Use hot seating in your classroom to develop understanding of characters. An adult or pupil can take on the role of a character from a book that you are reading or a character that they will be writing about. Others can then ask questions to the character, with them answering in role. This drama based activity can help deepen pupils’ understanding of characters and develop empathy for them.
What is hot seating?
Hot seating is a strategy used in drama to explore characters in more detail by asking questions about their feelings about an event or their actions. It is used in English lessons to develop character. Hot seating can also be used in other subjects: in history to explore eye-witness accounts of historical events; in geography to describe places that people have visited or to provide accounts of natural phenomena such as a volcanic eruption or flood; in DT or science to interview a person who made a significant discovery or invention; or in music to explore different people’s reactions to music.
What is included in this resource?
- In the Hot Seat – guidance notes
- In the Hot Seat – my notes about the character
- Hot Seating – question stem cards
- Hot Seating – my questions for the character worksheet
- Teacher notes with guidance on how the resources could be used in the classroom
How can these resources be used?
The ‘In the hot seat’ resources can be given to the person who will be in role to help them explore the character and what their responses during the hot seating activity could be.
The question stem cards and ‘my questions’ worksheet can be used by pupils to formulate relevant questions that pupils could ask the person in character.
Hot Seating used as a way to explore characters when reading and writing and is one of the many strategies employed in Plazoom’s Real Comprehension, a whole school resource to develop reading skills and promote reading for pleasure.