KS3 Drama Lesson Plan Masks: exploring characters - Boardworks

Lesson by
Patrick Salvadori
Focus
Background
Resources
KS3 Drama Lesson Plan
Masks: exploring characters
• Using body language and movement as an explorative technique
• Using status as part of a characterisation
• Using mime-based improvisation to devise a scenario (lazzo)
Masks are a very exciting prop to use in a drama course at any level but especially at
KS3 when it might be the first time for many of the students to use masks in a serious,
focused way. Students usually regard masks as fun to wear (Halloween; parties; etc.)
and treat them very casually because of this association. Without spoiling it for them,
the more the teacher turns this event into a ritual – something special – the students
will really appreciate the power of masks to make a strong impact on an audience and to
transform the appearance of the performer to such an extent that he or she becomes not
only unrecognisable but uncannily eerie or mysterious on stage.
It is worth investing in a set of different masks as a resource for the drama department.
A set of about 7 or 8 quality masks is a very valuable resource that can be used on many
occasions with all age groups, so the money won’t be wasted.
My suggestions are the following:
Download the free materials from
www.boardworks.co.uk
• Boardworks KS3 Drama presentation, ‘Masks’.
• Trestle Theatre Company sell a box of masks
with instructions on how to use them and
how to make masks.
• There is a quality set of half-masks that
can be bought very cheaply from Mamelock
Press Ltd, PO Box 12, Bury St Edmunds,
IP32 6NQ. These masks are also on sale at
the Victoria and Albert Museum and the
Museum of London. They usually stock a wide Free sample material: KS3 Drama, Masks
selection of these Victorian masks and they are
particularly effective for work on body language and status.
• Piano music from silent films. This can be bought cheaply from the BBC or played
directly from the web.

Lesson continued...
Aims & Objectives
Main Activity (Phase 1)
KS3 Drama Lesson Plan
Masks: exploring characters
• To enable students to appreciate the transformational power of masks,
both on themselves and an audience
• To enable students to highlight characters’ attitudes and status through
their body language and movement in the acting space
• To enable students to devise scenarios that focus on the actions and
movement of characters rather than what they say or the dialogue between them.
Show the students a slide about gestures and
movement taken from the Boardworks KS3 Drama,
Masks presentation. Discuss the effect of the
performers wearing the masks in the different
images.
Place four or five masks on a table to show the
students. Get them to walk past the masks and
consider the expressions on the masks. Ask them
to consider what gestures or movement they think
would go with the masks you have laid out for
them on the table.
Free sample material: KS3 Drama, Masks
Get a group of four or five to go up to the table, put on one of the masks and then stand in
the acting space. If all the other students are sat in front of them as an audience and you
have the use of stage lights, this will be more effective. Fade in the lights slowly and when
you have done so the students have to show a freeze frame signifying a gesture of greeting,
welcoming, shooing away, aggression, etc. When the lights snap off and snap on again the
students perform a brief piece of movement related to their gesture. The lights snap off again
and this time each student performs a different freeze frame. Fade in the lights; snap them
off. Movement signifying the new gesture. Snap off the lights.
This could be done three times so that each group gets to perform three gestures with
accompanying movement. When this phase has been concluded the students can discuss
the effect on them as an audience and as performers. Most of them will have found it ‘weird’
but the question is why?

Lesson continued...
Phase 1B
KS3 Drama Lesson Plan
Masks: exploring characters
If the students try to answer this question it will help them to understand how masks
depersonalise the performer and at the same time invest the performer with an attitude
and behaviour beyond his / her control…
Show the students a slide from the same
Boardworks presentation on the stock characters
of commedia dell’arte, with descriptions of their
qualities and the masks they typically wore.
Explain the background to the slide by telling
them about the style of commedia dell’arte – the
lazzo, which is a typical slapstick scenario used
frequently by commedia dell’arte performers to
create a sense of chaos and generate lots of visual
humour. They used mime and therefore projected
their gestures and movement so that the audience
could appreciate the humour and follow the story.
Free sample material: KS3 Drama, Masks
When the students have understood the nature of this style, get them all to devise and
rehearse a similar scenario without any masks. When it is their turn to perform their
scenario in front of an audience then they will be given the masks to wear. This discipline
of not distributing the masks until the time of the performance makes them special and also
emphasises the point that the students need to prepare for their use of the masks. They
can’t be put on casually and ‘messed around’ with!
When you think they are ready, play the silent films music. This should last about a minute.
Now tell the students that they have to maintain their discipline but perform their mime /
movement sequences in double time or faster, as the commedia dell’arte performers did in
their touring performances. The students really enjoy this condition on their performances.
Play the music a few times so that they get their timing right for their beginning, middle and
end. When they are ready they can now perform their final versions and evaluate the result.
Want to try out more from Boardworks Drama products? Then why not order your
free sample disc at: www.boardworks.co.uk/drama