International Pages - Ivan the Fool

A Play by Year Five based on a traditional Russian story (November 2006)

Year Five pupils wrote and performed their play based on the traditional Russian story, 'Ivan the Fool'. Their work started by hearing just the first part of the story. Groups acted out what they had heard and the best parts from each group were used to build the early scenes. They also used their prediction skills to see if they could work out how the story would develop. Working week by week the pupils listened to the next part of the story and thought about what effects would make the play enjoyable to watch.

As the story grew so did the script. Each week a new section of the play was written using the improvised scenes from the previous lesson. Parts were given out and children had to learn their lines so that they could act without a script.

We were keen to emphasise the Russian nature of the play, so some pupils found out Russian words to add into the play at certain times. Part of the play was developed to explain that Russians used to have a Tsar rather than a King. When using the internet we found out that there are several different versions of the 'Ivan the Fool' story.

All costumes were provided by the pupils themselves based on what they thought was a 'Russian fairytale' look! The final play was performed to an audience of parents and junior aged children on 16th November 2006.

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