Woodley Festival – Speech & Drama — A Berkshire-Style Festival Drama Section: Solo Acting and Duologue from Year 4 to Year 13

Speech & Drama · United Kingdom

The Woodley Festival of Music and Arts (Berkshire, England) Speech & Drama section, with real Solo Acting and Duologue classes across a UK National-Curriculum-Year-based age ladder from Year 4 & Under to Year 13 & Under.

A ready-made speech and drama festival with two classes, Solo Acting for individuals and Duologue for pairs, run across six school-year bands with time limits of four to six minutes.

This template models the Speech & Drama section of a community music and arts festival held each spring in Berkshire, in the south of England. School pupils and young people perform short prepared pieces in front of an adjudicator, who gives spoken feedback and awards a mark. It is built from the festival’s published 2026 syllabus, so the two classes, the school-year ladder and the time limits are real, but dates, fees and entry conditions change every year and the current syllabus must be checked before the template is reused.

Two items are modelled. Solo Acting is an individual class in which one performer presents a single prepared piece. Duologue is a pair class in which two performers share a scene and enter as one team. Both are open to boys and girls and are performed in English. The festival also lists verse speaking, prose reading, storytelling, public speaking, Shakespeare, musical theatre, mime, group acting and improvisation, own composition and news presenting, but those families are not part of this template.

Entry is by school year rather than by exact age, using the English National Curriculum year labels. The syllabus prints cumulative classes such as Year 6 and Under or Year 11 and Under; the template turns them into six non-overlapping groups: Year 4 and Under (ages 4 to 8), Year 5-6, Year 7-8, Year 9, Year 10-11 and Year 12-13 (ages 16 to 17). Solo Acting allows four minutes for the youngest group, five minutes for the middle groups and six minutes for Year 12-13. Duologue has a coarser ladder in the syllabus, so its printed times (four, five, five and six minutes) are carried across the finer groups they cover.

The syllabus prints a ladder of mark bands, from Developing at 65 and over up to Exceptional at 95 and over, but no points for each band and no criteria sheet. Every competition is therefore scored out of a nominal 10 on a single mark, and entry fees are set to zero so each organiser can add their own. Organisers should tell entrants beforehand how characterisation, voice, movement and, for pairs, the interaction between the two performers will be weighed.

Where this event comes from

The Speech & Drama classes are one section of a long-running regional festival of music and arts in Berkshire, England.

Where this event is run

Competitive speech and drama festivals are a long-standing tradition in the United Kingdom and in countries with a similar school system, including Ireland, Australia, New Zealand and parts of Canada. Local arts societies, schools and drama teachers run smaller versions of the same format, with an adjudicator, a time limit by age or school year and a single mark per performance.

• United Kingdom

Key facts

• Two competitions: Solo Acting (individual) and Duologue (pairs)
• Six school-year groups from Year 4 and Under to Year 12-13, ages 4 to 17
• Open to boys and girls and performed in English
• Solo Acting time limits: four minutes for Year 4 and Under, five minutes for Years 5 to 11, six minutes for Year 12-13
• Duologue time limits: four minutes up to Year 6, five minutes for Years 7 to 11, six minutes for Year 12-13
• Scored out of a nominal 10 on a single mark; mark bands from Developing to Exceptional are printed without points, and other speech and drama families are not modelled

Age groups

6

Competition items

2

Competitions

12

Grade bands

0

Rank awards

0

Age groups

Every candidate is placed into one of these groups by age, and competitions are run per group.

Year 4 & Under

4From

–

9To

Candidates aged 4 to 9 compete in this group

Year 5-6

9From

–

11To

Candidates aged 9 to 11 compete in this group

Year 7-8

11From

–

13To

Candidates aged 11 to 13 compete in this group

Year 9

13From

–

14To

Candidates aged 13 to 14 compete in this group

Year 10-11

14From

–

16To

Candidates aged 14 to 16 compete in this group

Year 12-13

16From

–

18To

Candidates aged 16 to 18 compete in this group

Competition items

The events themselves — each with the category it belongs to and how judges score it.

Solo Acting

ActionMarks

Duologue

ActionMarks

Frequently asked questions

Can I change this template after installing it?

Yes — installing it creates a fully configured, live event, not a locked package. Every age group, competition item, rule and scoring setting can be edited afterwards to match exactly what your event actually needs.

Do I need technical knowledge to set this up?

No. Installing a template does the setup work for you; you only need to review the details (dates, unit or house names) and open registration.

Want the fuller picture first? See our guide to mono act judging criteria guide.