Rhenny
Adventurer
I taught D&D 5e to my 9th grade English classes this year.
First, I made groups and gave each group a pre-made character. I asked them to read over all of the descriptive details (explanation of class and race and background, etc.) I told them to just pretend they were that character. I gave them some time to come up with a name and talk in their groups about what they understood and didn't, but I basically didn't have them focus on any of the numbers yet. As they did this, I went from group to group telling them a little more about their abilities, spending a little more time with the cleric and the wizard to explain cantrips and spells.
Once all of the groups were done naming their character and coming to terms with the character story/narrative, I explained to all the others a little about each characters' race and class and then I basically told them that during the game, I would describe situations and they had to respond as if they were their character. I told them that anytime the outcome of their decisions was in question, I'd roll a d20 and ask for modifiers from their character sheet when it was appropriate. Then I'd narrate the results. I decided to roll the dice for everything since I wanted to save time and I only had 1 set of dice (and 9th graders are sometimes quite annoying if you give them small objects that they can drop or throw).
Without much pre-teaching, I just narrated the situation the PCs were in and we started. During the game, when it came up, I'd explain a rule or the definition of a term, etc. I had them focus on story and character more than game mechanics.
We played for two class periods (about 70 minutes total after the initial 20 minutes of set up). It seemed to work really well. Some of them really got into it. As a DM, I enjoyed it because by focusing on character and story, I felt like we accomplished a lot in a relatively short amount of time.
My take away, and advice to you is to let them figure most of it out as they play. Don't pre-load too many of the rules. I think D&D works best when the rules serve the story/character dev. rather than become the focus of the game.
First, I made groups and gave each group a pre-made character. I asked them to read over all of the descriptive details (explanation of class and race and background, etc.) I told them to just pretend they were that character. I gave them some time to come up with a name and talk in their groups about what they understood and didn't, but I basically didn't have them focus on any of the numbers yet. As they did this, I went from group to group telling them a little more about their abilities, spending a little more time with the cleric and the wizard to explain cantrips and spells.
Once all of the groups were done naming their character and coming to terms with the character story/narrative, I explained to all the others a little about each characters' race and class and then I basically told them that during the game, I would describe situations and they had to respond as if they were their character. I told them that anytime the outcome of their decisions was in question, I'd roll a d20 and ask for modifiers from their character sheet when it was appropriate. Then I'd narrate the results. I decided to roll the dice for everything since I wanted to save time and I only had 1 set of dice (and 9th graders are sometimes quite annoying if you give them small objects that they can drop or throw).
Without much pre-teaching, I just narrated the situation the PCs were in and we started. During the game, when it came up, I'd explain a rule or the definition of a term, etc. I had them focus on story and character more than game mechanics.
We played for two class periods (about 70 minutes total after the initial 20 minutes of set up). It seemed to work really well. Some of them really got into it. As a DM, I enjoyed it because by focusing on character and story, I felt like we accomplished a lot in a relatively short amount of time.
My take away, and advice to you is to let them figure most of it out as they play. Don't pre-load too many of the rules. I think D&D works best when the rules serve the story/character dev. rather than become the focus of the game.
