MONDAY will be an historic day at York Theatre Royal: the staging of the last production on the raked stage before the auditorium’s redevelopment.

The honour goes to the Royal Shakespeare Company and York High School, who present The Head That Wears A Crown festival with the Theatre Royal.

Seven York schools will come together at 6.30pm for a re-imagining of Shakespeare’s Henry IV Part 1, Henry IV Part 2 and Henry V.

The event is the culmination of a three-year project through the Royal Shakespeare Company’s Learning and Performance Network (LPN), a partnership with schools and theatres across England.

In York, York High School has acted as the main ‘hub’ school, working with Acomb Primary, Applefields School, Poppleton Road Primary, St Barnabas CE Primary, Westfield Primary Community School and Woodthorpe Primary.

Julian Ollive, the Theatre Royal’s education and young actors associate, has linked the project together as festival producer and mentor to the schools.

“We’re proud and privileged to be working alongside the RSC and York High School in presenting The Head That Wears A Crown festival in York,” he says.

“Five different regions have been doing a festival with the same scripts, supported by the RSC over a two-week period and ours is the last festival to take place.”

The RSC did a call-out for schools interested in being hubs and York High School duly applied. “We’ve been working with them since then, and in conjunction with York High School we approached other schools to come on board if they were interested in looking at the teaching and learning of Shakespeare,” says Julian.

Significantly, the RSC’s LPN programme targets schools and children who may have the least access to Shakespeare and theatres, “offering exciting and dynamic ways to learn in the classroom as well as opportunities to perform”.

“There’s only one of the seven schools that we’ve had contact with before this project, and that was Acomb Primary School, which is part of our ‘pet school’ project and that’s now become a long-term partnering relationship,” says Julian.

“It’s been great to start new relationships with other schools, and from our point of view the project has been about accessing schools we hadn’t accessed before.”

Brenda Elliott, the project leader at St Barnabas CE Primary, has welcomed the new opportunity. “We’ve thoroughly enjoyed the whole experience. We have learnt many new techniques which we have used in the classroom and it has been a joy to work with experts and to have a final performance to aim for.”

The LPN also offers teachers training in how to approach presenting Shakespeare to children. Cathryn Jackson, at Acomb Primary, says: “I now have a better understanding of how to plan an ensemble piece and more confidence in what ten-year-old children are able to achieve with the right stimulus, motivation and enthusiasm.”

Last year, the schools took part in a mini-festival, presenting ten-minute pieces inspired by Shakespeare’s Richard III, and now they have progressed to this full-scale event.

Monday’s performance of The Head That Wears A Crown will comprise eight short scenes, telling the stories of Henry IV Part 1, Henry IV Part 2 and Henry V, edited by the RSC’s Chris White, the festival director. Each school will perform under the direction of a class teacher.

“The scenes will take Prince Hal from being an errant teenager in torment, drinking with Falstaff, through his scolding as a young man by his father, to his becoming Henry V and his victory at Agincourt,” says Julian.

“Approximately 170 children are involved in the performance, aged from seven to 19. On the day, each school will have a 45-minute slot for a tech rehearsal, lighting and sound check for live music, and then we’ll do the show in an hour and a quarter straight through with no interval.”

• Tickets cost £5 for adults and £2 for children (plus a £1 transaction fee per booking), on sale at 01904 623568 or at yorktheatreroyal.co.uk