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A dramatic take on learning photo by Jim Craven Megan Swinger, left, and Olivia Plotnick chuckle at a passage from the play they are reading at Sams Valley Elementary School in Mack Lewis' third-grade class Friday. Teacher's plays encourage kids' reading skills By VICKI GUARINO SAMS VALLEY -- Reading lessons become rehearsals as one third-grade teacher turns to drama to instruct and inspire students. Teacher Mack Lewis believes so strongly in acting as a learning tool that he has published his own plays to assist other teachers. Not only does the reading and rereading of dialog give students important practice with words, Lewis says, but topics ranging from Greek mythology to Christopher Columbus introduce history and social studies. Besides, Sams Valley Elementary school students say, reading a role beats reading a book. Cari Burt and Angelica LoMonaco say they like hearing classmates' voices as they practice their lines. And Brian Cray, fresh from reading the part of Columbus' son Ferdinand in a dramatization of the New World journey, likes the subject matter. "I like it because it's learning about history," Brian says. Lewis first introduced drama to his teaching repertory six or seven years ago. Now, his classes generally put on 20 plays a year. These are bare-bones productions in which small performing groups recite lines -- sometimes from memory -- for one another. The purpose isn't the performance, but to give youngsters lots of reading practice. By third grade, Lewis says, practice seems to be what kids need most. "It might look like memorizing to adults, but I'd call it repetition," says Lewis. "That repetition is extremely valuable." Putting on plays makes the practice more pleasant. Given Lewis' own interest in writing, it was inevitable that the teacher would become a playwright. In the 1980s, Lewis wrote and published a Medford-based Christian monthly, Second Chronicles. He is one of five teachers on an advisory board for the nationally circulated Storyworks creative writing and drama magazine for grade school classrooms. The magazine printed his version of Charles Dickens' "A Christmas Carol" last year. Another Lewis play was bumped from its September publication date in favor of a mystical adventure by the wildly popular character Harry Potter. Author J.K. Rowling's tales of 11-year-old Harry are best sellers. The Rowling play, about Harry's adventures at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, is one of three that Lewis' students have just begun to rehearse. Some students still stumble on their lines while others are working to get their inflection just right. "Ahhh-," one youngster reads from the script, but is cut off by Lewis. "You're screaming. You're scared. AAAHHHH..." Lewis corrects, adding volume and a note of panic. For lead characters Jake Warntjes and Doug VanRooyen, the rehearsal is an introduction to Harry Potter's supernatural world. "I never heard of him before," Jake says. "I like the magic." Mail Tribune Copyright � The Mail Tribune 1999, Medford, Oregon USA