The book I was working on in class (or just reading) was automaton which was about a boy whose sister was sick and had to go and work in a factory that was making dolls (more like robots) that could walk and talk. It was Thomas Edison’s factory and the book was set in the 19th century and supposedly based on a true story; maybe not the boy’s experience but the failure of the dolls to be accepted by society. In the book every character seed to be like every other character, all the bosses looked the same and the workers all looked like the boy, this seemed to point towards the workers becoming like robots because they were doing repetitive work day in day out for pittance (they were building robot/dolls but actually were making themselves robots/dolls). It also brought up issues of oppression of working class (communism), completing all the work and having no ownership over it, also that they were the ones in need of more money and help but got none because of their status. This also raises issues of child labour and social welfare; is it right to send children into the workforce to support an otherwise poverty stricken family. I could even go so far to say that the non-acceptance of the dolls in the story reflected that people were not designed to work in such conditions.
I guess the key question for me is ‘is it right to take advantage of the working class and children that have no other options?’ Now how to make the drama meet this objective?
- still images of working at the doll factory
- scene showing how the little sister became sick
- what happened to the family after the doll factory was shut down
- two different teacher in roles, one of a struggling man who needs to support hsi sick wife so his son or daughter must work as well and one of a child worker who life is so bad because he has to work.
- Movement sound piece depicting what the doll sounded like and how it moved.
- paired impro’s between the boy and his sister or the boy and his mother or the boy and the boss with his silver teeth
- actually the conversation between the big boss with silver teeth and the boy on his first day, their meeting.
- students could show scenes of the dolls non-acceptance or acceptance when they got one (playing the rich children who didn’t have to work in the factories)
- a whole group protest against the factory, maybe because of the dolls or maybe against child labour
- students could write an obituary (I know that’s a bit morbid but when death is an issue grief is an emotion that should be stirred) for the little sister who dies
- students could write a letter of complaint to Thomas Edison about the dolls
- the students could stage a debate between factory owners and workers about whether it is right or wrong to employ children.
- Documentary style or report style drama on the lives of those involved in the dolls factory.
- moving sequence with sound showing a production line at the factory, one starts then next goes in and then next until all apart of it.
The more I think about it the more and more ideas that keep coming into my mind but I’ll leave it at that before I get really carried away. I think it could be added with research or documentation about medical facts of children working in factories and built towards a morale choice for them.

It seems from the reading that when Simons conducted this drama with three different groups similar ideas came back to her through her student’s reflections. The first group of Yr10 students reflected on how much the drama made them aware of their own and others ideas. Some of the second group (pre service teacher) also reflected on how the drama made them feel about their own ideas of life, death and religion. This not being Simon’s intention for this group rather it being to focus on the actual processes of the drama and the meta-cognition associated with that. The third group of in service teachers tended to reflect on how this technique of process drama would work with their own students and ended up developing and critiquing each other’s ideas of lesson they could run. These examples highlights Simons points from the beginning of the article that as a drama teacher you begin to develop skills of the craft of drama in education in which to identify learning opportunities within drama’s, how to empower students, look for potential metaphor and guard students against potential hazards created by the drama. I think this really Simons idea of teacher as artist and development of craft knowledge makes a whole lot of sense because like an actor who is continually developing, honing and polishing her craft a teacher is doing the same. Within drama we find these are the skills and craft that depict a good teacher from a mediocre one. I identify with her description at the start pf the article that beginning teacher hide behind the security and safety of rules and lesson plans, it is one thing I identify is the need to be more flexible. It is something I am consciously working on but no it takes time and experience to develop.
Thinking about Simons article the first thing that came to mind is that it struggled to get published because it could be seen as the bear committing suicide and that the first thing that some people said about the book in class is that the bear committed suicide. Working with her Yr 10s she asked them to think about the ending in another way apart from suicide and depict it anyway they chose. This is great because after we read the book in class I interrupted that the bear didn’t kill himself but instead escaped to bigger and brighter things. I think she made the right move because their is so much more in the book rather then when life is hopeless, just quit.

I think the possibility of using drama to introduce students to the world of a text are limitless but the two that I have been thinking of are ‘To kill a mockingbird’ and ‘1984′.
To kill a mockingbird is about the ignorance of racial segregation because of fear of difference. Setting up a historical or even timeless drama about prejudice would work equally well so that students can understand what it was like to live under racial bigotry in a divided state.
A drama could involve:
- splitting the class on eye or hair colour making one group sit at the back so they are disadvantaged when a reading is done
- frozen images of what students see difference, segregation and oppression are.

1984 on the other hand could be done setting up a series of dramas in which totalitarianism as the theme.