English

The overriding aim of the English curriculum is to foster a love of language and literature and specifically to fulfil students’ ability to use and understand English.

We endeavour to:

• meet the needs of individual students
• promote reading through the use of challenging texts
• develop the self-esteem of all students
• enable students to develop a writing style and a good use of English
• enable students to analyse and evaluate their own views of literature and the views of others

• Promote the use of good literacy skills within the English classroom and across the curriculum.
• Ensure that all students feel valued and make good progress within the subject regardless of starting point and background
• Promote pupil self confidence in reading, writing and speaking and listening skills
• Promote creativity
• To give pupils experience of a wide range of literature and encourage them to become independent readers with enthusiasm for and curiosity about books

KS3 at Weavers includes years 7, 8 and 9, with year 9 beginning the practising of KS4 skills in the fourth half term (GREAT 4).

English in secondary school covers three elements: reading, writing, and speaking and listening. Speaking and listening is assessed in both English and Drama, with which there are close cross-curricular links. In each year, students will study poetry, pre-1914 literature, a novel, non-fiction, and a drama text. Students are assessed at the end of each half term on a range of reading and writing tasks, as well as on speaking and listening.

Grammar skills are embedded into our day-to-day practice and targeted intervention is implemented when necessary. We value our link with our primary schools and work closely with them to incorporate techniques students would be used to, examples include: use of working walls and drama for writing.

It is our belief that literacy is the driving force for progress across the curriculum and we work across the school to embed literacy in all subjects and so accelerate the progress of our learners. Our students have a clear understanding of the assessment framework, and the AFs for English are also used for assessment in Humanities and Drama lessons.

Success at GCSE relies on a firm foundation at KS3 and the English Learning Area and Weavers Academy are committed to providing your son or daughter with the best possible chance in their secondary Education.

We follow the English GCSE with AQA specification 4700. All students in Year 10 complete the controlled assessment element of the course with some sitting the exam at the end of year 10. The majority of students will refine their examination skills and will sit the examination at the end of Year 11. English Literature with EDEXCEL IGCSE is taken as a secondary course to develop critical awareness and analytical skills.

This specification allows candidates to demonstrate their ability in functional English; to investigate and analyse language and, to experiment and use language creatively. The specification offers a skills-based approach to the study of English. This enables candidates to make ‘fresh’ and individual responses to each element of assessment. Creative writing is also assessed through Controlled Assessment. Drawing on the ‘creative’ agenda in the National Curriculum Programme of Study, candidates will be encouraged to be imaginative and to experiment with language to create writing that goes beyond the ‘real life’ contexts of the writing in the external unit. They may choose to write narrative, script, poetry or indeed any genre that enables an imaginative or even experimental use of English. The specification covers the functional elements of English. This is done mainly through the externally examined unit. The term ‘functional’ should  be considered in the broad sense of providing learners with the skills and abilities they need to take an active and responsible role in their communities, in their everyday lives, workplaces and educational settings.

The course is structured as the following units:

• Unit 1: Understanding and producing non-fiction texts
• Unit 2: Understanding and producing creative texts

Unit 1:

Candidates are required to read and understand a range of non-fiction texts, identifying the writers’ crafts and transferring these skills into their own writing for a range of genres, audiences and purposes.

The functional elements of English reading and writing are embedded within this unit allowing candidates to demonstrate that they are competent readers and writers in their daily lives. Reading texts will be drawn from a range of nonfiction genres. Some texts will be clearly functional in context (such as information leaflets) and others will be those which candidates can clearly expect to read in their daily lives including media sources (including texts with images, and/or other presentational devices) and literary non-fiction (such as travelogues and biographies). In preparing for this unit, candidates should draw on a variety of text types and transfer their reading skills. There will be two writing tasks, one shorter and one longer. The shorter task will ask candidates to write to inform, explain or describe; the longer task will require more developed and sustained ideas which argue or persuade. Candidates will be required to adapt their style to fit audience and purpose.

Unit 2: Controlled Assessment completed in examination conditions.

Candidates will submit for assessment three written responses based on tasks chosen from the task bank for this unit. This flexibility allows you to choose texts and tasks which best meet the needs of your candidates and allow them to develop their own personal interest in texts. Tasks will draw on candidates’ study of the following texts:

• a play by Shakespeare
• a text from the English Literary Heritage
• a text from a different culture or tradition.

Candidates will also submit two written pieces of controlled assessment based on subjects released from the examination board.

This course enables candidates to:

demonstrate skills in reading and writing necessary to communicate with others confidently, effectively, precisely and appropriately express themselves creatively and imaginatively understand the patterns,  structures and conventions of written and spoken English select and adapt speech and writing to different situations and audiences understand how variations in spoken and written language relate to identity and cultural diversity become critical readers of a range of texts, including multi-modal texts use reading to gain access to knowledge and to develop their own skills as writers understand that texts from the English,  Welsh and Irish Literary Heritage have been influential and significant over time and explore the meaning of these today understand how literature from other cultures is influential connect ideas, themes and issues,  drawing on a range of texts.

Key Stage 5:

AS and A2: English Literature

We are following the AQA Specification B English Literature course.

The broad aim of the course is to encourage an enjoyment and appreciation of literature, where personal and critical response is extremely important. Students will constantly be asked what they think and feel about a variety of questions, issues and problems which arise from the literature studied. Discussion, in small or large groups, will form the major part of lessons where students will be able to articulate their opinions, argue their ideas as well as being able to challenge the opinions of others, including staff! Material discussed in class will inevitably be of use in the essays which students will be expected to submit on a regular basis.

Reading is an essential part of the English course and students will be expected to spend much of their own time preparing for lessons by reading the set books. In addition, students will read literature of their own choice. This is especially important as literature helps to open up experience not afforded before; the more the students read, the more competent they become at handling language and the more adept they become at critical analysis. They also become enriched as students of literature.

Successful completion of the Literature course will require a confident and competent grasp of more than just the basic English skills on the part of the candidate. It cannot be stressed strongly enough that the most successful entrants are those who contribute to discussion regularly and who demonstrate a willingness to have their own views examined critically by others. In every other respect, the Literature course opens up a wonderfully rich experience to the keen, interested student.

All assessment pieces will be inputted on the GREAT sheet for year 12 or 13 during the assessment week of each GREAT. Individual teachers will provide intervention to students who fall below the expectation of progress through the use of CRISPs.

We follow the AQA Specification for Communication and Culture.

This specification is designed to:

• emphasise cultural aspects of communication
• provide a framework in which students relate their own life experiences to contemporary academic debates
• engage students in a wide range of interesting and well supported coursework tasks
• give students a thorough grounding in the analysis and understanding of cultural products and cultural practices
• reflect developments in this field in higher education, but at a level that is accessible and stimulating for A level.

This specification is designed to encourage students to:

• recognise the importance of the relationship between theories, empirical enquiry, practices and policies related to the ideas of communication and cultural studies
• reflect critically on everyday life experiences
• relate their studies to their particular needs, interests and circumstances
• understand the significance of tolerance and diversity in the study of communication and culture
• develop competence in key transferable skills which can be applied to a range of contexts.

At AS, Units 1 and 2 provide an integrated and complementary introduction to the study of communication and culture. Both units deal with the personal level of communication and candidates' own experience of cultural products and cultural practices. The interaction between the individual and the broader cultural environment is a key area of investigation:

• Unit 1: Understanding Communication and Culture
• Unit 2: The Individual and Contemporary Culture: Portfolio

At A2, Units 3 & 4 build on the work established in the AS; providing an integrated and extensive programme of study. Texts and contexts are more challenging and there is greater focus on theoretical approaches to contemporary culture. Both Units cover broader issues of cultural reproduction and transmission, with a plethora of critical opinions and perspectives; key concepts switch from identity to power:

• Unit 3: Communicating Culture
• Unit 4: Communication and Culture in Practice: Portfolio.

This course is aimed at those students who wish to continue with English at Advanced Level but feel that an exclusively literature-based Advanced Level is not for them. Students opting for this course should have a keen interest in, and an awareness of language, both written and spoken, in everyday use. They should also have the ability to analyse and comment critically upon their own writing and that of other authors.

Discussion in small and large groups will form a major part of lessons. Students will be expected to articulate their opinions and justify their analysis. Reading is an essential part of the English Language course and students will be expected to spend a significant part of the course analysing texts in order to familiarise themselves with the different purposes of written language. There will also be the opportunity for students to write creatively and at length.

Successful completion of the Language course will require a competent grasp of more than just basic English skills on the part of the candidate. To support these skills students will be taught aspects of advanced English Grammar as well as being given the opportunity to develop their own writing style.

The areas of study include:

• Investigating Language
• Language and power
• Language and Gender
• Grouping texts
• Creating texts
• Child Language Acquisition
• Language Change

Coursework will account for approximately 30% of the final grade awarded and provides an opportunity for students to work independently upon areas of personal interest.

English Language will be delivered by a highly qualified team of English teachers. Independent study and research are vital components of the course, and students are encouraged to embrace these elements from an early stage.

English Language offers students the opportunity to reflect upon the nature of communication. In this respect it is an excellent preparation for the demands of any university/college course or work environment in which effective written or verbal communication are a vital ingredient of success. 

Links

Patron of Reading - John Townsend

Lendmeyourliteracy.com