I am an English specialist and I am passionate about supporting all students to access the English curriculum, to achieve at the highest possible levels in their exams and to love the subject. I currently teach AQA and have created lots of full schemes of work which develop exam skills and independence. All my resources have been tried and refined in the classroom; I hope that you will find them useful.
I am an English specialist and I am passionate about supporting all students to access the English curriculum, to achieve at the highest possible levels in their exams and to love the subject. I currently teach AQA and have created lots of full schemes of work which develop exam skills and independence. All my resources have been tried and refined in the classroom; I hope that you will find them useful.
An introductory lesson to The Canterbury Tales focused on an extract from the General Prologue - good for use with an A Level class that is going to go on to study one of the tales. Includes a listening starter activity to introduce the language aurally, then a deduction activity where students try to work out the meaning of individual words from the extract, followed by an interlinear translation activity of this section of the prologue and follow-up analytical questions.
A detailed, 22-page e-Book on the background, key themes and characters of Margaret Atwood's The Penelopiad focusing on historical context, power, sexuality and weaving. Created to give A-Level students the necessary background on The Odyssey and the roles of Penelope and Odysseus in Homer's text, it looks at themes of power and sexuality in the original text, throughout history and the ways in which Atwood explores, challenges and expands on these.
The e-Book is divided into the following sections:
- Aristotle's philosophical conceptions of power.
- Male power in The Odyssey, focusing on Odysseus, Telemachus and The Suitors, followed by a detailed analysis of how male power is represented in Homer's text, looking in particular at storytelling as a male prerogative.
- Female power in The Odyssey, focusing on Penelope, the Maids, Circe and Calypso, and the threat of female power and sexuality.
- Context on the Virgin-Whore Dichotomy and the Femme Fatale in 20th Century Culture. This is developed into a discussion on the cultural conception of two Penelopes; the virgin and the whore.
- Detailed section on the Maids in both texts and their connection to Artemis and her 12 Moon Maidens.
- Does Penelope sleep with the suitors? An exploration of this question in Homer and Atwood's texts.
- What other forms does female power take?: A look at inaction and weaving as key forms of female power.
- Penelope throughout History - An overview looking at Penelope in Ovid's Heroides, 16th and 17th Century poetry and 21st Century film and theatre.
- How far does Atwood reject and rewrite the limiting portrayal of Penelope? - An exploration of what Atwood's Penelopiad achieves. Contains critical quotations from Cixous, Stein and Gregersdottir.
Please note, the file will need to be opened and read in iBooks, which can be done on any iPad or iPhone, so works well for student revision on the go.
Detailed 2-page resource of analytical notes on 'Your Guide to Beach Safety' plus past questions on the extract - for use with Section B of the Edexcel IGCSE in English Language. I prepared these notes for first-teaching of the extract but also ultimately gave them to students who found them very useful for revision purposes. The notes begin by focusing on purpose, audience and tone and then focus in close detail on key linguistic and structural choices made by the writer. This helped my students to gain the in-depth and high level knowledge and skills required to score well on this section of the IGCSE exam.
A display of sentence stems to help students verbalise their ideas using academic language. 65 slides in total - two 'title' slides which works well at the centre of the display and 63 different sentence stems. The sentence stems range from straightforward (e.g. 'This quotation suggests...') to complex (e.g. 'The dichotomy between [civilisation and savagery] underpins the novel'.) Lots of examples from a range of literary texts including Lord of the Flies, Macbeth, Of Mice and Men, Romeo and Juliet. Ellipses and square brackets show students where they can insert their own relevant text/character/theme. There are also definitions of key words on many of the slides, e.g. 'quotation', 'inference', implies' etc. I have had this display in every classroom I've taught in and use it every day in discussions and writing with students, to help them verbalise complex ideas and use more formal language. This translates really well into essay writing and my students also use the display as a reference point when writing.
*The preview doesn't display properly - the slides are formatted properly but for some reason this isn't showing in the preview.*
Four Romeo & Juliet resources, suitable for revision or other activities. Bundle includes:
- Detailed character profiles knowledge organiser (32 pages). Focuses on character role, function, development, links to themes, and key quotations. Designed to give students the rigorous knowledge they need for the new GCSE specification.
- Key Motifs quotation resource - a 2-page resource with 27 quotation organised by key motifs including light & darkness, stars and religion. Perfect for focused revision.
- A3 double-sided themes & characters quotation revision resource. Contains over a considerable range of quotations, demonstrating the crucial links between theme and characters and also leaving space for students to add their own additional quotations.
- Treatment of women workbook, giving key contextual knowledge on women’s roles and space for students to complete tables about key female characters plus Lord Capulet and his attitude to women.
Resources for teaching The New Windmill Nineteenth Century Short Stories collection, including:
1. An in-depth, 30 page revision guide for the New Windmill Book of Nineteenth Century Short Stories on the Edexcel IGCSE English Literature Course. For each story, there is:
- An overview, covering key points on characterisation, plot and themes. Links are made between the stories where relevant.
- Key quotations
- A list of key themes.
2. Country Living SOLO Taxonomy Questions - 14 questions on the short story 'Country Living' by Guy De Maupassant based on SOLO Taxonomy principles. The questions are designed to be done after a first reading of the story to check and develop students' understanding of the plot, context and characters in a phased way. They are divided into sections of 'Unistructural', 'Multistructural', 'Relational' and 'Extended Abstract' going from basic, building-block knowledge of the story to abstract connections to contemporary ideas and writing. Students choose a starting point appropriate to their current skill and knowledge level; equally, they could work in differentiated groups, with each group taking a set of questions to answer.
3. 14 questions on the short story 'Napoleon and the Spectre' by Charlotte Bronte based on SOLO Taxonomy principles, designed similarly to those above for Country Living.
4. Nine comprehension and analysis questions on the short story 'The Nightingale and the Rose' by Oscar Wilde requiring in-depth, critical responses. The questions are designed to be done after a first reading of the story to check and develop students' understanding of the plot, characters and themes. This is a useful classwork or homework resource.
5. Three sets of questions on the short stories 'News of the Engagement', 'The Unexpected' and 'Hop Frog' from the New Windmill collection. The questions are designed to be done after a first reading of the story to check and develop students' understanding of the plot, context and characters. There is a combination of comprehension and analysis questions. This would make an effective classwork, homework or flipped learning task if you asked students to read the story independently before completing the questions.
An in-depth, 30-page knowledge organiser for the New Windmill Book of Nineteenth Century Short Stories on the Edexcel IGCSE English Literature Course. For each story, there is:
1. An overview, covering key points on characterisation, plot and themes. Links are made between the stories where relevant.
2. Key quotations
3. A list of key themes.
My GCSE students found this a really useful resource once we had finished first-teaching of the collection, to help them gain a thorough knowledge of the collection as a whole and a more secure understanding of the connections between the stories. I used this for phased revision - students would revise the information for one story, complete an in-class test on it and then move on to the next. Equally, it could be used as a resource to support essay-writing.
A handout which examines A Doll's House as a problem play, and looks at the evidence for it as a feminist play and a tragedy. Includes quotations from Ibsen himself and the critic Tornqvist. A useful resource for understanding genre and meeting the context assessment objective on the OCR A Level spec.
This lesson introduces essentialism and teaches students how to write an effective thesis/introduction to a comparative essay on essentialism and The Bloody Chamber. Designed for the OCR A Level English Literature comparative literary studies module. The resources include a fun 'odd-one-out' starter on stereotyping and essentialism, to be followed by discussion, a resource which clearly explains essentialism, a model thesis comparing two gothic texts (The Fall of the House of Usher and The Tell-Tale Heart) for students to read and dissect, a comparative essay question on essentialism and The Bloody Chamber and a paired activity in which students write a thesis in response to this question. The full essay is then written for homework.
This lesson works well early-on in the A Level course as it gives students confidence in how to approach a comparative essay.
14 questions on the short story 'Napoleon and the Spectre' by Charlotte Bronte based on SOLO Taxonomy principles. The questions are designed to be done after a first reading of the story to check and develop students' understanding of the plot, context and characters in a phased way. They are divided into sections of 'Unistructural', 'Multistructural', 'Relational' and 'Extended Abstract' going from basic, building-block knowledge of the story to abstract connections to contemporary ideas and writing. Students choose a starting point appropriate to their current skill and knowledge level; equally, they could work in differentiated groups, with each group taking a set of questions to answer. Students might need to conduct some research in order to answer some of the questions.
Designed for teaching of the New Windmill 19th Century Short Stories on the Edexcel IGCSE.
14 questions on the short story 'Country Living' by Guy De Maupassant based on SOLO Taxonomy principles. The questions are designed to be done after a first reading of the story to check and develop students' understanding of the plot, context and characters in a phased way. They are divided into sections of 'Unistructural', 'Multistructural', 'Relational' and 'Extended Abstract' going from basic, building-block knowledge of the story to abstract connections to contemporary ideas and writing. Students choose a starting point appropriate to their current skill and knowledge level; equally, they could work in differentiated groups, with each group taking a set of questions to answer. Students might need to conduct some research in order to answer some of the questions.
Designed for teaching of the New Windmill 19th Century Short Stories on the Edexcel IGCSE.
Three sets of questions on the short stories 'News of the Engagement', 'The Unexpected' and 'Hop Frog' from the New Windmill collection. The questions are designed to be done after a first reading of the story to check and develop students' understanding of the plot, context and characters. There is a combination of comprehension and analysis questions. This would make an effective classwork, homework or flipped learning task if you asked students to read the story independently before completing the questions.
Designed for teaching of the New Windmill 19th Century Short Stories on the Edexcel IGCSE.
Nine comprehension and analysis questions on the short story 'The Nightingale and the Rose' by Oscar Wilde requiring in-depth, critical responses. The questions are designed to be done after a first reading of the story to check and develop students' understanding of the plot, characters and themes. This is a useful classwork or homework resource.
Designed for teaching of the New Windmill 19th Century Short Stories on the Edexcel IGCSE.
A 3-page guide to writing a comparative thesis paragraph for the A Level Gothic Literature unit. The resource includes:
1. An explanation of what a thesis is.
2. The golden rules of thesis-writing.
3. A model thesis paragraph comparing The Tell-Tale Heart with The Fall of the House of Usher, focusing on the extent to which they are Gothic texts.
4. Two pages of sentence stems for essay-writing - these are useful for all Literature essays, not just Gothic.
I used this resource as the basis for a lesson in which students worked in pairs to write their own comparative thesis on a different pair of Gothic texts, using the model and rules for guidance, first getting them to read the model and articulate what made it an effective opening paragraph. Alternatively, if your students have studied these texts, they could write the rest of the essay, using the thesis paragraph as a road map.
*Please note, if you have purchased my 'Essay Writing Guide for A Level and GCSE', the sentence stems in this resource are the same as in that.
A 74-question test on the plot of Othello, designed to help A Level students to secure the knowledge required as a foundation for good performance in the exam. The answers are provided separately so that students can check their own responses and repeat the test at home as many times as needed.
