Students must put the jumbled events of the play in the correct order. This includes a help sheet for teachers.

An AQA A level English Language resource for Paper 1 Section B: Challenging Innateness Theory in Child Language Development. In 1986, Chomsky added to his theory of language innateness by putting forward the idea that the Language Acquisition Device contained a Universal Grammar, a set of basic rules of grammar that characterise all languages. Read through the following theories and decide whether they or PRO Innateness theory or CON. This is an extremely useful document for discussing the main theories of Language Acquisition with Innateness as a starting point. Students should spend five minutes reading through and deciding whether the statements agree with Chomsky’s theories or with Behaviourist/Interactionist theories. I have found that it generates a lot of discussion and improves students’ understanding of AO2, concepts and theories.

Two PowerPoints introducing lexical development in children for paper 1 section B of the A level English Language paper (AQA). Powerpoint one outlines difficulties that children might have with synonyms, homonyms, hypernyms and hyponyms. The next PP introduces different kinds of over/under extension referring to Jean Aitchison and Leslie Rescorla so should follow on from the first.

This is a collection of ten practice essays I made for The Sign of the Four (GCSE English Literature paper 1) covering most of the novel. They touch on themes such as: representation of women; representation of foreigners; the Gothic; drama and suspense; duality; friendship and more.

These are knowledge organisers for 11 of the poems from the Love and Relationships collection. They are very useful for revision because they focus on the language, ideas/themes, context and story of the poems in a concise, easy-to-revise manner. Poems covered: Porphyria’s Lover The Farmer’s Bride Before You Were Mine Follower Love’s Philosophy Mother any distance Neutral Tones Sonnet XXIX Winter Swans When We Two Parted Letters from Yorkshire

This PowerPoint introduces Child Directed Speech and its importance to language development in children. It goes through the features of CDS and theories about it, from Bruner to Brown, Bellugi and Cazden. It includes video examples and has a short task at the end.

I used this PowerPoint to introduce two dialects (Yorkshire and Norfolk) to my A level class. There is an interesting link to a lecture given by the great David Crystal and another to Jake Thackeray singing about ‘Yan tan tether mether pip’ the ancient Swalesdale way of counting sheep. Students could then undertake their own research in small groups on a dialect of their choice.

This is a booklet I devised for preparing students for the writing to argue/persuade task in paper 2 (question 5) It takes students step-by-step through the process of planning the task and the sort of techniques necessary for communicating clearly, and structuring a coherent argument. There is a section on punctuation along with suggestions for writing tasks. It was a very effective introduction to paper 2 question 5.

This is a booklet I made to revise children’s literacy theories for A level English Language paper 1, section B. It begins by dividing the theorists along ‘caught’ and ‘taught’ lines and then outlines theories from Kroll, Perera, Rothery, Britton and others. There are two past exam questions to work on too. Very useful for revision

This is a transcript of a conversation between Shelagh Fogarty of LBC and a caller called Jonathan on 14/02/24. Jonathan had rung to criticise Shelagh for giving her opinion on her radio talk show. This conversation has since become notorious for being a man trying to tell a woman what she can and cannot talk about, even saying to her he would tell her when she could speak. I have put the link to the YouTube recording of the conversation on the worksheet, because it is best to listen to the original conversation in order to understand some of its pragmatics. There are two extracts followed by eight discussion points (to be done either verbally or in writing) drawing on linguistic theory from Zimmerman and West, Grice, Fairclough, Dale Spender and others. This is very useful in preparing for AQA paper 2 section A when considering some of the main theories for Language and Gender (particularly Dominance theory). It is also great for class discussion focusing on attitudes to women’s speech.

This is a PP, plus style models, for preparing students for the 2021 paper 2 paper, question 5. It focuses on examiner expectations with close attention to the mark schemes. It asks students to do a couple of short tasks as well as look at two style models to get them to think of the kind of techniques used in writing to argue. Finally, students should complete the question in exam conditions and then 1) get feedback from a partner and 2) ideally have it marked by the teacher.

PowerPoint explaining Child Directed Speech for the Child Language Development question (Paper 1 Section B). There are two video examples to watch alongside lists of features of CDS so that students can identify them. Also plenty of examples of theorists and their ideas about CDS. Very useful for exploring Bruner’s LASS.

This resource is a grid to be cut up and given to each student. It has the principal theorists for Child Language Development (such as Chomsky, Pinker, Aitchison, Vygotsky, Piaget) and can be used as a simple revision device, or as a way into constructing a well-supported discursive essay about CLD. Some guidance is included for the teacher.

A comprehensive creative writing scheme I created to prepare students for Question 5 of paper 1, GCSE English Language both descriptive and narrative writing. My approach was to begin with reading extracts from interesting texts - e.g. The Thirty-Nine Steps, Great Expectations, I’m the King of the Castle and From the Here and Now (Ann Brashares) thus reinforcing skills for Section A of this paper. There are fun writing exercises as warm-ups (these can be successfully extended), a focus on technique and structuring and clear links with the mark scheme. Most of the assessment is peer assessment, although I often use a shared word document so that students can share their work and comment on each others. The final task is a GCSE task which would ideally be marked by the teacher.

This is a group of documents (three PowerPoints and one word document) which I use to introduce the theories of writing development in children. I start with Learning How to Write and follow with Spelling and then Learning to Write Theorists The sheet on social interactionism Vs constructivism is useful for starting a discussion about the different theoretical positions about how children learn to write. Is it the result of teaching or of personal development?

This is a PowerPoint I made introducing the subject of prestige speech forms, i.e. Standard English and Received Pronunciation. It explains what each of these are and gives some background, quotations from theorists as well as recent newspaper articles about controversies surrounding language use.

A comprehensive workbook for introducing analysing spoken texts for A level English. It starts with transcribing, gives a full table of definitions of key features and introduces main theories such as Face and Grice’s Maxims alongside plenty of transcripts. Activities range from discussions to essay-writing. Very useful for preparing students for understanding the way speech works and leads nicely into Paper 2, Section A topics of accent and dialect, occupation and gender.

Document detailing the specifics of the manner and place of articulation, for analysing the phonology of language acquisition. Very useful for developing AO1 skills (apply linguistic methods and terminology; apply different levels of language analysis) and for understanding sound production. Can also be used for the Accents and Dialects unit.

This resource is one which I produced for GCSE paper 2 Reading practice. It consists of a PowerPoint which takes students step-by-step through the paper with hints and tips, model answers and tasks; a lesson handout consisting of model answers used for annotation and the mark scheme for each question; the paper itself - an interview with Edmund Hillary and an extract from Isabella Bird’s C19th account of climbing in the Rocky Mountains.

This is a PowerPoint I made to take students through the June '23 paper 2, section A of the English Language paper. It is thorough and methodical and introduces students to key terms from the mark scheme like: perceptive, judicious, synthesis etc. There are model answers to examine in relation to the mark scheme, tasks for students and plenty of tips. I am including the question paper, insert and mark scheme from AQA although the charge covers only the PowerPoint. If you like the resource, please give me a good review!