Twelfth Night teacher's guide - California Shakespeare Theater

Now give each student a card labeled with a number between 1 and 10. Do not allow the student to see what number
card he or she has. Instead, each student will hold the card, for instance, on the forehead, so that everyone else in the
class besides the student can see the number. Ask the students to mill about the room as they did before, but now they
will treat each person according to their number. 10 is high and 1 is low. For instance, if a student sees a person with a
10 (or a King or a Queen), they should treat that person as if they have very high status, i.e., show that person low status
behaviors. The person who is being shown their status should take on those behaviors.
Call Stop or Freeze. Students (still not allowed to look at their cards) must now put themselves in a line from 1-10
according to where they think they belong on the status continuum. Once everyone is in line, reveal the cards.
Coaching: Be very clear that “status” does not mean literally better or worse than someone else. It is one way of
understanding a collection of behaviors that indicate how a person sees themselves or others, i.e., a point of view, not
the truth. If the terms “high” and “low” seem to show judgment to the students, you might want to replace them with the
terms “A” and “B”, which have been shown to work well.
Reflection: Was it clear what status you were? Did you meet people of similar status—how did you know? Did you
end up in about the right place in the line? Why or why not?
Further Reflection: Do you recognize these behaviors from life? Can you name certain characters in movies or
certain actors that play one status or another? (Keanu Reeves plays very high in The Matrix and extremely low in Bill
and Ted’s Excellent Adventure.) Which kind of status behavior lends itself to drama or comedy?
What groups of people are “high status” at your school? Why? Would it be easy to join a high-status group? Why not?
Name the different characters in Twelfth Night and put them in the order of their status. Discuss the order. Does it
change throughout the play? What evidence can you give to support that?
“No one’s allowed to sit down unless
you’re a king.”
-a character describing her short career as a Shakespearean
actress in George S. Kaufman’s play The Solid Gold Cadillac
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