Drama at Key Stages 1 and 2

Planning for Role Play Areas

Generating and categorising possible places

Invite student teachers to generate a list of possible role play areas in groups, reminding them to lean on what they have seen, as well as what they feel would motivate and involve children across the age phases.

It is useful for them to categorise their resultant lists into:

• real world settings e.g. doctor's surgery, the garden centre, post office or café
• imaginary/fantasy settings e.g. a cave, a castle, forest, on the moon, under the sea
• fictional settings e.g. Miss Wobble the waitress' café, from Alan Ahlberg's Happy Families series, Mr Grindle's lighthouse from Rhonda and David Armitage's series or Katie Morag's post office from Marie Heiderwick's series.

There is a tendency for real world settings to dominate school role play areas, but more fictionally oriented and imaginary areas allow children to play freely and build on the foundation of known stories, making connections between tales and allowing characters from well known narratives to inhabit the area.

In addition, the influence of popular culture needs to be acknowledged (e.g. creating Bob the Builder's yard). Children who are more used to the imitative play found in real world areas may at first find the demands of imaginary, more open ended areas, very challenging and may need more support from the teacher in role.


Selecting one role play area of each type, student teacher groups can also generate lists of the physical/literacy resources connected to the theme of e.g. a clinic, an island, the Three Bears' House. Once word processed, these can be shared as a resource. Stress that the co-creation of the area is important, with children suggesting ideas and contributing items; involvement influences interest and ownership.