Hear a teacher explaining what makes A Midsummer Night's Dream his favorite play to teach
Why A Midsummer Night's Dream is this teacher's favourite Shakespeare play to teach.
Courtesy of Folger Shakespeare Library; CC-BY-SA 4.0 (A Britannica Publishing Partner)
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Transcript
[MUSIC PLAYING] DARREN MCGARVEY: My favorite Shakespeare play to teach is a Midsummer Night's Dream. I love teaching it, because it's an easy play to take your students and divide and conquer them and even to divide and conquer the play. It's so segmented that you can assign a group of students to do the mechanicals, and a group of students to do the lovers, and a group of students to do the four scenes. And students can work together to figure the play out, to learn the language together, and to understand the play.
It's also a great way to give students a creative outlet. The play has so much in it and so many suggestions from Shakespeare that the kids can really run with that, with costuming, with the way they stage, and put on their performances, and the way that they interpret the language. It's also a great play to encourage them to write. There's so many themes in there that are so timely for them and characters for them to become attached to, and to get angry at, and to laugh and love. So it's an easy play for them to write about as well.
It's also a great way to give students a creative outlet. The play has so much in it and so many suggestions from Shakespeare that the kids can really run with that, with costuming, with the way they stage, and put on their performances, and the way that they interpret the language. It's also a great play to encourage them to write. There's so many themes in there that are so timely for them and characters for them to become attached to, and to get angry at, and to laugh and love. So it's an easy play for them to write about as well.