Naming the Shadows: Theatre as Research This short play is set in a multi-grade 1 to 3 classroom. It is the final minutes of the teacher’s after-school cleanup; post a short run production of a condensed and adapted version of Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream (Carter, 2008). One of the packing boxes transforms into a shadow puppet theatre and soon we have several locations and situations suggested by the dialogue and the shadows. The play is primarily the dramatization of research data generated within a scholarly inquiry. How might exploring drama and producing Shakespeare help to build a greater sense of learning and community? The time is the present. The script published here takes the smallest of moments from the data to give a glimpse of the learning. We are pleased to have the rare opportunity to publish a full script of a research based drama. Most of the shadows that are embedded in the script were created by the elementary student participants with the guidance of researcher, Amanda Wager, and further participation by the research team. The students were proud to know their work would be seen in places as far away as Australia. The play may be performed by at least two actors. In our production, one actor played both Mr. Calby and Bottom. Characters: Mr. Calby, inspired by the elementary teacher of the class where the research project was based. Bottom, inspired by Shakespeare’s original working class amateur actor. Some lines provided to him may be traced to varied sources of the research. Shadows Different voices may be used to represent Students and Family. Characters are given an individual essence. But working within the limits of the box of resources, the play focuses more on giving an overall impression of the learning moments throughout the journey, these include: Student as Oberon, Student as Lion, Student as Bottom, Titania Student, Researching Student, At Home Practicing Student, Granddad, Comforting Parent, and the Principal. I named many of the shadow characters according to the function, or the original role played in their production, rather than by names as this was an effective way of writing the moments and tracking them through the script. Workshop Production History: Naming the Shadows was performed for the original research participants (Vancouver Montessori classroom), the UBC Drama Institute (2009), and three scholarly conferences: the International Drama Education Research Institute (Sydney, AU), Canadian Association for Theatre Research (Ottawa, CA), Canadian Society for the Study of Education (Ottawa, CA) in 2009. The cast in all performances included Jaime Beck, George Belliveau, Graham W. Lea and Amanda Wager. PLAYSCRIPT 1