A major research project to explore the impact of Shakespeare’s works and RSC teaching approaches on Year 5 pupil writing, and give teachers innovative tools to improve it.
Rehearsal Room Writing is a major research project, funded by the Department for Education’s Accelerator Fund, exploring the impact of Shakespeare’s works and RSC teaching approaches on Year 5 pupil writing.
We are working with the Education Endowment Foundation (EEF), the National Foundation for Educational Research (NFER) and the University of Exeter to deliver our learning programme to more than 180 schools across England and evaluate its effectiveness.
Research by the National Literacy Trust tells us that children’s enjoyment and frequency of writing is at a historic low point. In 2023, 29% of 11-year-olds in England left primary school unable to write at the expected level, rising to 43% of disadvantaged children. This project seeks to address this and provide teachers with innovative tools for improving children’s writing.
What is the Rehearsal Room Writing (RRW) programme?
The programme offers teachers a unique toolkit of drama-based materials and practices. Techniques drawn from our rehearsal rooms are relocated to the English classroom. Pupils study Shakespeare away from their desks and in character, forming a company of actors. Together, they create the world of a play. In using their creativity to produce the sights and sounds of Shakespeare’s texts, pupils make imaginative and interpretive choices.
These approaches are intended to stimulate pupil engagement in, and enjoyment of, classroom activities, including providing pupils with a powerful motivation to write. Teachers consistently report the positive impact of these techniques on reluctant writers and our recent major research project, Time to Act, provided evidence of the impact on pupil writing and attitudes to learning.
This new study will train teachers in Rehearsal Room Writing (RRW) and assess the effect of this learning programme on Year 5 pupils’ writing ability, their enjoyment of writing and their belief in their writing ability, alongside their teachers’ perception of their ability to teach writing.
How can schools get involved?
Between February and June 2025 we are recruiting Year 5 teachers from across England to take part. Recruited schools will be randomised into two groups, an intervention group and a control group. Our intervention group teachers will receive:
- 5 days of Rehearsal Room Writing CPD in Stratford-upon-Avon, delivered by our expert practitioners
- Heavily subsidised travel, accommodation, hospitality, theatre tickets and teacher cover costs
Intervention schools will be asked to contribute just £200 towards the cost of the programme. Their teachers will be asked to deliver 20 hours of RRW sessions to their pupils in the 2025-26 academic year.
Our control schools will continue to deliver their regular English lessons, and won't undertake the CPD. These schools will receive £500 as a thank you for participating in the project and for completing the evaluation activities.
Both school groups will be asked to participate in the evaluation of the programme, undertaking data collection activities in autumn 2025 and summer 2026.
For more detailed information relating to school eligibility, programme delivery, data collection and project timeline, download the RRW School Information Sheet and see the FAQs below.
Help us build the evidence base for the value of arts learning. Complete our expression of interest form below and we will be in touch to discuss next steps.
