MOE responds to parliamentary question on including drama or theatre studies in the core primary school syllabus
by SDEA
This is in response to a parliamentary question by Nominated Member of Parliament Ms. Usha Chandradas on including drama or theatre studies in the core primary school syllabus.
He highlighted as an example, how “speech and drama activities can be employed to develop communication skills in English and Mother Tongue Languages.” and cited the Drama module in the Programme for Active Learning for primary one and two students that aims to develop social-emotional competencies through role-play.
The Ministry of Education has stated that they will “continue to review how drama can be used in schools to support the holistic development of students”.
SDEA would like to thank Arts NMP, Ms. Usha Chandradas for raising the parliamentary question.
We had recently discussed with Ms. Chandradas the impact of drama-in-education and process driven practices, and the perception and positioning of drama in local schools. We shared how Drama is a statutory curriculum requirement in countries such as Australia, Finland, New Zealand, Iceland, South Africa and Canada to name a few.
SDEA looks forward to deepening the conversation on Drama/Theatre's impact and will continue to advocate for policy makers to consider Drama/Theatre being meaningfully featured in the curriculum in a bigger way. We will continue our mission to advocate for value and practice and drama and theatre in performance, education, and community.
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