through force and behaviour policy. A specialist understands this nuance.
As other corners of the sector start to recognise the subject for what it truly can be – a crucial launchpad for core life skills – will more schools put drama in the spotlight where it belongs?
Connecting us as humans
After a technical revolution that has enabled people to interact without speech, we are bringing up a generation of learners who too often feel unable to communicate, even in phone calls, let alone face-to-face; unable to present themselves and their views through their own voices.
There is a striking irony here: in a world saturated with influencers, TV, film and clips, our curriculum, up until this point, has made little space for teaching drama or recognising the broader UK creative industries, which reached £126 billion GVA in 2022[4].
Through drama, we teach future-proof skills; skills that can connect us as humans. We teach speech: pace, pause, pitch and projection. By exploring plays, we also explore the subtleties that make us who we are: inhabiting emotions, expression, and empathy.
Skilled teachers can use drama lessons to build unique cultures, enabling students to feel comfortable exposing themselves through performance – especially during adolescence, when interacting can otherwise feel so challenging.
Embedding confidence is a key motivator for educators, just as it is for young people. It didn’t surprise me to read, in Pearson’s report, that self-confidence was selected by 54% of all teachers as a top outcome they would prioritise for their students.
Supporting subjects and communities
Drama, in my view, is the way forward – and I suspect most drama teachers reading this, perhaps even all of them, will agree. So how do we work in tandem with the sector to make the most positive impact in this subject?
School leaders: the following paragraphs are for you.
We can start by recognising drama as fundamentally intertwined with the rest of the curriculum. Yes, drama is an art in its own right, but it also supports other subjects. Drama is English, drama is history, drama is society. Drama is the human condition.
Schools can emphasise this power to students and parents to help improve drama uptake. Some might even rebrand the subject as ‘Drama and Communication’.
Giving students more protective time to learn the subject – and teachers more time to teach it – is another critical step in the right direction. And I don’t just mean inside the classroom. Just as it would be unthinkable to teach football without offering opportunities to play matches – or teach music without opportunities to play concerts – schools offering drama should create opportunities for school productions: feel-good events that provide real world scenarios for students to learn from.
In this way, we can create safe, supportive performance spaces that not only bring communities together but give students clear pathways to thrive and develop their skills. Ideally, these spaces will also be safe and supportive for teachers too: built into the teaching workload, rather than becoming an add-on that takes free time and increases stress.
Recognition and access
These changes in how we include drama are not just about improving our recognition of the subject. They’re also about improving access to high-quality teaching, curricula, and resources. To get there, we need to rethink the way drama fits into schools – and in students’ skillsets.
Let’s prioritise creative education[5], shows, trips and dedicated time and space for the subject. Call it communication. Call it collaboration. Call it performance. Call it a powerful place to start as we all face the challenges, the acts and the dramas of our lives.
References:
[1] Pearson.School Report 2025: Learning for Life. 2025
[2] Bell Foundation – EAL assessment Framework – Classroom strategies. 2024
[3] EEF: Oral Language Intervention. 2024
[4] Department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS), “DCMS Sectors Economic Estimates Gross Value Added 2022
[5] Durham Commission, 2021
To find out more about Pearson’s work to cultivate a creative curriculum, visit go.pearson.com/creatives
