Student playwriting for language development

Abstract

In this article I recommend the use of a particular type of drama activity—playwriting, and subsequent playreading—in English language teaching. I review the potential of playwriting activities for language development as described in the literature. I then describe how I organized playwriting and playreading activities within the framework of a language development course taught to first‐year undergraduate students of TESL at the University of Brunei Darussalam. Playwriting provides a natural context for the integration of the four skills, as students write and rewrite their scripts and rehearse their lines. As an example of an authentic and recognized text type—a play for the theatre—the playwriting activity results in a text of more than transitory value, which is written not for the teacher, but for the benefit of current and unknown future audiences.

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