Children drama for expressing their feeling

Children drama for expressing their feeling

  I chose Anthony Browne's Gorilla as a reference storybook to create the dramatic events. This book is one of the children's books of Anthony Browne, a best-selling author loved by people all over the world. Anthony Browne has said that 'Gorilla' is one of his favorite works. He said that in making this book, he finally understood how to make a picture book properly.

   Hannah, the book's main character, loves gorillas, but she has never seen a real gorilla. Hannah's dad, who is always busy, doesn't have time to go to the zoo with her. Her father offers her a gorilla for her birthday, but Hanna is disappointed when she receives a stuffed gorilla.

  ​ut unexpectedly, while Hannah is sleeping, this doll becomes a real gorilla. Gorilla puts on her daddy's coat and makes a fantastic outing with Hannah. Instead of a busy dad, Hannah goes to the zoo. She wanted to go with the gorillas and watches movies at the theater. When she is hungry, she also eats delicious food together.

  ​I chose this book because it concerns our most significant social problems, 'loneliness and isolation.' Loneliness is the biggest threat to people living in modern times. In the UK, to solve this problem, they even hired a minister in charge of loneliness.


Hannah, in the picture book, is also lonely. She is the daughter of a single dad and only watches television in a dark room while her dad works. Like the other kids, Hannah can't go to the zoo, eat out, or watch a movie because her dad has to work to earn her living. Hannah's situation epitomizes the loneliness of children raised in the home of their single mother or single dad. We, too, have fallen into this terrible loneliness. A scene comes to mind when looking at Hannah's picture of her. You're right. When everything was shut down during the pandemic, we had to sit in the corner of the room watching TV like Hannah in the picture, waiting for things to get better. At this time, our children and we had to fight the terrible loneliness and isolation like Hannah. To Hannah, the gorilla is Superman, who will bring her out of this loneliness.

  ​Another picture in a book shows a gorilla flying around wearing Superman's suit. Hanna suffers from her loneliness due to her social isolation. Still, to Hannah, her gorilla acts like a story that helps her spread the wings of her imagination and fly anywhere, anytime. She runs from place to place with an imaginary gorilla. And wake up from a dream.
And she comes back to reality. Still, her father is always busy, and Hannah eats her breakfast at breakfast, only looking at her big father's newspaper. But she is different from before. She understands her dad and starts helping her dad because she has a sense of accomplishment in her heart that she has already overcome her loneliness through gorillas.
She's grown up like that.

  It would be good to make a drama for children experiencing problems of loneliness and alienation, such as Covid or a child from a broken family. Heinig, R.B. (1992); her favorite story is in the book Improvisation.
"Dramas force children to scrutinize the story more closely to improve their comprehension. They are encouraged to think creatively, pretend to be their favorite characters, and examine life from different perspectives." That said, when viewed from this perspective, Hannah becomes her favorite character, the gorilla, examining her life from her father's perspective. Therefore, when she returned to reality, her father bought her a real gorilla doll as she wished, but she wasn't too happy about it because she had already been gifted a diversified perspective on life.


Therefore, it is meaningful to find our gorilla and create a play for children suffering from loneliness and alienation.
I focused on the importance of the Mime in David Booth's Story drama to create this event. According to him, when students role-play, they find themselves in dramatic situations. Through movement in the drama, students learn concentration and physical control; Extend and improve kinesthetic and spatial awareness. It promotes the trust and sensitivity to others necessary for suitable 'group feeling' activities that the movement creates because Mime is a dramatic act that relies on gestures and movements. i.e., more than words. Emphasis is placed on exploring ideas without dialogue.
Loneliness is a feeling that is hard to put into words. Modern people would not be so lonely if these emotions could be defined, written, and drawn. But loneliness is odorless, formless, and colorless. Like smoke, it seeps into every nook and cranny of our souls. Mime is an excellent way to express this existence of loneliness. Mime brings out the invisible loneliness in a form that can be seen, heard, tasted, and touched. And the moment this is dramatically visualized, we finally face the reality of our loneliness. When we meet it like this and become conscious, we can actively deal with our loneliness more easily, like Hannah.


In that sense, I made a mime play titled "Superman Gorilla" to bring out the loneliness of children.
First, children learn to mime their loneliness. Among the methods suggested by Ruth Heinig, I focus on changing roles in a play. In this play, a child expresses loneliness, and there is a Superman who will solve that loneliness. In other words, they exchange roles for expressing various emotions.
Second. Seeing the Mime of a child expressing loneliness, the would-be Superman raises her hand to mime that loneliness. I will act as a side coach to encourage the children to become loneliness killers as much as possible using Ruth Heinig's creative or directive drama methods.
Third. When the child who expresses loneliness sees Mime volunteering for Superman, thinks that he understands his loneliness well, and believes that he will solve it well, he puts a cape on him. This is one of David Booth's plays, through rituals, through which difficult and complex problems are solved.
Fourth. A child in a cape flies excitedly through the crowd of children. Kids can watch a movie with Superman, go to the zoo, or go to a restaurant. In various mimes, children sing Superman.
Fifth. A child whose loneliness has been resolved receives a gorilla doll from the side coach. In this way, all children will receive a gorilla doll.


This drama will give children hands-on experience with the guidance of Dorothy Heathcote's expert cloak.
The expert's cloak aims to change perception, emphasizes the emotion that triggers knowledge use, composes the whole as a context, views learners as a responsible and active perspective, and provides a subject-integrated approach. Since long-term progress is possible, I actively introduced and created this concept.


Dorothy Heathcote's Cloak of Expertise is a stunning cape that protects, allows flight, and expresses children who may not yet understand the world, problems, and conflicts they find themselves in. I want my drama's gorilla cape to be the same as her cape. And I hope that these cloaks will be used like magic in the educational field.