Making and Using Maps in Drama

by Patrice Baldwin

What do Drama maps offer?

Drama maps are not only helpful visual organisers; they sometimes make sounds, tell us important information and answer our questions!  We might even become the drama maps!  

Making ‘drama maps’ collectively before, during, or after a whole-class drama gives many opportunities for children and students of any age to talk together, in or out of role, about the place where their drama will take place, or is already taking place.  

There are different types of maps. Some maps show landscapes, and/or boundaries, buildings, significant sites and places of historical and cultural significance. Map-making at the start of a drama helps establish the setting and can help students engage with their roles, as the people who live in, or will arrive in, this place.

A drama map can be of an entirely imaginary place, or somewhere that exists, or once existed. When teaching history or geography through drama, a respect for evidence needs to be maintained and drama maps need to be based on what we truly know about the place. Authentic historical maps might also be used, and maybe added to during the drama. For example, if children are learning through drama, about The Great Fire of London, they could draw themselves onto a replica map of London (1666) and add appropriately positioned ‘in role’ comments and quotes as the drama develops. 

Drama maps can also be compiled, with direct reference to authentic or fictional texts, e.g. diaries, stories and picture books that we are exploring through drama.

Drawing the map

The map-making can be focused and framed by the drama teacher, one step at a time. A big sheet or roll of blank paper and some felt pens, can be placed centrally. Teachers might first ask the students to enter in turn and each draw a landscape feature, whilst saying something about it ‘in role’, e.g. ‘This is the river. We wash our clothes here. They can label it and maybe answer one or two questions about it in role.  

Everyone can then be asked to add a man-made feature to the map and say something about it, e.g. ‘This is the church. We come here to pray together’. As human -made features are added, we will inevitably be finding out more about the people, their lives, the community, its heritage and its culture. 

The students can then be asked to mark on the map a place of personal significance, and explain its significance in role; e.g. ‘This is the tree I planted when my father died’.  Personalising the map can help to deepen their emotional engagement and develop their role.   

Teachers working in role, alongside their class, can add to the map too; e.g. ‘This is our meeting hall. We come here to make important decisions together’.   

Making a 3D map (using objects)

A drama map can be constructed using pieces of material, boxes, books and other available objects. If paper strips and pens are available, they can write labels and information notes, and position them appropriately. Then, everyone can stand around the map and talk about it and answer each other’s questions, in or out of role.  

Physically becoming the map

The students can physically become different parts of the map. They enter the space in turn and physically position themselves, stating what they are and offering snippets of information; e.g. ‘I am the lighthouse. I have seen men drown.’ Gradually, the drama map is formed in an embodied way. Characters can walk around the map and different parts of it can speak to or about the character, as he/she passes by. 

‘Making sense’ of the map 

A map drawn on a long roll of paper, can be walked along. The students stand either side of the floor map, then someone walks along the map, from end to end. As they pass by, the nearest students vividly describe in a sensory way, what the person is passing and /or can make appropriate sound effects, to ‘give a sense’ of the place.

Mapping ‘Storyland’ 

Very young children can collaboratively create a pictorial map of Storyland before visiting it with their teacher. This helps move young children from self-initiated, socio-dramatic play, into ‘whole-class drama’ with their teacher. 

The teacher can say that Storyland has different areas, (see below).

1) Where the stories have already been made 

This area of Storyland is where they will go with their teacher to re-enact and explore ‘stories that they already know’. They will meet some well-known story characters, (usually their teacher-in-role). If the class takes a picture book with them to area one in Storyland, they will arrive in that story!   

2) Where new stories are made 

This is where they go with their teacher, to create together, ‘the stories that have not been made yet’. They won’t meet known story characters here, e.g. Cinderella. However, they might meet generic characters, e.g. a wizard, giant or princess (who is not yet in a story).  They explore this part of Storyland, possibly in pairs and the class may come across various residents of Storyland, characters adopted by the teacher-in-role. They often find that Storyland residents need their collective help, e.g. a noisy giant is keeping the residents awake.

3) Where we can hear sounds and words coming from stories (but can see nothing)  

They close their eyes, when invited by the teacher, to enter this area. They will then hear sounds (often sequenced), e.g. a creaking door, footsteps, clanking keys. They might also hear some lost story words or sentences, (voiced by the teacher), e.g. ‘the castle door creaked…’   

On return from Storyland, the children will often have something new to add to the map. 

Teachers can add to the map too, e.g. 

A Word Well:   The well gives the children different sorts of words, e.g. rhyming words. 

Phonics Forest: Each tree has leaves that make different sounds as they fall. When leaves fall next to each other, they sometimes make words. 

Story Shells: If the children tell a story to a real (or imaginary) shell, it will help them remember the story again later, if put it against their ear.

Story stepping-stones: The children can cross the river, by walking on the story stones one at a time. On each stone, they speak a sentence, building up a story, one sentence at a time. 

Story- mapping 

After a drama, the children can draw a linear, chronological story-map of the narrative and jot notes on it, (like an annotated storyboard). This can then help them when giving a verbal recount, in or out of role, of the story-drama. They might then write the story they have retold. 

At any stage of a drama, a map can be helpful. It can make visible the place where the drama happens and can be revisited and added to as the drama progresses. It can act as a stimulus for the drama and as an ongoing record of it, which can be revisited at any time. Long after a drama is over, the map will trigger memories and talk of the drama and of the associated learning.