Just let the creativity flow…actually, don’t! Here are a selection of activities and teaching strategies I use in the endless search for teaching effective creative writing. In every other lesson I teach, […]
Story writing: a few tips
myenglisheffects
Sharing ideas and resources for English secondary school and sixth form teaching.
Approaching Analysis
Analysis Detailed examination of the elements or structure of something: study, investigation, scrutiny. The Fall of Icarus is a painting I love and first came across during my PGCE. A seemingly innocent […]
S.T.E.M in English: a quick think
STEM is an acronym for Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths. From an English teaching perspective, it may initially seem tricky to encourage and integrate these subjects and ideas into our lessons. It’s […]
Top Ten Starters for Reading and Writing
A strong engaging starter involves three things: preparation, interest and purpose. A good starter will set the tone for your lesson and allow for a positive transition towards more challenging work. […]
Developing Detailed Explanations
Today, my colleague read the following in an essay response: “The phrase ‘he is dead’ from the poem confirms that the person is dead”. As much as this caused a giggle, this […]
Paper 1, Questions 3 and 4
dracula-by-bram-stoker question-3-buzz-words question-3-1984-opening-extract question-3-practice never-let-me-go question-4 question-4 question-4-hale Teaching structure has always been a tricky one and I think many teachers have shied away from doing so and have taken full advantage […]
Treasure Island! Teaching Language Paper 2 with interesting extracts…(!)
english-language-paper-1-question-2 treasure-island-extract The example extracts that AQA have released are not the most exciting and I was getting fed up with the wave of disappointed expressions at being faced with another text […]
Key Word Banks – Poetry/An Inspector Calls
My students have loved having these to refer to. They’ve glued them in the back of their books. We’ve run competitions in lessons to who can use the most words (accurately!). an-inspector-calls-word-bank […]
Quotation Analysis (Jekyll and Hyde, but works well for any text!)
My lower set students struggle with analysing quotations and particularly including context when it is relevant. Instead of asking students to write P.E.E.L or a P.E.E.L.Z or a P.E.A.K.L or one of […]
English Literature, Paper 2: Approaching the Unseen
This is a revision lesson that is appropriate for Year 11 students who are returning to the unseen section. I think an important link to make is that this question reflects the […]
