We all learn best when we are in a state of rational and emotional balance, or what is referred to as ‘flow’. We know that body and mind are linked physically, cognitively and emotionally and teachers need to recognise and support the integrated development of all the three areas within their teaching and to seek safe and positive ways of doing so.
The emotional environment improves students’ self-awareness, motivation, empathy, recognition of choices and leads to strong and supportive communities. Drama provides a supportive forum for checking out that impact in a distanced way, with the teacher there to mediate the experience, often from within a role. Drama offers a stimulating and rich opportunity to discuss and understand our own emotions, attitudes and beliefs through observing, empathising with, feeling and exploring the emotions of characters both portrayed and interacted with in a role. Drama provides a safe emotional context and a sense of security for learners.
In the various fields of research into the factors influencing success in Second Language Acquisition (SLA), trends accentuating the importance of recognising the indicators of success based upon personality and psychology have been ascribed great significance. In the paper, the results of a pilot study to an ongoing research project will be presented. The main aim of the project is to establish the influence of drama on the creation of a positive educational environment, taking into consideration such variable factors as: feeling of security, feeling of identity, sense of belonging, sense of purpose, feeling of competence, and through this an improvement in language competence. The research is a theoretical-empirical investigation of a diagnostic-explanatory-verifi catory nature. Results will be presented from the perspective of both quantitative and qualitative analysis.

PIRANDELLO IN WROCŁAW

The aim of the article is to outline the presence of Luigi Pirandello in Wrocław. After a brief overview of his critical reception in Poland after the First World War, the essay focuses on the three performances that took place in Wrocław after the Second World War. For each performance, the theatre program and the critical reviews are analyzed. The article attempts to show how Pirandello, after his rare appearance, disappeared from the theatre scene in Wrocław.

Means and methods of literary understanding of everyday life in the works of I. Rozdobudko and M. Gretkovska

The present article shows that as a result of historical, cultural and social changes that have aroused interest in the life and work of women, the attention of literary critics was drawn to the literary everyday life in Ukrainian and Polish modern women’s prose. Everyday life in women’s prose has become a mirror of woman’s worldview, philosophy, feelings and emotions. The significance of the study is based on the lack of the clear system of means and techniques that belong to the poetics of everyday art in literature studies. The purpose of this study is to make an attempt to systematize the means and methods of literary understanding of everyday life in the texts of I. Rozdobudko and M. Gretkovska. In the process of the research it is established that the nature of literary everyday life in the texts selected for analysis is determined by attention to the inner world of the character that is typical for women’s prose. It is noted that women’s images described in the analyzed texts completely contradict patriarchal ideas about the role of women in society and family. Such components of the everyday life of the characters as woman’s life, body and actions become the key to revealing her inner world. It is noticed that the external demonstrations of everyday life (space, time, clothing, body, reactions of the characters, etc.) become a reflection of the inner world of the characters. The following methods of modeling of everyday life in the prose of I. Rozdobudko and M. Gretkovskaya are singled out: construction of own representation of time by characters; «stretching» or «stopping» of time; laconicism in space modeling; emphasis on details; focusing on sensory sensations; close intertwining of the real with the unreal; concentration on corporeality, sensuality; attraction to the naturalism of the image; increased attention to the personal, private life of the character; autobiography; reproduction of global problems of the country or epoch through modeling of destiny of one person; fragmentary modeling of images and situations; the impact of the death of a pet on the emotional state of the character; modeling of provocative situations and images in order to encourage the reader to think, search for the truth. It is noted that writers implement these techniques within their authorial styles and ideas of novels in different ways. It is established that the authors use a wide range of artistic means: metaphors, comparisons, epithets, paradoxes, ironies, contrasting images, symbols, archetypes etc. Using a wide range of artistic means and techniques, writers construct models of everyday life of their characters in their own way. The results of the research can become the basis for a generalized theoretical description of the poetics of everyday life.

Drama is an art form, a practical activity, and an intellectual discipline highly accessible to young people. In education, it is a mode of learning that challenges students to make meaning of their world. Th rough students’ active identification with imagined roles and situations in drama, they can learn to explore issues, events and relationships. In drama students draw on their knowledge and experience of the real world. Drama has the capacity to move and change both participants and audiences and to affirm and challenge values, cultures and identities Drama can develop students’ artistic and creative skills and humanize learning by providing lifelike learning contexts in a classroom setting that values active participation in a non-threatening, supportive environment. Drama empowers students to understand and influence their world through exploring roles and situations and develops students’ non-verbal and verbal , individual and group communication skills. It develops students’ intellectual, social, physical, emotional and moral domains through learning that engages their thoughts, feelings, bodies and actions. In the paper I will demonstrate process drama and how it may be used as a creative medium of teaching English as a foreign language.

Drama is an art form, a practical activity, and an intellectual discipline highly accessible to young people. In education, it is a mode of learning that challenges students to make their world meaningful. Through active identification with imagined roles and situations in drama, students can learn to explore issues, events and relationships. In drama students draw on their knowledge and experience the real world but they explore them in a safe fictional context. Drama is the enactment of real and imagined events through roles and situations. It enables both individuals and groups to explore shape and symbolically represent ideas and feelings and their consequences. Drama can be used as a tool of an appreciative inquiry which is a form of action research widely used in organisations. It has the capacity to move and change both participants and audiences and to affirm and challenge values, cultures and identities. The paper presents appreciative inquiry which can bring a positive change through an act of recognizing the best in people and the world around us affirming past and present successes, strengths and potentials and through the act of exploration and discovery. It can be successfully applied in education through drama – the most powerful medium of change.