Archive

Active filters: Category: English Clear all

Castle Shakespeare: Why study the Bard?

Jul 23, 2017 | Category: English

Let me give you, let me share with you, the City of Invention. For what novelists do... is to build the Houses of the Imagination, and where houses cluster together there is a city... Let us look roun...

#Shakespeare

Are 'closed book' examinations a bad idea?

Apr 06, 2017 | Category: English

Changes to the GCSE English Literature specifications are, apparently, starting to bite. As well as abandoning the modular approach to assessment in which students sat 2 separate modular exams and com...

#English #Literature #learning by heart

"There are no wrong answers!"

Jun 18, 2016 | Category: English

Along with, "It's a skills based subject," the cry that there are no wrong answers in English is, I think pretty unhelpful.Take the example of teaching Priestley's perennial, An Inspector Calls. Every...

#misconceptions #An Inspector Calls #cognitive dissonance

Improving critical reading through comparative judgement

May 11, 2016 | Category: English

The following is a guest blog from Dr Chris Wheadon of No More Marking.The reformed GCSEs in English present new challenges for pupils in critical reading and comprehension. Teachers across the coun...

#Chris Wheadon #No MoreMarking

Cargo cult teaching, cargo cult learning

Dec 10, 2015 | Category: English

…it is the peculiar and perpetual error of the human understanding to be more moved and excited by affirmatives than by negatives…Francis Bacon, Novum Organum, Aphorism, 1620 Cargo cults grew up on...

#modelling #Richard Feynman #cargo cults

Essay writing: style and substance

Nov 17, 2015 | Category: English

You have such strong words at command, that they make the smallest argument seem formidable.George Eliot As with most subjects, the step up from GCSE to A level English literature is tough. You can...

#English literature #nominalisation #Stephen Pinker

researchED English & Literacy Conference

Jul 01, 2015 | Category: English

A few months ago I asked Tom Bennett if he'd be up for rubberstamping some sort of rEDx project (like TEDx but with brains) devoted to exploring the intersection between education research and English...

#English #Tom Bennett #researchED #Ray Land

Using Threshold Concepts to design a KS4 English curriculum

Mar 24, 2015 | Category: English

The big change a-coming for curriculum design is that the final vestiges of modularity will soon have been licked clean from the assessment spoon; from September it will linearity all the way. Many En...

#gcse english #Threshold concepts #Poetry by Heart

Who's to blame for the new English literature GCSEs?

May 30, 2014 | Category: English

The sound and fury surrounding text choices for GCSE English literature just won’t go away. The exam boards got their digs in first with Paul Dodd of OCR claiming Gove wanted to ban US authors because...

#GCSE #English literature #AQA #Michael Gove #Jonathan Bate #OCR

How can we increase breadth and challenge?

Jun 02, 2014 | Category: English

Over the past few days as sorry tale has unfolded. The new GCSE English literature specifications have been announced in draft form, full of sound and fury, signifying... nothing.The current GCSE lack...

#GCSE English literature #Ofqual