Is there a cure?

A team of scientists is required to visit the rainforest, to work collaboratively with the indigenous peoples, to discover a plant that will help cure the common cold. Using in-role, hot seating, movement, art and design students will investigate the world around them. This scheme of work will enable students to identify and imagine a plant from the future that can cure an illness, such as the common cold, and explore the importance of respecting the culture of the indigenous people in the rainforest.

The scheme is linked to KS2 speaking, listening and responding, group interaction, drama objectives, language variation and composition from the English National curriculum. Global awareness and respect for other cultures and their way of living are also embedded within the drama. Elements of the science curriculum are woven throughout the plan: SC1 scientific enquiry and Strand 5 in the National Curriculum: living things in their environment.

Students are actively encouraged to make connections, justify their ideas and opinions by drawing on evidence from the collaborative drama, their direct experience in the local environment, and from additional research. All the activities enable the students, in-role as research scientists, to work collectively to present a ‘talking report’ of their ‘cure’ to an audience for discussion.

Learning objectives:

By the end of this scheme the students will have learned to:

• Speak with confidence about their point of view and ideas
• Listen, understand, respect and respond appropriately to each other in group and whole class discussions
• Ask relevant questions to clarify, extend and follow up ideas, observations and opinions shared in the drama activities
• Talk effectively as a member of a group, qualifying and justifying their opinion, design or idea
• Use dramatic techniques such as: in-role, thought tracking, soundscape and freeze frames to explore
• Evaluate how they and others have contributed to their talking report
• Apply their experiences to develop and deliver a group talking report about their plant that can cure an identified illness 
• Describe the functions of leaves and flowers of rainforest plants and trees
• Explain the effects of the elements: light, water, temperature and air on the plants in the rainforests
• Know the different features of plants that enable them to survive in the different layers in the rainforest
• Speak respectfully about the indigenous people of the rainforest showing awareness that they have a different culture and way of living that is equal to the West
  

Number of Lessons: 4