ENGLISH LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE

Words can be like x-rays. If you use them properly - they'll go through anything. You read and you're pierced.

- Aldous Huxley, Brave New World

Contact

Head of English: Ms C. Parkinson

Email: parkinsonc@harpergreen.net

Subject overview

In the English department, we believe in the power of words. We want our students to leave Harper Green School with an excellent control of the English language, whether they are speaking, listening, reading or writing. We teach both English Language and English Literature through set texts, and all students are given access to a broad range of writers, including canonical novelists, poets and playwrights. Throughout both Key Stage 3 and 4, students will build upon the skills developed in primary school.

Speaking and Listening

Students are encouraged to make plenty of contributions in lessons, to listen carefully to the ideas of others, and to critically reflect upon contributions. We explicitly teach learners the appropriate ways to talk and listen in different contexts.

Reading

Students are encouraged to read regularly at home, and to learn to enjoy a wide range of fiction and non-fiction books. We actively teach reading strategies, and for students with reading ages that are below their chronological age, we tailor in-class support to ensure that everyone is able to access rich and challenging material.

Writing

Learners will become increasingly competent in using language for deliberate effect to interest a reader. They learn to critically evaluate, proof-read, and redraft their work, reflecting on others’ suggestions. They will develop their own clear style as a writer, which we will teach them to employ across a range of contexts.

Key Stage 3 Overview

We follow the National Curriculum for English at Key Stage 3.

We read whole texts (rather than extracts), because we firmly believe that it is important for students to experience and enjoy books in their entirety. In our schemes of work, we include high quality novels, short stories, poems and plays with a wide coverage of genres, historical periods, forms and authors.

Year 7 - Morality	Year 7	Half Term 1 and 2	Half Term 3 and 4	Half Term 5	Half Term 6
	About this unit (Literary Heritage)	Oliver Twist by Charles Dickens (14 weeks)	A Midsummer Night’s Dream (11 weeks)	Poetry Anthology (Metaphor) (6 weeks)	Reading for Writing: Ancient Tales (7 weeks)
	Knowledge	Life in Victorian London; Victorian Crime; the form of the novel; Bill Sykes, Fagin, The Artful Dodger, Oliver; morality	Life in Elizabethan England; life in ancient Athens; Shakespeare’s life; the four lovers; the love potion; Elizabethan family relationships; the form of a play	Structure and use of metaphor; poetic forms; how to approach an unseen poem. Poets studied include Blake and Tennyson, Phoebe Hesketh, Langston Hughes, Richard Kell, Carl Sandburg.	What Ancient Tales are; the oral story tradition; what the morals of stories are; ‘The Cheetah’s Whisker’; ‘Hansel and Gretel’; ‘Two Dinners’; ‘The Giant’s Causeway’; ‘The Wicked King’; ‘1001 Nights’
	Analytical Writing	Topic sentences about characters / characterisation + selecting / embedding a quotation + exploring how meaning is created in a Victorian prose text.	Topic sentence about themes/concepts + selecting / embedding a quotation + starting to use analytical sentences to explore effects of dramatic choices.	Topic sentence + selecting / embedding a quotation + using analytical sentences to explore how writer’s choices of poetic language (metaphor) create meaning (s).	Topic sentence + selecting / embedding a quotation + using analytical sentences to explore how writers’ structural choices in short stories create meaning
	Writing for pleasure	Creative Writing 1.1 - The foundations of short stories Structure, ingredients, action, focus, character, ending.	Creative Writing 1.2 - Creating Coherence in short stories Action, challenge, struggle, coherence, set up, pay off	Creative Writing 1.3 – Writing a full story Apply knowledge: plan, draft, write, edit	Oracy: Re-tell a story clearly and fluently choosing appropriate vocabulary, facial and tonal expression, gesture and posture.
	Mastery Writing	Mastery Writing 1 and 2 Grammar content includes: writing in complete and full sentences; identifying the action and verb; subject-verb agreement for ‘to-be’, regular and irregular past simple verbs, avoiding fragments; avoiding fused sentences; using capital sentences accurately; using pronouns; sentence structure; paragraphing; speech punctuation. Writing content includes: telling what happened; opening a story, writing about up to four images, writing with no images, structuring a story.
	Assessment	Learning checkpoints: fortnightly quizzes + exam	Learning checkpoints: fortnightly quizzes + exam	Learning checkpoints: fortnightly quizzes + exam	Learning checkpoints: fortnightly quizzes
	Key vocabulary	Villain, victim, vulnerable, corrupt, naïve, orphan, moral	soliloquy, severe, conflict, unrequited love, to mock, chaos	Metaphor, literal language, metaphorical language, tenor, vehicle, ground	Quest, enunciation, ingenuity, out-wit, relatable, comeuppance, repentant

Year 8 - Duality	Year 8	Half Term 1 and 2	Half Term 3 and 4	Half Term 5	Half Term 6
	About this unit	The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes (14 weeks)	The Tempest by William Shakespeare (11 weeks)	Animal Farm by George Orwell (Allegory) (6 weeks)	Rhetoric (7 weeks)
	Knowledge	Scientific developments in the Victorian era; class and society in Victorian England; the detective genre; duality; periodicals	The Elizabethan age of exploration; colonialism; nature / nurture; the form of a comedy; subplots; soliloquy and monologue; Italian city-states	Allegory; Orwell’s life and times; the Russian Revolution; recurring imagery; irony and corruption	Aristotle; ethos, logos, pathos; links between Greek & Roman discourse of rhetoric and Renaissance/Shakespearean texts; how to write for performance and impact
	Analytical Writing	Y7 + Using complex topic sentences to explore character; selecting/embedding quotations; using analytical sentences to explore (dual) meanings; using sentences to link ideas from one paragraph to another.	+ Using complex topic sentences to explore character and theme; selecting/embedding quotations; using analytical sentences to explore (dual) meanings; using dramatic terminology accurately; memorising key knowledge.	+ Using complex topic sentences to explore themes & concepts; selecting and embedding quotations; using analytical sentences to explore how writer’s choices create meaning; linking textual analysis to contextual analysis	Applying Writing Mastery sentence knowledge: using sentence variety for impact in a performed speech. Focusing on the effect of writing using ethos, logos and pathos.
	Mastery Writing	Writing Mastery 3: problem-solved, romance, action, fantasy & horror stories Grammar content includes: clauses; subordinate clauses; sentence demarcation; speech; apostrophes; possessive pronouns. Writing content includes: problem solved stories; love stories; action stories; fantasy quests; horror stories; poetic justice, Chekov’s gun; avoiding deus ex-machina. Writing for Pleasure opportunities: (1.1) description of Victorian / urban character / setting (1.2) description of a dual or usurped character, villain/victim or pastoral / island setting; (1.3) description of a dystopian setting; creating an extended metaphor (Animal Farm)			Oracy: Write and perform a structured speech about a power imbalance you feel strongly about (inspired by themes in ‘Animal Farm’)
	Assessment	Learning checkpoints: fortnightly quizzes + exam	Learning checkpoints: fortnightly quizzes + exam	Learning checkpoints: fortnightly quizzes + exam	Learning checkpoints: fortnightly quizzes
	Key vocabulary	to enlighten, deduction, scandal, periodical, introspective, dual nature, observation	colonialism, to usurp, tempest, treason, callous, pathos, nurture, tragicomedy	allegory, tyrant, rebellion, harvest, propaganda, cult of personality, treacherous; authorial intent	Rhetoric; ethos, logos, pathos; viewpoint; perspective; effect; narrative voice; metaphor & figurative language; duality; antithesis; tricolon; rhetorical question.

Year 9 – Multiplicity	Year 9	Half Term 1 and 2	Half Term 3 and 4	Half Term 5	Half Term 6
	About this unit	Jane Eyre (14 weeks)	Small Island (11 weeks)	Poetry (comparison) (6 weeks)	Reading for Study (7 weeks)
	Knowledge	Victorian attitudes to children and childhood; rural isolation; Christianity; Victorian sickness; juxtaposition in Jane Eyre	The Windrush; colonialism and multi-cultural Britain; modern dramatic conventions; character and monologue; foreshadowing; the form of a tragedy; AC Bradley’s lectures on tragic character	Journeys: Extended metaphors & comparison; ‘Paradise Lost’, ‘The Road Not Taken’, ‘Night Mail’, ‘The Canterbury Tales’: Poets include John Milton, Geoffrey Chaucer, Patience Agbabi, W.H. Auden, Grace Nichols, Jackie Kay	Reading nineteenth, twentieth and twenty-first century non-fiction; using models to plan, structure and write letters, articles, speeches, and essays. Transitional language unit into KS4.
	Analytical Writing	Y8 + how to introduce and sustain a thesis across a whole essay; planning & developing; writing introductions; analytical sentences exploring alternative meanings.	+ Analysing structure through a whole text through characterisation, exploring alternative interpretations (context of production/reception)	+ Using comparative topic sentences for poetry comparison; exploring alternative interpretations; using tentative language (may/could)	Writing an introduction, thesis and argument, including counter-argument.
	Writing Mastery	Mastery Writing 4: non-fiction argument writing, essay argument Grammar content includes: subordinate clauses; quantifiers; defining and non-defining relative clauses; appositives; past perfect tenses; future perfect tenses; using conditionals. Writing content includes: argumentative writing; introducing examples; writing a thesis; writing an introduction; ‘because, but, so’ counter-arguing; writing a complete non-fiction argument.			Oracy: Opportunities to read, share and perform student work.
	Assessment	Learning checkpoints: fortnightly quizzes + exam	Learning checkpoints: fortnightly quizzes + exam	Learning checkpoints: fortnightly quizzes + exam
	Key vocabulary	Dependence / independence; oppression; juxtaposition; humiliation; hypocrisy; comeuppance; childhood; patriarchy; consent .	Adversity; ambition; empire; colony; colonialism; obstacle, tragic, tragic flaw, foreshadow, monologue	extended metaphor, epic poetry, procrastination; journey; identity; comparison; inter-textuality; partner text	Holistic, bleak, corset, liberation, seize, capture, atrocious, humane, inhumane, traumatic, exonerate, advocate purpose, audience, formality, style.

Key Stage 4 Overview

We follow the AQA specifications for both English Language and English Literature. All students are entered for both GCSEs at the end of Year 11.

Years 10 and 11 are spent developing skills in:

Reading
Writing
Speaking
Listening

English Language

Students will be assessed through two papers, each assessing reading and writing. GCSE English Language will have an endorsed component, covering Spoken Language. This endorsement will be reported as a separate grade (PASS, MERIT, DISTINCTION, or not classified) and will not contribute to the result of the GCSE English Language qualification.

English Literature

Students will be assessed through two papers, each assessing understanding and analysis of a wide range of different texts and literary forms (novel, play and poetry). Students will be expected to make links between the text and its context and there will be marks awarded, on each paper, for technical accuracy.

We study the set texts for Literature throughout both years, and place heavy emphasis on students revisiting and revising previously-learned content throughout the duration of the two year GCSE course.

Year 10	Autumn 1	Autumn 2	Spring 1	Spring 2	Summer 1	Summer 2
About this unit	An Inspector Calls by J. B Priestley (7 ½ weeks)	Jekyll and Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson (6 ½ weeks)	Narrative and Descriptive writing- Paper 1 Section B (6 weeks)	Unseen poetry (5 weeks)	P&C Poetry (6 weeks)	Paper 1 Section A (7 weeks)
Knowledge	Dramatic devices Socialism and capitalism Priestley’s life and times. 1912 vs 1945 The presentation of key characters. The structure of a play. Priestley’s ‘big ideas’	Life in Vıctorian England The gothic tradition Mental illness Science and experimentation Duality Repression Reputation Secrecy and silence The structure of a novel	Non-linear structures. Cyclical structure. Withholding information. Characterisation. Settings.	Poetic forms, structures and language devices.	Prejudice  Colonisation  Immigration  N.Ireland (60s-90s) Life in the trenches  The French Revolution  Gender inequality in mid 1800s  Romanticism  The Japanese Empire Crimean war	Language features. Structural features. The form of a novel.
Principles, generalisations AND concepts	Authors’ beliefs may be influenced by the context in which they were writing. Priestley’s beliefs may have been influenced by his ideals surrounding socialism.	Authors may be influenced by genre and context. Stevenson may have been influenced by the gothic genre and Victorian values.	The aim of this unit is to build upon students’ prior knowledge of descriptive and narrative writing by focusing on how to manipulate the structure a piece of writing for effect.	Authors may be influenced by their feelings.	Authors may be influenced by their experiences and the experiences of others. Poets may be influenced by their experiences and the experiences of others particularly surrounding identity, conflict and nature.	The aim of this unit is to allow students to apply their analytical skills to an unseen extract. This unit draws upon their knowledge of structural analysis, language analysis and evaluation. It breaks down each threshold concept separately, rather than asking students to create one essay.
Analytical Writing	Topic Sentences: purposeful crafting of topic sentences using vocabulary precisely + selecting relevant quotations in response to a specific question focus + understanding how to contextualise and embed quotations in an analytical paragraph.	Writing a conceptualised introduction: + selecting judicious quotations from an extract and the wider text to support topic sentences, in response to a specific question focus.		Selecting purposeful methods from an unseen text + developing detailed analysis of the relevant meanings.	Comparative topic sentences driven by relevant thematic links between texts.	Analysis of language + exploring quotations in a clear / detailed way. Identifying explicit / implicit information in an unseen fiction text. How to analyse structure throughout a whole text + character change. Evaluating a writer’s choices in relation to a specific question focus.
Writing Skills			Use of descriptive techniques for effect. Use of key tier 2 vocabulary. Creating a story arc. Creating a convincing character. Manipulating structure for effect, including sentence structure and punctuation.
Assessment	Learning checkpoint x 2	Learning checkpoint x 1 + Feb exam.	Learning checkpoint x 1 Feb exam	Learning checkpoint x 1	Learning checkpoint x 1
Key vocabulary	Socialism, Capitalism, Bourgeoisie, Affluent, Proletariat, Egocentric, Hubris, Exploitation, Unrepentant, Petulant	Repression , Reputation , Depraved; Epistolary;, Inhuman;. Morality, oxymoron, Physiognomy.	Adorned, tormented, radiated, regarded, lacerating, descend, compelling, darted, enveloped, flickered, obliterated, contemplated.	Injustice, Cherished, Poignant, Reconcile, Impassioned, Apprehension,	Transcend, Existential, Belie, Subservient, Menacing, Egotistical, Patriotism, Fleeting	Tone, mood, cyclical structure, flashback, motif, tone, characterisation, figurative language

Year 11	Autumn 1	Autumn 2	Spring 1	Spring 2	Summer Term
About this unit	Macbeth by William Shakespeare (7 ½ weeks)	Paper 2 Section A (6 ½ weeks) PPEs: Full Lit P1 Full Lang P1	Paper 2 Section B and Spoken Language (6 weeks)	Mastery and Revision 2 weeks of Unseen Poetry. PPEs: Full Lit P2 Full Lang 2 (5 weeks)	Mastery and Revision (13 weeks) Lit Paper 1 Revision (Macbeth and Jekyll and Hyde) Revision of English Language Paper 1 and Paper 2. *GCSE Examinations begin*
Knowledge	Tragic conventions The role of women in Jacobean society The beliefs of King James 1^st The concept of a hero Witchcraft/the supernatural. Hubris Ambition Fate and free will. Good and evil.	Language features. Persuasive/rhetorical devices. Writers’ viewpoints and perspectives.	Language features. Persuasive/rhetorical devices. Writers’ viewpoints and perspectives. Speaking confidently and audibly. Listening to and building upon the contributions of others. Organising information and ideas effectively.	Poetic forms, structures and language devices.	Revision strategies • Mind maps- theme and character • Cue cards. • Review of critical theory/critical reading. • Essay planning • Timed exam responses.
Principles, generalisations AND concepts	Authors may be influenced by both genre and context. Shakespeare may have been influenced by the conventions of a tragic hero and the preferences and opinions of King James I.	The aim of this unit is to allow students to apply their analytical skills to non-fiction texts. This unit draws upon their knowledge of comparison of viewpoints and language analysis. It breaks down each threshold concept separately, rather than asking students to create one essay.	The aim of this unit is to build upon students’ prior knowledge of writing to persuade by focusing on how to manipulate the structure a piece of writing for effect and in different forms. Students will learn how to deliver a speech to a group of peers whilst demonstrating listening and responding skills.	Authors may be influenced by their feelings.
Analytical Writing	Writing purposeful analytical paragraphs, driven by a relevant, conceptualised introduction + analysis which is driven by ideas and concepts.	Analysis of language + exploring quotations in a clear / detailed way. Identifying explicit / implicit information in unseen non-fiction texts. How to summarise information from two sources. Identification and comparison of writers’ perspectives. Writing comparative topic sentences.		Selecting purposeful methods from an unseen text + developing detailed analysis of the relevant meanings.
Writing Skills			Use of persuasive techniques for effect. Use of Tier 2 vocabulary. How to adopt a persona in writing. Manipulating structure and form for effect, including sentence structure and punctuation.
Assessment	Learning checkpoint x 2 November exam	Learning checkpoint x 1	Learning checkpoint x 1 March exam
Key vocabulary	Prophesying, Dichotomy, Deceitful, Manifest, Manipulative, Sacrilegious, Corroborate, Ambivalent, Erratic, Antagonise.	Rhetoric, tone, cyclical structure. Persona, perspective.	Rhetoric, tone, cyclical structure. Persona, perspective.