Compare the ways an event is described in ‘Blessing’ with the ways an event is described in ‘Island Man’.

Imtiaz Dharker and Grace Nichols are both clearly concerned with issues of identity and clashing cultures when exploring the main events in their poems ‘Blessing’ and ‘Island Man’. Despite the fact that Dharker originates from Pakistan, and Nichols from Guyana, each seems able to use similar poetic techniques to get to grips with wider issues beyond the apparently mundane occurrences in their poetry.

The concept of identity is...

A Pre C20th GCSE Assignment on Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte

Speaking & Listening and/or Written Response

I often get asked how to make Pre-Twentieth Century texts more accessible. This assignment has been used with a number of classes with children with statements of SEN and the students have enjoyed it. I hope you can make use of it too.

It can be used in conjunction with the full novel, the full chapters and/or the film version of the novel. The full chapters are available as a separate download and can be used on a whiteboard or...

Points to consider when assessing Chapter One of “Great Expectations” by Charles Dickens.

Some ideas to get you started…

• What makes this opening chapter a good read? It might be useful to colour code your sheets with a highlighter pen!
• Narrative technique – first person narrative. What effect does this have on you, the reader? What does first person have that third person misses and vice versa?
• Setting (Where is the story set?)

The setting is very important in Great Expectations in a number of key scenes. The varied settings...

A Scaffolded Essay Guide to Lord of the Flies

At the beginning of the novel, Ralph stands on his head and celebrates the fact that there are no adult survivors.

This is a dream come true. How does this dream turn into a nightmare?

It is true that at the beginning of the novel that in conversation with Piggy that Ralph celebrates the fact that there are no adults on the island. I think he…

Within hours of celebrating the lack of adult supervision. Ralph assumes the role of…

The dream really turns into a night mare when…

Another key...

This is arguably the key skill in English A Level specifications, and it’s often one that is difficult to develop.  Students, after having been successful enough in their GCSEs to progress to AS Level, often feel they know how to write essays and are offended when bad habits are pointed out or corrected, especially when these are bad habits which derive from ‘frames’ used at GCSE level.

It can be helpful to approach essay development with an insistence on the academic nature of A Level writing, to emphasise how advanced it is in...

This new EnglishEdu guide is aimed at GCSE English and English Literature students in Year 11 and, although based on poetry, it contains much of value regarding general essay writing skills and the use of the key essay writing “P.E.E / P.Q.C” technique.

Its strength perhaps is that it is based on an average student’s writing rather than that of a top grade student, as is often the case with published exemplars. This, it is hoped, will allow students of a variety of abilities to feel comfortable with the essay and not feel belittled by...

Associated Resources

• Discourse Markers Toolkit.doc
• Discourse Markers PowerPoint.pptx
• DISPLAY Discourse Markers.doc

A ‘discourse marker’ is a word or phrase that helps to link written ideas. These words are generally more formal lexical items that find little use in speech – which is perhaps why they do not always come naturally to students.

Discourse markers can be used, for example, to link ideas that are similar (e.g. the adverbs, also and similarly); and they can be used to link ideas that are dissimilar (e.g. however, alternately)....[ read full article ] »

Exemplar Argument Style Essays for all English Literature and English Language & Literature Specifications

The following two essays were written by the author as part of her English Literature A Level. Although they address the requirements of a legacy A Level specification, these resources can be used in two main ways, whatever specification you are following:

• as generic examples of argument-style essays. These two examples are accompanied by commentaries which follow each paragraph and trace how the writer has constructed and developed an...

Harry The Spider Is My Friend…

I teach lots of students, both young and old, who find that writing does not come easy to them.

Essay questions scare them… especially the ones that appear on examination papers.

I always introduce them to Harry the Spider. He helps them learn how to make the task of writing an essay easier.

Harry likes working on speeches, letters, newspaper articles and lots of other assignments that teachers give out all the time.

Before long, my students are more relaxed about the whole process. They find examination...

By following this guide, students will be able to construct an argument based on Lockwood, the narrator of Wuthering Heights.

Lockwood, the narrator of Wuthering Heights is often dismissed as mere writing device. What do you think of him?

What do we know about Lockwood? His role as the ostensible narrator allows Bronte to include a Germanic “Rahmenerzahlung” approach to the piece. Simply stated, the novel Wuthering Heights is a “frame story”. One tale sits inside another like a picture sits in a frame. This type of narration was very...

To complete this Pre-Twentieth Century Prose Assignment, you can use Tess of the D’Urbervilles (1998) TV Version of the Hardy Classic starring Justine Waddell and Jason Flemyng and/or the full novel.

The Task

The task is to look closely at two journeys Tess takes with the men in her life. One is in Chapter 8 and the other is Chapter 30. Students are invited to comment on the action and dialogue in these two chapters and state what these encounters reveal about the relationships between Tess and her suitors.

This task has been designed to...

Emily Bronte’s “Wuthering Heights” was published in 1847 under the pseudonym of Ellis Bell. It is now considered a classic novel in English literature.

Originally, the book seemed to hold little promise, selling very poorly and receiving only a few mixed reviews. Even the author’s sister, Charlotte, stated in a preface to the book, which she wrote shortly after Emily Brontë’s death “Whether it is right or advisable to create beings like Heathcliff, I do not know. I scarcely think it is.” and other Victorian readers found the...

The Task

The boys on the island busy themselves looking for a beast or demon. We are painfully aware of the irony here. There is indeed a devil on the island… or rather several and they are openly on view.

Looking closely at the action in Golding’s novel, who do you consider could be described as a demon?

Beelzebub (Hebrew בעל זבוב, with several variants) appears as the name of a god worshipped by the Philistines. In ancient contexts, there appears to have been little, if any, meaningful distinction between Beelzebub and Baal....

William Golding wrote his second novel entitled “The Inheritors” one year after “Lord of the Flies”. The action covers the extinction of the last remaining tribe of Neanderthal Men at the hands of the more sophisticated and malevolent Homo sapiens. What does “malevolent” mean?

The novel is written in such a way that the reader might assume the group to be modern humans as they gesture and speak simply among themselves and bury their dead with heartfelt, solemn rituals.

The plot follows the fate of one Neanderthal called Lok when...

1. ‘Measure for Measure’ has plenty of examples of comedic character, plot and action - but the elements that lead to this are precisely those aspects of the play that gesture towards the important questions of judgement. The Duke’s cleverness is what elicits the comic procession of people kneeling to be forgiven at the end, and yet this scene is pathetic as well as comedic, because it reflects the sinful nature of all of the characters hitherto involved. Isabella’s decision to ‘side’ with Mariana in pleading for Angelo’s life...

What does Lady Macbeth do to help her husband kill King Duncan?

To sum up, what does she do/say?

Reads letter.
Rejoices in the news.
Worries about his nature.  (Why?)
Prays to the devil. (Why does she need to?)
Welcomes him home.
Chastises him. (How?)
Takes over.
Uses euphemisms to describe the regicide. (Why can’t she call a spade a spade? What does this reveal about her?)
Insults his masculinity. (How? Why?)
Talks of killing her own child.  (Why?)
Issues orders. (Where? How? What are they?)
Drugs guards.
Leaves out daggers for him....[ read full article ] »