ABSTRACT
Teacher in-role work is the ultimate expression of that reconfi guration of the teacher and student relationship that has been a consistent principle of drama in education from its ideological beginnings in the writings of Rousseau and Froebel to the present day. It requires a strong bond of mutual trust between teachers and students if it is to work and this is why the establishment of what Neelands calls a ‘learning contract’ (described in Activity Sequence 1) is so important and needs to be negotiated and agreed before any in-role work of this kind is undertaken. The fact that the contract does need to be negotiated and then ‘owned’ by all the participants – including the teacher – offers the possibility of a truly democratic alternative to traditional power structures in the classroom.
