Role Play Activities
This page describes the technique and the uses of the role play model and then lists all the activities that are based on this model.
Role Play or Simulation?
How does a role-play differ from a simulation? It’s a delicate difference but I’ve used role-play to describe activities which are built round students taking decisions as if they are in a given historical situation. These decisions can lead to movement round a map but the focus is on the decisions. In simulations students re-enact, for example, an event but don’t face options and make choices.
Almost all of the role-plays are very closely structured, much more so than many people expect on hearing the words “role-play”. Movement is directed by the teacher rather than being left to students. Much greater emphasis is placed on thinking – thinking from the inside of the situation. However there are examples of more open-ended role-plays. Geoff Lyon’s activities on the pre-1832 election and on 1930s unemployment provide good models of these.
Why use a role play?
They work at all levels, up to and including undergraduate level and can be adapted to accommodate a wide variety of demands and levels of detail. The major benefits are:
- they are an effective introduction to people, names, a sequence of events and places
- they develop students’ understanding of the motives and attitudes of people in the past
- they can bring out clearly why sources might have gaps or be subjective and why interpretations differ
- they help students develop an understanding of the complexity of past situations, a much greater complexity because they are, for a lesson, taking part in the historical event.
- they stimulate effective reading, especially at A level and above
- they help students to care about the people in the past because they identify with parts they and their friends have played.
- they require a lot more concentration than standard lessons – any moment you might be put on the spot to make a crucial decision!
Note-Taking
One final practical point – note-taking, particularly at A level. If you have sufficient students pairing them up, one as role-play participant and one as note-taker on behalf of the pair is a useful way of ensuring everyone has a set of notes to take away. If necessary, provide note-takers with structured guidelines for the notes.
How do you create a role-play?
I've drawn up a diagram to sum up the process I follow.
This picture only shows a corner of it.
Click on the picture to see the full diagram.
Activities
Walk through the events and ask pupils to take the key decisions |
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Create a map of England, walk your pupils through key decisions and see how their chronicles match up to the real thing. (Don't forget the hair dryer!) |
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Put your pupils into roles, find out who survives and explore the consequences of the Black Death |
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Put your students into role as villagers facing the aftermath of the Black Death, French attacks and Poll Taxes |
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A role play – will your nobles depose the king? |
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A role–play introduction to the people and events for A level and above |
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Turn your room into a map of Europe and chart Henry's road to glory – or failure |
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A role play that focusses on people and the importance of monasteries to communities |
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A role play for A Level students who take the roles of the leading villagers of Deerhurst, dealing with the pressures put on them by Royalists and Parliamentarians |
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Liven up the railway revolution with a trip from Stockton to Darlington |
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A role play that’s simply not fair – but very good for learning |
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Test your acting skills and get your students researching Chartism with renewed interest and purpose |
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Walk your students through the map of Europe and make your decisions - then discover the grim reality |
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Sally Burnham demonstrates how these complex events can be readily assimilated. Chocolate biscuits an essential resource! |
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Make the Depression personal and enhance students' understanding |
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Were the politicians of the 1930s really blunderers? |
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