Zephyr Learning - English and General Literacy Shop
Average Rating4.96
(based on 17 reviews)
I hold an MA in literature and a CELTA in language, and over the last 20 years I've taught language and literature in the UK and USA as well as ESOL in France and Tanzania. In addition to my work as a teacher, I am the Literacy and Grammar Consultant for Zephyr Learning and Professional Development.
These resources have been refined in my own classroom and are the same ones I reference in my CPD for teachers. Prices for complete lessons are based on the current cost of an Americano at my local.
I hold an MA in literature and a CELTA in language, and over the last 20 years I've taught language and literature in the UK and USA as well as ESOL in France and Tanzania. In addition to my work as a teacher, I am the Literacy and Grammar Consultant for Zephyr Learning and Professional Development.
These resources have been refined in my own classroom and are the same ones I reference in my CPD for teachers. Prices for complete lessons are based on the current cost of an Americano at my local.
I created this matching exercise for my students in A-Level Language and also in A-Level Combined Language and Literature, who were confident in applying literary terms to texts but who consistently neglected to apply language terminology in their analyses.
We’ve drilled on this a few times now, and I’m starting to see more confident application of these terms. I’ll continue to use this exercise as a starter activity from time to time to keep these terms at the front of their minds.
Complete lesson designed for students taking A-level English Language as well as A-level English Lang/Lit Combined.
Slideshow covers the following:
schema,
face theory,
politeness theory (positive face, negative face, face-threatening acts),
the cooperative principle,
Grice’s maxims,
implicature,
deixis (personal, spatial, temporal).
Lesson and worksheet - students read passages from The Call of the Wild by Jack London and identify the noun phrases in apposition/ appositive phrases that London includes in the text.
Two-part lesson on written and spoken discourse, designed for students taking A-level English Language as well as students taking A-level English Language and Literature combined.
The first slideshow (focusing on written discourse) covers:
mode
genre
structure
cohesion and referencing (exophoric, endophoric, anaphoric and cataphoric)
intertextuality
interdiscursivity
The second slideshow (focusing on spoken discourse) covers:
turn taking
adjacency pairs
phatic expressions
back-channelling
false starts
fillers
repairs
ellipsis
Complete lesson covering aspects of phonology and phonetics for A-level English Language as well as A-level English Language and Literature Combined.
Lesson covers the following:
Consonants
voicing
place of articulation
manner of articulation
glottal stops
Vowels
monophthongs
diphthongs
Phonetic transcription using the IPA (with practice exercise)
Sound iconicity
lexical onomatopoeia
non-lexical onomatopoeia
alliteration
consonance
assonance
sibilance
(Starter or mini-lesson) Provides a quick revision of the guidelines for punctuating direct speech to encourage students to incorporate quotes/ dialogue in a creative writing task (e.g. English Language Paper 1 Section B). It’s in Powerpoint format; simply copy and paste into your own existing Powerpoint for a ready-to-use starter activity.
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Complete A-level English language grammar lesson on verb phrases. Includes slide presentation and worksheet with exercises (answers included in slide presentation).
The lesson covers:
grammatical person
grammatical number
active and passive voice of verbs
verb tense (past, present and future)
verb aspect (progressive, perfective and perfect progressive)
Complete lesson covering terms and concepts linked to the language level of semantics. Designed for students taking A-level Language as well as A-level Language and Literature Combined.
The lesson covers the following:
literal language vs. figurative language
figures of speech (metonymy, synecdoche, hyperbole, metaphor, simile, personification)
denotation
connotation
synonyms and antonyms
hypernyms and hyponyms
semantic fields
semantic change (ameiloration, pejoration, broadening, narrowing and semantic reclamation)
Based on the assessment objectives for AQA A Level Language and Literature combined; designed to be printed on two sides of A4.
Covers the following:
Social and historical context (the Industrial Revolution, Edmund Burke’s theory of the sublime, Rousseau’s theories regarding the nature/nurture debate, the alchemists Cornelius Agrippa, Albertus Magnus, and Paracelsus)
Biographical context of Mary Shelley
Literary context (explanations of important allusions and general characteristics of fantasy, science fiction, Romanticism, Gothic fiction and the tragic hero)
Themes (the pursuit of knowledge, nature versus nurture, justice and injustice, the importance of family, isolation and companionship, fortune versus fate, personal responsibility)
Characters (the roles and functions of Robert Walton, Victor Frankenstein, the creature, Elizabeth Lavenza, Justine Moritz and Safie)
Settings (untamed natural settings versus university cities)
Features of lexis, grammar, discourse and pragmatics to consider
No coloured ink used, so the resource will print equally well on different colours of paper to suit student needs/preferences.
Complete lesson which includes a slide show explaining concepts to students, a printable worksheet with exercises for practice (answers included in slide show) and a printable knowledge organiser (in both colour and black and white).
Focus of the lesson is on lexis and identifying these 9 word classes within texts:
noun,
pronoun,
verb,
adjective,
adverb,
preposition,
conjunction,
determiner,
interjection.
A fully resourced grammar-for-writing lesson that teaches students what adverbs and adverbials are and then gives them practice with placing adverbials in different places within sentences (i.e. at the front (fronted adverbials), in the middle or at the end). I have found it particularly useful in preparing students for Section B of GCSE English Language Paper 1 and Paper 2.
The powerpoint includes a starter, an explanation of adverbs and adverbials (with examples), instructions for the worksheet (with an example), a list of possible answers and a plenary.
Provides detailed explanations of the 9 word classes along with examples. It’s designed to be printed on the front and back of a single sheet of A4, and both colour and black and white versions are included (to make allowance for photocopying budgets at different schools).
A useful resource for the cost of a cup of coffee!
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Fully resourced lesson that teaches students how to use semi-colons to combine simple sentences into compound sentences. It also teaches them about conjunctive/linking adverbs (e.g. ‘however,’ ‘besides,’ ‘likewise,’ ‘consequently,’ ‘instead,’ etc.) and how they can be added immediately after semi-colons to clarify meaning.
Resources include printable explanations and practice exercises along with a Powerpoint presentation that can be used to guide students through the lesson (the Powerpoint includes the answers for the exercises on the worksheet).
Teaches noun fundamentals (common and proper, concrete and abstract, countable and non-countable). In the lesson, students practise identifying the nouns in extracts from two classics (A Christmas Carol and The Wizard of Oz ). They must also identify and capitalise the proper nouns in each text. This provides very useful practice for helping students to analyse language (specifically lexis) on Language Paper 1 and Paper 2 as well as Literature Paper 1 and Paper 2.
In addition to explanations and examples of common and proper nouns, concrete and abstract nouns, and countable and uncountable nouns, the presentation also explains the rule for when to use ‘less’ and when to use ‘fewer’ to present quantity of nouns.
Complete lesson on language levels with slide show, printable exercise sheet (answers included in slide show), and printable notes for teacher and/or students. Designed for use with both A-level English language and A-level English language and literature combined classes.
Introduces students to the following language levels:
lexis,
grammar,
discourse,
semantics,
pragmatics,
phonology,
graphology.
Also explains and provides students with practice in identifying the following sentence elements:
subject,
copular verb,
dynamic verb,
subject complement,
direct object,
indirect object,
object complement,
adverbial.
Fully resourced lesson. Students learn to identify the main verb in a sentence, no matter whether it is an action verb (a ‘doing word’) or a linking verb (a ‘being word’).
The Powerpoint explains action verbs and linking verbs, with examples of each. Afterwards, students practise identifying the verbs in sentences on the exercise sheet (there are 40 sentences in total; you might wish to do only a portion at a time and spread the activity over a few lessons). More able students can be challenged to classify each verb as either an action or linking verb.
Three lessons that teach students how to recognise, punctuate and compose simple and compound sentences. Each lesson includes worksheets with explanations, examples and practice exercises along with Powerpoint presentations that can be used to guide the lesson and display correct answers. Lessons are organised as follows:
Lesson 1: how to recognise when a simple sentence is complete and requires a full stop. For the final task students are given an informative article about the Titanic which contains no full stops or sentence-signaling capital letters. They must insert full stops in the correct places.
Lesson 2: how coordinating conjunctions can be used to combine simple sentences into compound sentences (and when joining commas should be included). Students are given pairs of simple sentences which they then join with coordinating conjunctions, inserting joining commas as appropriate.
Lesson 3: how semi-colons can be used to join simple sentences to form compound sentences. Students practise using semi-colons and linking adverbs to combine simple sentences into compound sentences.
I have also added a bonus resource examining simple sentences that do not follow conventional word order (i.e. questions, imperatives and inverted sentences). It includes two pages of explanation and examples followed by an exercise designed to help the teacher assess students’ ability to identify the subject in sentences with unconventional word order.
Students place cards containing key events in the correct order on the A3 placemat or in their exercise books (they can work individually or in groups). This provides a straightforward and fun way to revise key events of the plot, and it helps students to place extracts in context when responding to the extract question and to organise essays chronologically when writing about a character or theme.
I have included a Powerpoint slide show that explains the activity and which also provides the correct answers for assessment after students have completed the task.
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