Fun, engaging and hassle-free resources for secondary English and Drama. Developed by a lead practitioner and AQA examiner, you can be sure all resources are geared towards the latest specifications.
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Fun, engaging and hassle-free resources for secondary English and Drama. Developed by a lead practitioner and AQA examiner, you can be sure all resources are geared towards the latest specifications.
If you make a purchase and find the resource useful, why not get another one absolutely free? Simply leave a review for the resource purchased, email ireviewedajs@outlook.com with your TES username along with the free resource you would like. Your free resource will then be sent over right away!
These feedback sheets dramatically reduce marking workload and get students taking more ownership of their work and actually acting on feedback. I introduced these into my department a while back. As a result, markloads have reduced and students are much more responsive to feedback and much more accountable for the improvements that they make.
The only writing you need to do is to input levels and to write in a WWW. The rest is taken care of as all you need to do is highlight the applicable statements
Sheets are for KS4 but could easily be adapted to suit KS3 and are easy to tweak. I've adapted many of the targets and areas for improvement from the AQA English language and literature mark schemes
They've worked like an absolute dream, saved me loads of time and Ofsted really liked how they worked across the whole department and got students more invested in making improvements. Only minor tweaks would be needed for these to work with pretty much any assessment you might be doing.
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This is a multi-discipline CPD designed to raise awareness of the importance of literacy and its impact on the lives and life chances of students.
The session aims to look at literacy in the modern world and to establish its importance in our daily lives. The presentation also includes a wide range of academic research which reveals some shocking statistics about illiteracy and functional illiteracy in the UK.
Importantly, this is an active session, with plenty of activities for delegates to ‘do’ during the course of the CPD. Delegates need to undertake a proof reading activity, along with a range of practical tasks with the aim of embedding literacy into their everyday lesson planning. The content can be squeezed into one hour, but could easily fill a couple of hours.
I’ve had lots of positive feedback from the session, which I’ve delivered to NQTs and Trainees in the past. Equally, I think it would work brilliantly as a whole school CPD with the aim of raising the profile of literacy across the curriculum.
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Create an informative and visually engaging display with these ‘responding to a text’ materials. Ideal for Key Stages 3 and 4
There are lost of acronyms out there when responding to a text. PEEZL is an ideal middle ground between the more simple PEE model and some of the ridiculously complicated ones that seem to be around these days!
Each part of PEEZL is broken down with a pupil-friendly definition alongside two worked examples.
Image depicts what the finished display could look like (although I’m guessing you’ll be better at lining up the letters than me!)
All the slides are fully editable and adaptable, so can be changed to suit your needs. When you’re ready to print them off, simply opt for the ‘print full page slides’ option on your settings and the resources will print as displayed.
Feedback welcomed and appreciated!
Complete schemes of work for the writing sections of papers 1 and 2 of the English Language GCSE qualification. Concise, skills driven lessons to boost your student’s skills in a number of key areas.20+ hours worth of lesson content.
Everything you need to teach these papers is here. Fully resourced and ready to go. Additional freebies thrown in:
* 40 worksheets for papers 1 and 2 (writing tasks worded in the AQA language format with guidance)
* 150 sensational starters for English
Save big compared to buying these separately. 74% saving! Please see the individual resources for more information about them.
Buy in confidence from a TES recommended author.
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Here I have the second volume of the 'Sensational Starters' series which aims to give teachers a huge bank of starters that they can use with all of their classes.
50 slides, with each slide providing a different starter task for your classes. Ideal as bell ringer/ entrance tasks. It's as simple as that!
This edition focuses on reading skills; with a huge bank of starters developing the following aspects of reading:
Basic Inferences
Layered Inferences
Using evidence to support points
Inferring from images
Inferring from quotations
Exploring key words within quotations
Identifying word classes
Commenting on the effect of word classes
Understanding the writer's messages/viewpoints
Understanding the writer's world (context)
Responding critically to a text
Would suit Key stages 3, 4 and even 5. Ideal Language GCSE preparation tasks for Paper 1 and 2; great for general skill building too! The tasks suit a wide range of abilities and can be easily tweaked if required. This would be an ideal resource for a whole school literacy drive too.
Perfect toolkit and inspiration for any teacher. Ready to roll. Enjoy!
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This scheme of work equips your students with a range of skills to tackle the writing section of their English Language Paper 2 exam. Tailored to the latest 9-1 specifications.
All lessons are packed with fun and engaging activities, as well as being visually appealing. Each ‘lesson’ is packed with activities that are more likely to take a couple of lessons than just one.
Save big compared to buying these resources separately!
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Here I have a lesson/mini scheme on duologues. This is a great way for students to pair up and study a script together. You may wish to have groups of three, with one student acting as director for the other two.
There are five duologues for students to perform (so one can be done per lesson or you can give different groups different duologues, it's up to you). There is also a lesson powerpoint to coach students through preparing for, annotating, performing and evaluating their work.
The duologues are my own creation and cover a variety of different themes and ideas. They have been deliberately crafted in order to present complex characters which challenge the performer to demonstrate a wide range of emotions. They are also relatively short, meaning your students shouldn't have too much bother learning lines. Most can be performed by either gender.
They have worked incredibly well with my groups and I'm glad I introduced these lessons early in year 10. Little/no adaptation is required.
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Everything you need to teach Act 1 Scene 5 of Shakespeare’s Macbeth. This is also available as part of a complete scheme of work whereby a considerable saving can be made; further details can be found here.
The lessons have been created specifically for teaching at GCSE level, and cover the key assessment objectives for AQA: understanding of the text, language and structure, context/themes/author intent (although equally applicable to other exam boards).
Differentiated outcomes and tasks allow you to reach all learners, although I would recommend the lessons specifically for middle to higher ability students. Throughout the scheme, students are encouraged to make notes and annotate the text, as this will be a valuable revision tool when preparing for exams.
Teacher notes are provided to help explain and guide you through all phases of the lesson, with a range of interesting and engaging tasks for you to choose from. Importantly, full analysis is provided for all the tasks set, to enable you to lead interesting and engaging discussions which will deepen the students’ appreciation of the text. Strictly speaking, there is probably a lot more here than you would fit into a 1 hour lesson, so you may wish to spread this over a couple of lessons, or perhaps be a little selective with the tasks you wish to do.
Buy in confidence from a TES recommended author!
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20 worksheets each with a unique AQA GCSE English Language Paper 2 style writing task. Ideal to set as HW and designed to be really quick and easy to mark.
The worksheets are worded/presented in the way you would expect to find an AQA English Language writing question (equally suitable for other exam boards).
They also contain lots of prompts and interactive questions to encourage students to use a wide range of skills as they are writing. That way, as you continue to set different questions, good writing skills will become habitual.
Most importantly, marking the work is really easy. Simply circle the effort level and highlight a target from the target bank. Diagnostic marking without even having to write a single word!
Ideal to set as homework, as part of a scheme of work, or simply some inspiration for some AQA style worded writing tasks.
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This is a fully resourced lesson about using colons. Available as part of a punctuation and SPaG scheme of work here. Lessons are ideal for KS3 and KS4 students with a fun and light-hearted feel. Could also be taught to higher ability KS2 students.
Would suit a range of abilities as there is lots of scope for stretch and challenge, with ambitious success criteria and extension tasks built in throughout. Scaffolding and differentiation options are built in where appropriate.
Fully resourced and ready to roll, minimal adaptation or tweaking required.
This is obviously a SPaG/Punctuation lesson, but it is equally focused on creative/descriptive writing too. Much of the content is therefore ideal for teaching general creative writing skills or preparing for the fiction writing task on the new specification GCSE English exam.
There’s at least a lesson’s work here; it usually takes a couple of lessons to get through all the content due to the detailed and structured nature of the writing task.
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Here is the ultimate SPaG/punctuation quiz! Let's face it, teaching SPaG can be dry, this quiz is just one way of making it a little more fun and adding a competitive element to it too.
* Rounds comprise of either 5 or 10 questions
* A single round can be completed as a starter, or the whole quiz can take at least a lesson
* Answers are provided at the end of each round and can be peer assessed
* Students must get all aspects of the question right to gain marks for that particular question (for example, all commas must be in the correct place on a comma question to gain a single mark). However, the test can be made easier by giving a mark for each punctuation mark in the correct place.
* If you wish, you can use this as a baseline assessment and revisit the test again to check progress at the end of a SPaG or writing unit.
Rounds as follows:
Round 1 – Brackets (out of 10)
Round 2 – ? ! or . (out of 10)
Round 3 – Speech marks (out of 5)
Round 4 – Semicolons (out of 5)
Round 5 – Colons (out of 5)
Round 6 – Commas (out of 10)
Round 7 – Mixed 1 (out of 5)
Round 8 – Mixed 2 (out of 5
Round 9 – Mixed 3 (out of 5)
The quiz is reasonably challenging, and is therefore geared more towards KS3 and GCSE English level. However, it could also work with really bright KS2 students. Ideal activity as a standalone lesson or as part of a programme of GCSE revision for the new 9-1 Language spec, which places huge emphasis on this aspect of writing. I guess it would also make an ideal whole school literacy drive resource during tutor time!
Ready to roll, Enjoy!
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This is a lively and engaging resource developing students’ word choices and general vocabulary skills. Ideal in preparing students for GCSE English Language Paper 1, Section B. The full scheme of work is available to purchase for just £5. Click this link to check it out!
A range of activities designed to develop your pupils’ vocabulary use and to also get them into positive habits of editing and improving vocabulary after having ‘finished’. This has been designed with the new AQA Language Paper 1 specification in mind, which places heavy emphasis on making effective vocabulary choices in the writing, but is equally useful for KS3 teaching and for other major GCSE exam boards.
Would work well as a standalone writing/literacy lesson or as part of the paper 1 writing scheme of work of which this is a part.
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This is a 38 page, fully loaded revision, study and comprehension resource for Dennis Kelly’s ‘DNA’.
This has been written with the latest AQA (9-1) English Literature specification in mind, but I’m sure this would work equally well with other exam boards. This would also be ideal for drama specifications too. I’ve tried to make this revision guide as active as possible, so there are lots of activities and tasks for students to do as they work through the booklet. There’s a good balance of information and engaging tasks for students to work through.
Contents of this guide run as follows:
* Visual summary of plot
* Storyboard resource for students to then recall the plot and key events from memory
*Form and structure comprehension questions
*Settings questions
* Context (students explore key issues raised in the play such as youth stereotypes, gang culture, growing violence in the age of the internet etc)
* Symbols and Motifs - lots of information about symbols and motifs in the play, followed by a revision activity
* Key Quotes - Students explore key quotes through analysis of their meaning and significance, quotes are broken down chapter by chapter and provide thematic links etc.
* Themes - Students make connections between themes, characters and events in the novel
* Characterisation - Students have to complete a character profile for all the main characters using the study tasks provided
* Key Terminology - Exploring some key terminology and vocabulary that will deepen their understanding of the play as well as impress examiners.
* Exam question - a series of exam questions worded and structured in the same way you will expect to find them on the new 9-1 literature paper
*Exam Techniques - Hints and tips on how to maximise performance in the exam.
Ideal for all teachers as this is a new set text to be added to the specification. Definitely a grade saving resource that enables students to fully prepare for the exam and to explore the text from lots of different angles.
Ready to roll, everything a student needs to revise for the exam and boost their confidence in the run up to the exam. Little/no adaptation required. Suitable for a range of abilities. Enjoy!
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A comprehensive set of documents which aid with the writing of reports, hopefully providing you with the tools you need to write fair, honest and balanced reports for English.
The comment bank covers the following areas (as you can see from the preview there are documents for each):
Introductory comments/learning cognition and progress
Topics Covered
Behaviour and Attitude (with targets)
Reading/comprehension (and targets)
Writing skills (and targets)
The resources are suited to secondary Key Stages 3 and 4. Most of the comments simply require you to add a student’s name or to write their specific gender in the space provided.
I’m sure these will save you a good deal of time and effort, and help bring a little inspiration to the baleful process of report writing!
Mini scheme of work for the new spoken language element of the English Language 9-1 GCSE.
As you know, exam boards are now displaying speaking and listening grades on certificates and video recording of candidates is expected. As such, I've developed this scheme of work to ensure that my classes deliver intelligent, thoughtful and engaging presentations to secure the best possible grades.
This scheme is particularly tailored for the AQA specification (and contains exemplar material from AQA candidates). However, I'm sure it will prove equally useful for all other exam boards with some very minor alterations.
This is a complete mini-scheme that takes around 8 hours to complete properly. You'll also need to allow another couple of lessons on top of this for the presentations themselves.
The Powerpoint will coach your students from start to finish and will cover the following aspects:
* Understanding the spec and mark scheme
* Generating an engaging topic (provocative statement)
* How to research effectively for a presentation
* Structuring the talk itself
* Writing in shorthand for cue cards
* Looking at exemplar material to understand the ingredients of a good presentation
* Paired rehearsals
* Final presentations
* Student reflection activity to record grade and consider skills developed.
You also have a writing frame which takes the form of a 'checklist'. This is ideal for weaker groups who might struggle with the sheer size of the task; it therefore helps them break their speech right down. I've also included the specimen Spoken Language mark scheme that has been issued across all exam boards, for your reference.
I've found that the scheme has worked very well due to the high level of focus in terms of getting the topic right that students talk about. There's lots of guidance on this particular aspect of the process so I'm sure you will have as much success with your groups as I've had.
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Here is a detailed guidance booklet for the OCR 'Presenting and Performing Texts' unit of the GCSE Drama qualification.
Having recently had the examiner visit our school for this unit (former chief examiner David Cross I might add!) it was mentioned that the centre's concept pro-formas were particularly strong and effective. I have further updated and improved this booklet based on his feedback, so you can be sure that this has exactly what your visiting examiner will be looking for!
This booklet covers all the questions on the concept pro-forma individually. For each question:
* Students are given a breakdown of what the question is asking them to do, along with detailed guidance on how best to tackle the question
* Top Tips for each question, along with suggested activities they can do to help them successfully prepare for the questions
* Detailed exemplars (in this booklet I use DNA as the exemplar text) for each and every question in order to model strong responses.
This is everything your students need to successfully tackle the pro-forma and to make the best possible impression with the visiting examiner!
Buy in confidence from a TES recommended gold author!
A fun and engaging lesson developing students’ ability to use create interesting and developed characters. Ideal in preparing students for GCSE English Language Paper 1, Section B. The full scheme of work is available to purchase for just £5. Click this link to check it out!
In this lesson, a range of activities have been designed to develop your pupils’ imagination and descriptive writing skills. Lots of image based activities which connect quite strongly to what they will encounter in the writing section of paper 1 on the new AQA 9-1 Language syllabus. There are a wide range of activities that should keep your students busy for at least a couple of lessons.
Would work well as a standalone writing/literacy lesson or as part of the paper 1 writing scheme of work of which this is a part. Ready to go, lots of differentiation and Assessment for Learning built in to the activities.
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The mother of all GCSE Animal Farm revision resources.! Huge range of (107 to be precise!) activities to fully prepare students for the new specification 9-1 GCSE exam. This is focused on George Orwell’s Animal Farm.
Each slide is a stand-alone activity designed to improve students’ awareness of character, plot, themes, key subject terminology, context, writer’s intentions and those all important quotes!
Many of the activities make ideal starters, and plenaries, whilst some of the more extensive tasks can take a whole lesson. Ideal in the run up to the exam!
I’ve tried to approach the text from lots of different angles to keep it feeling ‘fresh’ for you and your students. I created this with the AQA spec in mind but am sure it’s equally applicable to other exam boards.
If you loved the resource and think it’s worth 5 stars, why not get another one absolutely free?
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A series of paper 1 style exemplars that students must punctuate correctly. Ideal preparation work in the run up to exams as it models good examples of creative writing whilst promoting proof reading and active reading strategies that will boost their AO6 SPaG mark.
They are all reasonably challenging, and are designed for Level 5 and above (C and above) students.
I find that they serve 2 purposes: they keep a student's proof reading skills sharp (essential, in my view, to get a good mark on the SPaG component of the writing task) whilst also modelling strong creative writing skills (I often use these activities as a foundation for detailed discussions about the strengths and weaknesses of the writing). I have found, particularly with top sets, that modelling the style of the writing in this way dramatically improves the content and sophistication of their creative writing.
Useful, no fuss worksheets that you can just print off and use straight away. Ideal bit of revision and skills building for the Section B writing section of the new specification GCSE language paper.
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A fantastic collection of visually stunning display posters guaranteed to light up your classroom!
Using quotations from Romeo and Juliet, this collection of 20 display posters combines striking images with beautiful fonts to create memorable visual prompts for your students. Ideal in any GCSE English classroom.
In the age of closed book exams, these will not only look great, but help your students revise quotations during each and every lesson. As part of the display bundle, there is also a ‘thinking points’ poster which encourages students to think about the different aspects of the quote in the same way they would need to in the GCSE exam.
I have also included the PPT files, so that you can print using the ‘2 slides per page’ option and print them off for your students to use as revision cue cards!
Most of the key quotations are included here, covering all the key events and key characters from the play.
The PPT preview is problematic on TES, but they download absolutely fine when purchased. I’ve also included the PDF version for added peace of mind. Why not check out the free trial before you buy?
If you loved the resource and think it’s worth 5 stars, why not get another one absolutely free?
Simply leave a review, email ireviewedajs@outlook.com with your TES username and state the free resource* you would like!
(Free resource cannot exceed the value of the original resource purchased)