In this lesson, students will explore the Essential Question: How does Atwood use historical and contemporary influences to construct the dystopian world of Gilead? This engaging and thought-provoking lesson explores the real-world historical, political, and feminist influences behind The Handmaid’s Tale. Students will examine how Margaret Atwood critiques society through fiction and apply contextual knowledge to their analysis of the novel. Lesson Objectives: Understand the historical, political, and feminist influences on The Handmaid’s Tale. Analyse how Atwood uses real-world events to shape her dystopian vision. Apply contextual knowledge to develop deeper textual analysis. Lesson Activities: Starter: “Dystopia or Reality?” – Students engage with a quiz featuring real-world events and determine whether they are fictional or factual. Exploring Context – A deep dive into Atwood’s key influences. Atwood Interview – Students will watch and discuss a video where Atwood explains the truth behind The Handmaid’s Tale. Research Task – Students choose one of Atwood’s key influences to investigate further. Exit Task: Students show how Atwood’s use of real-world influences strengthens the novel’s warnings in a quick exit task. Perfect for GCSE and A-Level English Literature, this resource promotes critical thinking, discussion, and independent research skills. Download now to enhance your students’ understanding of Atwood’s dystopian warning! Copyright Notice: This resource is for personal classroom use only. Redistribution, resale, or uploading to shared platforms (including school drives and VLEs not for personal classroom use) is strictly prohibited. If you need additional licences, please purchase them separately. © 2024. Revolutionary Education. All rights reserved.

A A4 14-page A-Level revision booklet for Handmaid’s Tale written to support the AQA A Level English Literature course. This can be completed by students as a useful revision tool. The booklet includes tasks such as research activities, mindmaps, theme tables, character profiles, various questions and thinking points. Students can work through revising everything from contextual information, setting, and key extracts, to themes and characters. These are summarised towards the end with the final pages including a broad range of practice questions and extracts.

Powerpoint detailing key context for Margaret Atwood’s ‘The Handmaid’s Tale.’ Contains authorial context as well as historical and social context. Also contains quotes from Atwood herself about the novel.

Booklet taking students through the novel 'The Handmaid's Tale'. This booklet does not 'spoon feed' students. It requires them to use their close reading and understanding of the novel to explore themes, ideas, other opinions and their own understanding of the novel. This is an excellent resource for homework/independent study time and can be edited.

English literature → A-level → Edexcel → Paper 2: Prose → Science and society → Frankenstein and The Handmaid’s Tale Comparison notes for help with subject knowledge, discussion, handouts, essay topics, and revision. PDF file. (See free download for an example.)

Here are 21 lessons I’ve made covering Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale for Edexcel’s English Literature A Level spec. These lessons are also suitable for other exam boards covering the novel. They have been designed with Sixth-Formers in mind, but they may be able to be used in GCSE lessons with some adaptation and streamlining of the more advanced concepts covered. Hopefully these lesson activities will provide a useful starting point for teachers taking their students through this novel. The final 5 lessons pertain to comparing The Handmaid’s Tale with Frankenstein: I have included these lessons in case that is the text other centres have paired The Handmaid’s Tale with, but obviously they could be adapted to accommodate a different comparison text. I’ve also included an essay planner template I’ve made for students. I have not provided a written scheme of work on a separate document, but the titles of the Powerpoints and the activities on each one should make it clear how I have structured the content.

This revision pack is designed to help students taking the Edexcel A-Level exam comparing Frankenstein with The Handmaid's Tale. The revision pack includes: 1) Comprehensive essay plans for practice exam questions (issued by the exam board) . 2) Model responses and how they relate to the mark scheme. 3) Lists of contextual factors which could be discussed for both texts. 4) Ideas for structural points to be made for both texts. 5) Over-arching thematic comparisons. 6) Key terminology. The full units of work (with lesson ppts for Frankenstein and Handmaid's Tale are also available for download). Frankenstein ISBN number: 978-1-85326-023-0 Handmaid's Tale ISBN number: 978-0-099-74091-9

Full SoW for teaching Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale, including full lessons, context, and some wider reading articles. Planned for Edexcel’s Literature A Level to be compared with Frankenstein, but easily adaptable. I have where possible linked events in the novel to real world events and/or current affairs, to make the text as relevant as possible. The slides consist of a clear title, main task, and extension task, and have a variety of tasks in each lesson - engaging starters, discussion, group work, quote finding, extract analysis, and evaluative plenaries.

This was created for Scottish Higher English, but could be adapted for Advanced Higher / A Level etc. This is a full unit on the novel ‘The Handmaid’s Tale’ by Margaret Atwood.

A comprehensive revision booklet that is 68 pages long - design to be used alongside a SoL. These tasks are based around learning, researching and revising the content for the AQA Language and Literature ‘Imagined World’ section specifically for ‘The Handmaid’s Tale’. This could be used alongside a SoL to extend and consolidate learning, or it could be set as part of independent revision in preparation for exams. The breakdown of the booklet is as follows: An Independent Subject Audit of all of the key content Character Analysis: The Handmaid’s - Offred and Ofglen, The Marthas, The Eyes, The Aunts, The Commander, Serena Joy, Nick, Moira, June’s Mother, Luke, Professor Pieixoto… Atwood’s Intention: Speculative Fiction, Sexist Attitudes, Apathy and Conformism, Religious Fundamentalism, The Power of Language, The Power of Memories, The Oppression of Women, Forms of Rebellion, Women Turning on Women and Forms of Power Setting (Storyworld): Offred’s Bedroom, The Commander’s Library, The University, Cambridge Massachusetts, The Wall, The Jezebels, Serena’s Garden and The Red Center Religious and Philosophical Contexts: Feminism, Religious Perspectives, Freedom to and Freedom From, Post-modernism, The Power of Language (Close-text Analysis Tasks: Ten key quotations from across the text - focusing on AO1, AO2 and AO2 approaches. Themes and Ideas: The Female Body and Bodily Autonomy, Hypocrisy in Power, The Power of Language: Neologisms, The Power of Language: Religion, The Power of Language: Musings, Myth and Fairytale, The Power of Storytelling and Memory, Individualism and Identity… Practice Questions: Five AQA style questions

For A Level Eng Lit AO5 Divided by character and theme

100 revision questions on Margaret Atwood’s ‘The Handmaid’s Tale’ for A-level English Language and/or Literature students, compatible with AQA, Pearson, OCR and WJEC specifications. This versatile document can be used in the following ways: Printed out or uploaded as a complete handout for A-level students. Set as homework. End-of-unit quiz. Plot summary questions. Cherry-picked questions for starter activities or retrieval tasks. Includes questions on detailed aspects of context and critical theory to challenge A-level students to think more deeply about the novel.

For A Level English Literature students. Bank of critical quotes grouped by theme and character

A revision booklet aimed at A level students doing the Lit B exam with AQA, focusing mainly on the themes present in the Handmaid’s Tale with analysis from a social/political protest lens. The analysis includes argument starters, quotes and character analysis. The themes include: oppression naming/identity religion women and their roles in society freedom and imprisonment language as a theme sex, love and feeling memories power and control rebellion rule-breaking and appearances Structure: the Historical Notes comment on the general structure comment on the language This resource was not made by me and I take no credit for it.

A selection of resources focused on a critical reading of The Handmaid's Tale, utilising the literature circle technique. Extracts from other dystopias included as part of wider reading.

Ideal for spaced learning, here is a 20 question multiple choice test on The Handmaid’s Tale with answers included.

Quotes matched with statements from The Handmaids Tale