This collection of resources was put together to encourage art students, who also had to sit Functional English, to engage and participate with English, something they are very reluctant to do. I soon recognized that due to Banksy’s fame, his themes of power, corruption, environmentalism and animal rights etc, this session worked with a wide range of students from all curriculum areas and quickly developed into a popular lesson which could be altered to suit a variety of levels. The session looks at Banksy’s work, promotes discussion, opinions and team work. The session uses videos, word banks and looks closer at an article written about him with the final task being for the students to plan and write their own piece about him. The larger aim of the session is to broaden vocabulary and to plan writing but is open for you to develop and arrange in whichever suits you and your students best, as one size does not fit all. Please keep in mind that the TES preview sometimes distorts the look of the resource and this is not a true reflection. Hope it helps.

Many students often struggle with the freedom to use their imagination, particularly under exam conditions. This resource was created for the AQA specification, Paper 1 Question 5 - create a short story based from an image. However this resource is diverse enough to be adapted to a wide range of exam boards and creative writing skills, from encouraging writing in low level Functional skills English students to developing language features in GCSE students. It uses paintings by Picasso and Frieda Kahlo. It is a team activity which allows for differentiation among levels and abilities by using a scaffold questions system. The activity is developed to allow the teacher freedom to build in specifically tailored skills they wish their students to learn. Encouraging students to use their imagination allows English to be fun and engaging whilst also developing their confidence in the subject, as with this activity there is no wrong answer.

As controlled assessments are a thing of the past now on the GCSE English Language course, I have a selection of bite sized assessments to be used through out the year as a means to track students progress on individual question from the exam. This is extremely useful for both student and teacher as it allows for continuous yearly exam practice and progress tracking on each exam question without the burden of marking full mock exams for large classes at a singular time. This assessment focus on a section of text from Warm Bodies for paper 1 question 4 (critical thinking). The lesson includes group tasks and a video to help warm your students up. It also comes with a helpful scaffold to allow students to form ideas to use as their assessment answers, this can be edited to suit the level of your class. Hope it helps.

A full lesson to introduce the concept of comparison of writers opinion for paper 2 question 4. This lesson uses modern celebrities and scandals, such as Marilyn Monroe and Johnny Depp and Amber Heards divorce to help students identify bias language with the larger aim of being able to compare two piece of writing based on the same topic. The lesson PowerPoint comes with guidance notes rather than a lesson plan and slides which can be used to either stretch and challenge strong students or support weaker ones. Resources include 2 videos and various worksheets to be used in group or paired work. The lesson is designed to be fun and engaging but also challenging as this question is often the one most students struggle or worry over the most. Hope you find it helpful.

A great lesson to help students get ready for Paper 1 Question 4 (critical thinking) from the AQA GCSE English Language exam, spec 8700. This lesson focuses on fast paced group activities and discussions based on an extract from 1984 where students actively investigate the use of the familiar and unfamiliar to create a unsettling atmosphere in the book. The session starts with a critical thinking question as a starter task and builds up to the main task through quick fire questions and a video to help students visualise and understand this world created by Orwell. The session builds towards a final written task which doubles as exam practice, allowing you to track how each individual handles this tricky question. This session allows for the opportunity to stretch and challenge your students but also comes with support structures and starter sentences to help those who need it and a peer marking plenary which allows the students to self assess and learn from each other. Hope it helps

This is a well paced, exciting lesson filled with fun and team games. Paper 1 Question 5 is worth a lot of marks and today the examiners expect students to use a wide range of sentence forms and language features to obtain those marks. Many students jump into this question as it looks deceptively easy and they will forget to PLAN for what the examiner wants to see. This lesson is a fun well paced lesson to help students to remember what to plan for in this question and therefore is great as an introduction to the question / topic. Using games and short activities, students will build up a bank of language features and sentences on the topic of Donald Trump over the course of the lesson to use in their final task. Feel free to amend to your students needs and levels. Please be advised that the preview sometimes distorts the look of the resource. Hope it helps

A handy bite sized assessment to help support and track students towards their paper 2 of the AQA GCSE English Language exam (spec 8700). This assessment tests students on paper 2 questions 3 and 4 by using comparable sources on festivals (Greenwich and Glastonbury). Rather than throw the students in cold to an assessment, this assessment is broken down and uses reinforcement of prior learning and paired work to help students prepare, discuss and scaffold (2 scaffold templates, one populated with examples, one not as to stretch and challenge your students) their answers before the final timed assessment.I find that by having these bite sized assessments at the end of each term helps to build up confidence and allows for tracking progress through out the year. It also helps to reduce your marking. Please note that these resources are designed to be modified by yourselves to support your students needs in whatever way you see fit. Also, the TES preview does at times distort the look of the resource and this is not always a true reflection. Hope it helps

This is an entire lesson for AQA English Language (spec 8700) for Paper 2 Question 4 where the students must compare two sources. For this lesson I have used two modern sources as opposed to one modern, one older as it would be in the exam. The reason for this is highlighted in the lesson and is clear to the students what they will expect, however I have found that by using this method helps the students build confidence in tackling this overwhelming question and is a good way to build them towards comparing older sources. This lesson looks at the award speeches made by Leo DiCaprio and Kanye West, the lesson starts with a personal values starter and this idea of personal values continues throughout the rest of the lesson by looking into the values these two celebrities display in their speeches. There is room to develop the personal / British values concept if desired. The lesson has 2 videos, links to the you tube site is on both the worksheet and the power point. The activities are timed, short and allow for group discussion and discovery learning. The lesson ends with the students writing their findings in a structure which will suit the examiners needs and a short, self assessment plenary. The power point provides slides which can be printed and distributed as support / scaffolding materials for the weaker students if needed. Hope it helps

This is a full, interactive, quick paced lesson which covers a lot of ground as this lesson has enough material to cover a 3 hour class, however it can easily be broken into 3 separate lessons if needs be as there is a lot of information in this session. The lesson warms up the students by using vocabulary building activities and by looking at Cirque Du Soleil to practice the skills needed for paper 2 question 3. The lesson then moves on to an older piece of writing covering the Great Exhibition in 1851, developing the skills needed for P2:Q3 but also preparing the students for a piece of 19th century writing. The last phase of the lesson then compares the Great Exhibition to a piece of writing covering the Millennium Dome Exhibition in 2000. The lesson is broken up with 3 videos, worksheets and has lots of room for interactive paired and group activities and also includes practice exam answer tasks which involve deeper thinking skills. Students support and learn from one another with peer assessment and a short self assessment plenary which encourages independent learning whilst slides and worksheets include starter sentences to support the weaker students. Hope it helps

This resource is a complete lesson with a complete mock exam for Paper 2 of the AQA English Language exam and enough material to fill a 3 hour session. It is designed to be a informal and supportive lesson to help students become more comfortable and confident in the lead up to mock and real exams, although it can be altered to be presented in a way which suits the individual teachers style or to be more formal in delivery. Based around two war speeches made by Winston Churchill and Chief Joseph this lesson examines to two sides of war made by two different war leaders from different eras, it allows the student to work in teams and as individuals with bite sized activities which help the student to focus and develop ideas around the materials, supporting the less able in the class to get up to speed but also allowing your more able to push further and develop insightful answers. As the theme is war, this lesson also allows room for embedding of deeper social issues. Hope it helps

This fantastic and fun lesson can be used with either AQA or Edexcel exam boards for GCSE English language. This lesson focuses on writing skills, emphasising ambitious vocabulary, developing language / structural features and writing for an audience. It is a perfect refresher to build on already taught skills and is an excellent lesson to use after a break or half term to re-inspire students and re-engage them in to English. This full lesson has enough material to fill 3 hours and can be used as one complete session or broken into 2 sessions, it is designed to re-awaken students imagination and uses plenty of bite sized group and team activities to encourage self motivation and independent learning. This session starts off with the "design your dream house" theme and uses MTV Cribs and plenty of stimulating visuals to inspire students and get their engines running. It ends with a look at Tolkiens description of a Hobbit Hole and the use of structural features used to engage his audience and bring them on a journey , therefore progressing students skill level from simple descriptive writing to something more sophisticated. The final main task is for the students to write a piece of mind blowing descriptive writing of their own dream house using all the skills covered. Resources include ppt of the full lesson with slides which can be printed and distributed, Hobbit extract with Q&A section, video with accompanying worksheet, writing scaffold, MTV cribs blurb sheet for those who don't know the programme. This lesson has engaged and inspired students every time I have used it and has lead to some really great pieces of writing. Hope it helps.

This resource is an 8 page group of worksheets which can be used to design your own lesson around depending on which exam board you are working with in GCSE English. Using the prologue from the 1st book of George RR Martins series, this resource looks at language and structural features. It comes with worksheets for a range of levels, starting simple with read and obtain questions, working our way up to inference, language analysis and strong example answers with stretch and challenge tasks. The resources are designed so you can develop a teacher led lesson around them or set self study or independent learning seminar sessions with teacher acting as support or facilitator as the worksheets allow for paired or team interaction between the students. There is enough material for a 3 or more hour session, which can be broken into 2 or more sessions depending on your timetable. Hope it helps.

This exciting lesson is designed to help students prepare for paper 1 question 1 from the AQA English Language exam - spec 8700. It's primary focus is to help students gain a understanding of inference and how to use it in a structured answer for the exam. This is done by weaving activities focused on PQI (POINT, QUOTE, INFERENCE) around clips from the Tom Hardy movie "Warrior" (cert 12A) in where we look the Character of Tommy, played by Tom Hardy, and use inference to examine what kind of person he is. This lesson uses bite sized activities to keep the lesson moving forward at a good pace and to engage the students, this includes team activities and class discussions. The lesson includes some high level analysis of the character of Tommy and low level activities to help those who have mixed level classes reach all students. Hope it helps

This speaking and listening lesson focuses around the conspiracy theory that Princess Diana was murdered. Students love this lesson because many students love a good conspiracy theory. This lesson comes with videos to help students get a full background of her life and events. It requires the students to work together to collect their own research and develop their own opinions and counter arguments which will form part of the group debate. The videos don’t come with additional worksheets although they can be created to help form part of the students research as and when you feel necessary. This lesson can be used with any exam board and also with functional skills SP & LIST. It can be developed to underpin skills such as identifying bias and critical thinking. Please be aware that TES preview can often distort the look of the resource and this is not a true reflection. Hope it helps.

This is a short lesson to help students understand inference. I especially find that this lesson is useful with second language learners or lower level learners. This short lesson break down the concept of inference and shows how it can be used in various forms, such as speech, images and in fiction. The final task is to take an image of a wrecked house and “sell” the property in writing as an estate agent would, using language to mislead and infer. This can be used with any exam board and with L2 Functional Skill learners. Hope it helps

This is a simple card matching activity that can be used as a starter to help students with simple spellings by using mnemonics. This is great to use with lower level Functional Skills students or students with dyslexia. Feel free to use in a way which works with your students. Hope it helps

This work pack is designed for Functional skills and covers areas such as reading for information, summary writing and speaking & listening. The lesson is designed around the murder of Sophie Lancaster, who was killed for the way she dressed. This lesson touches upon issues such as equality, prejudice and British Values . Feel free to tinker with to suit the needs of your students. Please be aware that TES previews can at times distort the look of the resource and this is not true reflection. Hope it helps

I have always used cheat sheets as a form of revision for my students sitting GCSE. It is essentially an extended version of an exam plan but not quite a mock exam, it’s some where in the middle. I love to use these because it promotes a sense of confidence for the students and it it a condensed version of EVERYTHING they need to know about each question of the exam. I explain it to them as an “exam blueprint”. This session is what I call a “meat and potato” type of lesson. No frills just does what it says on the tin and gives the students what they need. The session puts students into teams and takes them through a breakdown of each exam question and they copy these “cheats” onto a past exam paper. Along the way they try their hand at some of the questions, get examples of what makes a good answer and they have some independent study questions in their cheat sheet to try at home. They get to keep their “cheat sheet” for revision purposes. This has always worked and I have found that students have always got on board with this idea because they instantly see the benefit of it and it helps them feel more secure about sitting their exam. This session comes with a full powerpoint for paper 2 and student handouts with source material. Please keep in mind that TES preview can distort the look of resources but this is not a true reflection. Hope it helps

Great, fun, humour filled lesson filled with interactive group activities your students will love. Tasks include: Starter game Competitive vocabulary game. Guess the celebrity game Descriptive writing task Pleanary This resource also comes with slides which can be printed and used as worksheets, slides also come with optional guidance notes on each task / activity which can act as a lesson plan if needed. I have taught this lesson for years and it has always gone down very well with students. Suitable as an introduction at GCSE or Functional Skills level to description but can also be built upon to stretch and challenge. This was created for the AQA GCSE specification but is suitable for any exam board.

This is an 8 page booklet designed to be used as independent study to help students prepare for their creative writing task in the GCSE English Language exam. This has been designed with the WJEC EDUQAS exam board in mind but will equally work with those who are studying for other exam boards. This booklet is designed to cater for different levels. We all know we have students who need explicit structure and instructions, therefore often find it difficult to create from imagination, even with prompts. Whereas we all have students who will fly on an imaginative roller coaster with the vaguest of hints. This booklet caters for both type of student. It starts with visual prompts to help coax ideas out of the least creative of students and then walks them through a planning process where they develop language features, vocabulary and short story lines. We also have writing prompts which will allow the student to use real life experiences to help inspire a story, much like the WJEC exam board will give. To turn the level up a notch we have a wide range of writing prompts using song titles. All through out the pack there are hints and tips to help students keep on track as to the skills they need to display in their writing to ensure the most marks from the examiner. This can be used in any way you feel will work best with your students. Please keep in mind that TES preview can distort the resource, this is not a reflection of how to looks. Hope it helps.