Key Stage 3 English: Improving Grammar and Punctuation - Starter Lessons This resource was designed as a series of starter activities to be taught across a half-term. It is a flexible resource for students who require input on improving sentences. It focuses on sentences structure and punctuation and provides opportunities for students to apply new skills. It takes a visual approach to teaching simple, compound and complex sentences and provides texts and writing activities which help provide a context rather than the more traditional method of writing out individual sentences. As well as sentence structure, it covers punctuation including use of commas and punctuating direct speech. It perfectly complements teaching of narrative or descriptive writing as many of the examples and tasks are fiction based. Included are 13 starters on a 68 slide teaching PPT plus all ten resources in both word and pdf formats as well as a detailed set of teacher’s notes. I hope you enjoy using these starters and that they help your students to improve their grammar and punctuation. You may also like: English Key Stage 3 Creative Writing Unit for Years 7-8 This highly engaging and enjoyable unit of work is designed to help students write creatively with a particular focus on narrative and descriptive writing. It supports students in actively exploring and enjoying both descriptive and narrative texts, looking at excellent and varied models from a range of literature and identifying successful features before moving to composing their own creative responses.A very nicely presented 83 slide teaching PPT is included as well as a detailed set of teacher’s notes with suggested approaches and all thirteen classroom resources.**

Key Stage 3 English: Narrative Writing Digital Planning Frames This resource includes three narrative writing planning frames/ graphic organisers in pdf and a pdf format which allows students to type in their responses. I have also included a resource with ten narrative writing tasks for student s to choose from. They are ideal for setting a narrative task to be completed at home. You may also like: English Key Stage 3 Creative Writing Unit for Years 7-8 This highly engaging and enjoyable unit of work is designed to help students write creatively with a particular focus on narrative and descriptive writing. It supports students in actively exploring and enjoying both descriptive and narrative texts, looking at excellent and varied models from a range of literature and identifying successful features before moving to composing their own creative responses.A very nicely presented 83 slide teaching PPT is included as well as a detailed set of teacher’s notes with suggested approaches and all thirteen classroom resources.

English Skills: Vivid Verbs, Amazing Adjectives and Adventurous Adverbs This is a highly engaging and enjoyable series of lessons which helps to develop key skills including vivid verbs, amazing adjectives and adventurous adverbs in an interactive way. It can be taught as a weekly or fortnightly skills lesson to a Year 6 or Year 7 group and culminates in a piece of descriptive writing. I have used it this term with my lower ability Year 7 group and had some lovely writing from them. A teaching PPT and accompanying resources are included. You may also like: ENGLISH SKILLS: Improving Grammar and Punctuation- Starter lessons English Key Stage 3: Creative Writing Unit for Years 7-8

This unit is aimed at English teachers and departments who wish to develop their practice in relation to teaching narrative and descriptive writing for IGCSE. It is a self study unit which includes lots of practical ideas for the IGCSE classroom as well as opportunities for reflection and activities to help translate what you have learned into practice. The unit covers approaches to teaching key elements of narrative and descriptive writing including planning, structure, sentences and vocabulary as well as specific techniques such as ‘show not tell’. It comes with extras such as planning frames and tasks to inspire imaginative writing. You may also like: [Cambridge IGCSE English: Narrative and Descriptive Writing Unit - Gothic Fiction] (https://www.tes.com/teaching-resource/resource-12591942) [Pearson Edexcel IGCSE English Language: Imaginative Writing Unit - Gothic Fiction] (https://www.tes.com/teaching-resource/resource-12592363)

AQA English Language GCSE Paper 2 Unit: Mountaineering This unit is designed to help develop some of the key skills required for responding to literary non-fiction in Paper 2 as well as creative and transactional writing. It is built around the subject of mountaineering and takes a number of key extracts from ‘Touching the Void’ as the basis for language study and as models for good writing. It focuses on teaching the skills required to plan and respond to the summary, language and comparison questions in Paper 2 as well as teaching descriptive writing for Paper 1 section B and writing to argue for Paper 2 section B. A beautifully presented 76 slide teaching PPT is included together with all 22 student resources in pdf format and a detailed set of teacher’s notes. I hope you enjoy teaching the unit. You may also like: AQA English Language GCSE Paper 1: Creative Writing Unit for Mid to High Attainers This half-termly unit of work is designed to help prepare students for the AQA English Language Paper 1 exam with particular focus on narrative and descriptive writing. It supports students in actively exploring and enjoying both descriptive and narrative writing, looking at excellent and varied models of texts and identifying successful features before moving to students composing their own creative responses. AQA English Language GCSE Non-examination Assessment: Spoken Language Unit This three week unit is designed to prepare students for their AQA spoken presentation on a topic agreed with their teacher. The unit guides students through the process by looking at aspects of effective presentations such as openings, rhetorical devices, memorable endings, use of cue cards to structure a talk, delivering the talk and responding to questions.

This highly engaging and fully resourced unit of work is designed to teach some of the key skills required for responding to and writing non-fiction texts. It is built around the topic of Leisure and is aimed at grade 9-10 students. There are two sections: Reading section – building key skills through the study of three different non-fiction texts including a news report, a leaflet and web pages. Writing section – focus on building the skills required to write a review. This unit includes a 47 slide teaching PPT as well as a set of detailed teacher’s notes and all 9 student resources. Common Core Standards include: CCRA R.4,6,7 W4,5 I hope you enjoy teaching the unit as much as I did.

This highly engaging and enjoyable unit of work, written for a higher ability group, is designed to help students write creatively with a particular focus on narrative and descriptive writing. It supports students in actively exploring and enjoying both descriptive and narrative texts, looking at excellent and varied models and identifying successful features before moving to composing their own creative responses. A well-presented 60 slide teaching PPT is included as well as a detailed set of teacher’s notes with suggested approaches and all eleven classroom resources. Common Core Standards include CCRA W.3,W.4 and W.5 I enjoyed teaching this unit and hope you do too. Best wishes, RoseandMay

In this highly engaging and enjoyable unit, students explore literary non-fiction texts on the theme of mountaineering as a prelude to completing their own creative and non-fiction writing. It is ideal for a grade 9-10 class. Texts include extracts from Joe Simpson’s ‘Touching the Void’ and Matt Dickinson’s ‘The Death Zone’ both of which are dramatic accounts of mountaineering expeditions. There are lots of opportunities for paired and group discussion and students learn how to write analytical responses to reading as well as their own creative pieces and an argumentative essay on the subject of extreme sports. There is a particular focus on planning and your class will be introduced to innovative planning methods including the box plan and the ‘because, but, so’ model. Common Core Standards include: CCRA W.3,W.4,W.5, R.5,R.9 Included is a 62 slide PPT as well as 20 well-presented resources to use as handouts in class. I hope you enjoy teaching the unit.

This engaging and enjoyable half-termly unit is designed to develop key skills in reading fiction and non-fiction as well as writing creatively. It is based on the topic of Heroism with lots of activities and great texts to help students develop key reading skills such as locating information, inference, commenting on structure and comparison as well as key narrative writing skills such as opening and ending a story, writing direct speech, varying sentences, improving vocabulary and planning. Texts include extracts from non-fiction and fiction texts including 'Pat Barker’s ‘Regeneration’, Remarque’s ‘All Quiet on the Western Front’ and Tolkien’s ‘The Lord of the Rings’. All 17 well-presented student resources are included in pdf format as well as a 68 slide teaching PPT and a detailed set of teacher’s notes. I hope you enjoy teaching the unit as much as I did.

This highly engaging unit teaches students the key skills required for delivering an individual spoken presentation on a topic agreed with their teacher. It guides students through the process by looking at aspects of effective presentations such as openings, rhetorical devices, endings, use of cue cards to structure a talk, delivery and responding to questions. Strategies include exploring good examples of talks as well as group discussions and opportunities to try out a variety of techniques. A well-presented 37 slide PPT is included as well as all six resources in both word and pdf formats. Common Core Standards CCRA.SL. 1,4 I hope you enjoy teaching this unit.

This engaging and enjoyable unit of work is designed to help build the skills necessary for success in two speaking and listening tasks as well as those valued by employers. It is a discussion based unit and explores skills such as asking questions, leading a discussion, researching and planning a presentation. It leads to two assessment activities, a ‘meeting’ in which students discuss setting up a series of lunchtime clubs for younger students followed by an individual presentation in which students showcase their own plans for a school club. I have included a detailed set of teacher’s notes, a well-presented 44 slide teaching PPT and all student resources. I hope your students enjoy taking part in this unit. Common Core Skills include CCRA SL 1,4,6

This engaging and enjoyable half-termly unit is designed to develop key skills in reading fiction and non-fiction as well as writing creatively. It is based on the topic of Exploring with lots of activities and great texts to help students develop key reading skills such as locating information, inference and comparison as well as key writing skills such as opening a story, writing direct speech, using narrative voice and varying sentences. Texts include extracts from non-fiction and fiction texts including ‘My Family and Other Animals’ , Charles Darwin’s Journal and Michael Morpurgo’s ‘Kensuke’s Kingdom’. Common Core Standards CCRA W.3,4,5 CCRA R1,4 All 15 student resources are included in pdf format as well as a 54 slide teaching PPT and a detailed set of teacher’s notes. I hope you enjoy teaching the unit.

This engaging and enjoyable unit is designed to develop some of the key skills required for responding to and writing non-fiction. It is built around the topic of Music and includes three sections: speaking and listening, reading and writing. The speaking and listening section prepares students for a discussion task and an individual presentation. The reading section is built around engaging texts such as music magazine covers, an advice leaflet on setting up a band and web information pages on the history of blues music and explores aspects such as organizational and presentational features. The writing section prepares students to complete their own gig review after exploring and identifying the key features of the genre. Common Core Standards CCRA SL1,2 CCRA W2,4 CCRA RI 7.5,7.9 All 11 student resources are included in pdf format as well as a 53 slide teaching PPT (see Preview) and a detailed set of teacher’s notes. I hope you enjoy teaching the unit.

This resource was designed as a series of engaging starter activities for my English Grade 8 class to be taught across a half-term. It is a flexible resource which can be used for other year groups who require input on improving sentences. It focuses on sentences structure and punctuation and provides opportunities for students to apply new skills. It takes a visual approach to teaching simple, compound and complex sentences and provides texts and writing activities which help provide a context rather than the more traditional method of writing out individual sentences. As well as sentence structure, it covers punctuation including use of commas and punctuating direct speech. It perfectly complements teaching of narrative or descriptive writing as many of the examples and tasks are fiction based. Included are 13 starters on a 68 slide teaching PPT plus all ten resources in pdf format as well as a set of teacher’s notes. I hope you enjoy using these starters and that they help your students to improve their grammar and punctuation.

This engaging and enjoyable unit is designed to develop some of the key skills required for responding to and writing non-fiction. It is built around the topic of Hobbies and includes three sections: speaking and listening, reading and writing. The speaking and listening section prepares students for a discussion task and an individual presentation. The reading section is built around engaging texts such as a persuasive leaflet, an instructional piece on how to draw cartoon faces and an advice blog on starting up a new hobby, exploring aspects such as language, organizational and presentational features. The writing section prepares students to complete their own fact sheet after exploring and identifying the key features of the genre. Common Core Standards CCRA S.1,4 CCRA W.2,4 CCRA R.7 All 11 student resources are included as well as a nicely presented 54 slide teaching PPT and a detailed set of teacher’s notes. I hope you enjoy teaching the unit.

This highly engaging unit of work is designed to help prepare students to complete an extended piece of narrative or descriptive writing. I designed it with my own lower attaining class in mind. It supports students in developing some of the key skills required to write their own creative pieces such as writing effective openings, writing dialogue, varying sentences, creating characters and planning responses. It supports and leads them towards a creative writing task (either narrative or descriptive) which they complete at the end of the unit. The 75 slide teaching PPT is included as well as a detailed set of teacher’s notes with suggested teaching approaches and all eleven classroom resources. I have also included extra creative writing tasks based on images. Common Core Standards include CCS CCRA W.3,W.4,W.5 I hope you enjoy teaching the unit as much as I did. Best wishes, RoseandMay

This highly engaging, relevant and carefully designed unit of work is designed to teach some of the key skills required for responding to and writing non-fiction texts. It is built around the idea of preparing for the world of further education or work. There are three sections: Speaking and Listening – preparation for a discussion and presentation task Reading section – exploring and responding to three different non-fiction texts - a news report, a college prospectus and web pages Writing section – covers writing a personal statement and a formal e-mail This unit includes a 71 slide teaching PPT as well as a detailed set of teacher’s notes and all 15 student resources. I hope you and your students enjoy the unit.