“Before the Law”: Merging process drama with creative writing in new media

Script writing can be a challenge for learners to present the human condition and emotions which embody multimodal elements like facial expression, sound, speech, music, movements, gesture and space. This chapter shares sample activities from a lesson plan and steps of employing conventions in process drama for a short scripting exercise. Using a short story, “Before the Law”, prologue to The Trial (1925) by Franz Kafka, and an animation from a film production, a sequence of episodes from the parable can be presented through conventions of process drama and captured on a storyboard. The writing exercise was piloted using a hand-drawn storyboard on paper and image templates pre-set on a digital storyboard platform before adapting and rewriting the story into a script. It is suggested that a blended learning approach can be adopted in reading and adapting a literary text for creative writing practice using new media. With the help of process drama conventions, namely, in and out of role discussion, chorus, still image and fluid sculpture, participants were encouraged to explore, specifically, characterisation, mood and visual metaphor and to represent abstract concepts in digital storytelling. Samples of storyboard and script followed by student reflections on completion of the exercise were analysed. The chapter endeavours to review learners’ application of multimodal elements with hindsight on the pedagogic design in nurturing creativity and scripting skills through a blended learning approach.