A presentation given at the 2008 South Atlantic Modern Language Association Convention held in Louisville, Kentucky.

1. Drama, Language, and Thought:
Vygotsky, Stanislavski,
and You

2. by Gary Carkin, Ph.D.
Graduate Professor of TESOL
The Institute for Language Education
Southern New Hampshire University
Manchester, NH USA

3. No Words, No Voice, No
Language – Just Compassion
By Martha Epperson
The Essential Teacher
March, 2008

4. • TESOL-Drama
• EVO_Drama
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/EVO_
Drama_2008/

5. Gary’s Research Website
http://garycarkin.tripod.com/garycarkinseslefldramalog/

6. Dr. Daniela Bacova
Slovakia

7. Torun Teacher Training College
Torun, Poland
Anita Debska
Joanna Ciechanowska
(Przewiezlikowski)

8. London School of Language and
Drama
• Actor training through English as a second
language
• Concentration exercises
• Mime
• Improvisation
• Poetry reading
• Scene study

9. Nicole Kupfer
Zurich, Switzerland
•Students create original texts
•Students play their own musical
instruments
•Students dance
•Students prepare lighting, sound,
costumes, and properties
•Students rehearse using the target
language on and off stage

10. Julie O’Sullivan
New York University
System
New Paltz, New York
•Uses mime
•Movement
•Scene study

11. Alexis Finger
Drexel University
Philadelphia, PA
• Uses contemporary drama
• Students read plays
• Students see plays
• Students discuss plays
• Students re-write plays
• Students perform their rewritten plays

12. George Plautz
English Language Institute
University of Utah
Theatrical Production Course
•Students rehearse play
•Students work on props, set, sound,
and costumes
•Study all aspects of production

13. Second Language Acquisition
Theorists
Krashen – Affective filter
Krashen – Comprehensible input
Hatch, Pica, and Long – Task based and
natural approach
Boulton, Heathcote, Freire, Kao, O’Neill
– Learner centered

14. Lev Semenovitch Vygotsky
•Zone of Proximal Development –
Mind and Society (1978)
•Thought and Language (1976)

15. Thought and Language
A person starts with a MOTIVE to speak.
The motive generates
INNERSPEECH/SUBTEXT.
The inner speech/subtext generates a
THOUGHT/IMAGE.
The thought/image generates a FEELING.
The thought/image/feeling is communicated
through the MEDIUM of (L2) SPEECH.

16. Motive or Intention
•State motivating desire in specific
terms
•Words are tools to achieving an
objective
•Intentions must be expressed in
active terms
•Doing, not being

17. Inner speech or Subtext
•Abbreviation of syntax
•Predicates
•The thought behind the text
•The meaning based upon context
•Sense and meaning combine

18. Image
Create flow of images based upon
motive/subtext/inner speech
Wait for feeling
Link to text
Link to inner monologue

19. Feeling
• Created through work with motive/inner
speech/subtext/ and image
• The thought creates the feeling
• Thought/feeling support the meaning of the
text

20. Conclusion
Language acquisition/production
occurs when a learner moves from
motivation to inner speech or subtext
to a flow of images that excite a flow
of feeling. The feeling leads to
selection of L2 words and syntax
related to the context/circumstance
for which they are used. A written
text can help the process of language
acquisition because it supplies
vocabulary/grammar in context.

21. Using drama for life
Drama trains learners to control their
thought processes.
Thought can be directed to envision
positive results
Such constant imaging of positive
results produces the results desired.

22. The Secret
By Rhonda Byrne

23. The End
(and a beginning?)