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Pedagogy and professional development
Of Mice and Men - Context: The American Dream and The Great Depression
This engaging and interesting lesson aims to improve students’ knowledge of the social, historical, and cultural context of John Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men. It also aims to build their skills in creating clear and specific links between the text and it’s context, focusing on a specific extract from the novel.
The lesson uses a range of tasks, that require students to use their visual and interactive skills. It follows this learning journey:
- Understanding what dreams are and how they differ for each of us;
- Defining the American Dream, The Wall Street Crash and The Great Depression;
- Creating a timeline which visually depicts the other influential events of the time;
- Reading and reflecting on an extract from the text;
- Analysing the links between texts and contexts, from a success criteria;
- Evaluating each others’ analytical attempts.
All images in this resource are licensed for commercial use, and are cited on the final slide of the lesson presentation.
You can choose to buy this resource alone, or as part of the ‘Of Mice and Men - All Lessons and Scheme’ bundle, which contains seven full lessons, resources, teachers notes, and PowerPoint presentations, plus a Pointless Of Mice and Men game, for just £5!
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A Christmas Carol Huge Bundle!
THIS BUNDLE CONTAINS ALL OF THE ‘A CHRISTMAS CAROL’ LESSONS, IN ADDITION TO THE 30-PAGE COMPREHENSION BOOKLET, THE KNOWLEDGE ORGANISER, AND THE POINTLESS GAME!
This engaging, varied, and informative scheme of learning is designed to help students gain understanding, assessment skills, and key interpretations of Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol. Made up of a wide-range of interesting and exciting lessons, students should complete this scheme having gathered vital skills in: interpreting the significant meanings of the text, understanding the writer’s ideas within the text, analysing key characters, settings, and themes, and understanding Dickens’ language devices.
Stimulating, visual, and easily adaptable, these lessons provide suggested learning objectives and outcomes for students of a wide-range of abilities - The vast majority of tasks are differentiated to allow for different abilities and needs in your classroom. Each lesson loosely follows this logical learning journey to ensure that students learn in bite-size steps:
- Engaging
- Defining/ Understanding
- Identifying/Remembering
- Analysing/ Creating
- Peer or self evaluating.
All of the lessons are interactive, employ a variety of different teaching and learning methods and styles, and are visually-engaging. Resources, worksheets, and lesson plans are all provided.
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Animal Farm Huge Bundle!
THIS BUNDLE CONTAINS ALL OF THE ANIMAL FARM LESSONS, IN ADDITION TO THE 30-PAGE ANIMAL FARM COMPREHENSION BOOKLET, THE KNOWLEDGE ORGANISER AND THE POINTLESS GAME!
This engaging, varied, and informative scheme of learning is designed to help students gain a valuable understanding of George Orwell’s allegorical novella ‘Animal Farm.’ The lessons enable students to gain a comprehensive understanding of the key features of plot, character, context, and language, in addition to considering the key messages being offered by Orwell.
All of the resources that you need are included in the bundle: informative and engaging whole lesson PowerPoints, worksheets, activities, and lesson plans.
The bundle is made up of a wide-range of interesting and exciting lessons, including:
- The Russian Revolution;
- Old Major’s Dream;
- The Rise of the Pigs;
- Dictatorship;
- Squealer;
- The Ending (Orwell’s Message)
Stimulating, visual, and easily adaptable, these lessons provide suggested learning objectives and outcomes for students of a wide-range of abilities - The vast majority of tasks are differentiated to allow for different abilities and needs in your classroom. Each lesson loosely follows this logical learning journey to ensure that students learn in bite-size steps:
- Engaging
- Defining/ Understanding
- Identifying/Remembering
- Analysing/ Creating
- Peer or self evaluating.
All of the lessons are interactive, employ a variety of different teaching and learning methods and styles, and are visually-engaging.
Macbeth: Act 2 Scene 2 - The Murder of King Duncan!
This lesson aims to improve students’ understanding of one of the key scenes in William Shakespeare’s Macbeth – Act II Scene II. In particular, they learn to make insightful interpretations about Shakespeare’s use of symbolism, and are enabled to understand how this would have affected Shakespearean audiences.
The lesson utilises a range of tasks, that require students to be visual and interactive learners. It follows this learning journey:
- Defining the key term ‘symbolism’ and establishing its importance as a literary technique;
- Understanding the different objects that were used as symbols in Shakesperean times through a multiple choice team game;
- Reading and interpreting Act 2 Scene 2, and establishing how symbolism is utilised throughout;
- Summarising the events of the scene;
- Analysing Shakespeare’s intentions in using literary techniques, and considering the audience reactions to them;
- Peer/self evaluating the learning in the lesson.
Included in this resource pack are:
- A well-presented, thorough, and informative, whole-lesson PowerPoint presentation;
- Resources for the reading and interpreting activity - full scene transcript with space for notes;
- A template to help scaffold the main task, complete with P.E.E instructions;
- A comprehensive teacher guidance form/lesson plan to assist delivery.
All images in this resource are licensed for commercial use, and are cited on the final slide of the lesson presentation.
Animal Farm: Squealer (Double Lesson!)
These resources enable students to understand and analyse the character of Squealer in George Orwell’s Animal Farm. More precisely, students learn to make clear and accurate interpretations regarding his role in within the consolidation of Napoleon’s dictatorship. Students also demonstrate their understanding of chapters 7 and 8, with a particular emphasis upon the actions of Squealer. There are easily enough resources here for two lessons.
Students learn through the following tasks:
- Gauging and collaborating previous knowledge of ‘propaganda’ through a discussion-based starter task;
- Using an interactive, out-of-seat, group activity to build understanding of the features of propaganda;
- Reading chapters 7 and 8 with a particular focus on the character of Squealer, and demonstrating their understanding through a related activity sheet;
- Developing their understanding of Squealer’s actions, and finding textual evidence to back this up, through a scaffolded, retrieval activity;
- Using their imaginative and creative skills, in addition to their knowledge of Squealer and propaganda posters, to construct their own propaganda poster for Animal Farm;
- Peer assessing their partners’ learning attempts.
The following resources are provided:
- Engaging and colourful step-by-step PowerPoint
- Teacher lesson guidance/plan;
- Squealer’s Propaganda worksheet;
- Four propaganda texts for group analysis;
- Template for recording group analysis;
- Chapters 7 and 8 worksheet (plus teacher answer sheet);
- Copies of Chapters 7 and 8.
All images and videos are licensed for commercial use, and are cited on the final slide of the PowerPoint.
Animal Farm: Dictatorship
These resources enable students to understand and analyse the characteristics of Napoleon’s dictatorship in George Orwell’s Animal Farm. In addition, students learn to make clear and accurate interpretations regarding the events of the chapters 5 and 6, (as Napoleon’s dictatorship begins to emerge) and make appropriate links to individual characters and their allegorical relationship to context. As these chapters signal the end of the animal democracy on the farm, and the start of Napoleon’s totalitarian dictatorship, a heavy emphasis throughout these resources is placed upon the character of Napoleon - particularly with regards to his similarities with Joseph Stalin.
There are easily enough resources for two lessons within this pack. Students learn through the following tasks:
- Gauging and collaborating prior knowledge through a discussion-based starter task;
- Gauging their knowledge of key terms such as ‘totalitarian’ and ‘oppression’ through a collaborative card-sorting activity;
- Reading chapters 5 and 6 and demonstrating their understanding through an apt and informative worksheet;
- Developing their understanding of the main character of Snowball, and his allegorical equivalent, Joseph Stalin, through a comparison task;
- Analysing the links between Napoleon and Stalin in chapters 5 and 6, using a templated writing frame;
- Peer assessing their partners’ learning attempts.
The following resources are provided:
- Engaging and colourful step-by-step PowerPoint;
- Cards for card-sorting activity;
- Teacher lesson guidance/plan;
- Analytical paragraphs worksheet;
- Pictures for comparison task;
- Copies of Chapters 5 and 6.
All images are licensed for commercial use, and are cited on the final slide of the PowerPoint.
Of Mice and Men: The Ending - George's Dilemma
This engaging and interesting lesson aims to improve students’ knowledge of the final events of the novel (the killing of Lennie by his best friend, George) in John Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men. It also aims to build their skills in retrieving information from texts, understanding the writer’s ideas and opinions, and making precise and confident interpretations about texts.
The lesson uses a range of tasks, that require students to use their visual and interpersonal skills. It follows this learning journey:
- Reading, and interpreting the ending of the text;
- Inferring the hidden meanings in the final section of the text;
- Identifying the options available to George, and evaluating the pros and cons for each of them;
- Arguing a viewpoint either justifying or condemning George’s actions;
- Evaluating each others’ argumentative attempts.
The resource includes a comprehensive and visually engaging PowerPoint presentation, a worksheet to evaluate George’s reasoning, an abstract from the text, a help-sheet for writing to analyse, and a lesson plan/ teacher guidance sheet.
All images in this resource are licensed for commercial use, and are cited on the final slide of the lesson presentation.
You can choose to buy this resource alone, or as part of the ‘Of Mice and Men - All Lessons and Scheme’ bundle, which contains seven full lessons, resources, teachers notes, and PowerPoint presentations, plus a Pointless Of Mice and Men game, for just £5!
New GCSE English Language Reading: 19th Century Non-Fiction
These informative and engaging resources enable students to build the skills needed to interpret and analyse 19th Century non-fiction texts. This will aid students through the new Paper 2 Section A of GCSE English Language - for which they need to become confident readers of 19th, 20th, and 21st Century non-fiction texts. These resources give students a strong foundation of knowledge of features of non-fiction texts in the 19th Century, using newspaper stories from the time based on 'Jack the Ripper' as the predominant examples. There are easily enough resources for at least two lessons within this resource pack.
Students learn through the following tasks:
- Inferring and deducing contextual knowledge through an interactive starter task;
- Understanding the features of London in 1888 through a video introduction;
- Building close reading skills through a study of a non-fiction extract about Jack the Ripper;
- Answering exam-style questions interpreting and inferring the key meanings in the text;
- Using models and templates to write extended analysis responses about the language used in the non-fiction extract;
- Peer assessing their partners' learning attempts.
The following resources are provided:
- Engaging and colourful step-by-step PowerPoint;
- Jack the Ripper newspaper extract;
- Teacher lesson guidance;
- Interpretation worksheet;
- Analysis worksheet;
- Writing to analyse.
All images are licensed for commercial use, and are cited on the final slide of the PowerPoint.
Diary Writing!
This stimulating and informative lesson aims to improve students’ ability to adapt the style of their writing to suit their audience and purpose. In particular, they attempt to meet the purpose of writing diary entries.
Students follow a clear and logical learning journey, in which they:
-Define diaries and their key content features;
-Read extracts of diaries, and explain which content features different writers employ;
-Work collaboratively to ascertain the language and structure features of diary entries;
-Create a success criteria for effective diary writing (although a ready-made success criteria is included)
-Write a diary entry for a famous character from their favourite movie, using the techniques that they have learnt;
-Peer/self-assess their diary writing attempts.
There are enough resources here really for two lessons, including:
-Visually engaging whole-lesson PowerPoint;
-Diary extracts x 4 (Adian Mole, Anne Frank, etc.)
-What's in a Diary Entry worksheet;
-Success Criteria;
-Step-by-step lesson plan.
All images are licensed for commercial use, and are cited on the final page of the slide.
Assessment for Learning CPD Session!
This CPD session offers an engaging and original approach to introducing or revisiting assessment for learning. Grounded in educational research, this CPD session is interactive, well-structured, and has been successfully tried and tested. The aim of the CPD session is to develop the knowledge, skills, and strategies needed in order to utilise assessment for learning even more effectively in lessons, and it achieves this by embarking upon the following learning journey:
1. Understand what assessment for learning is and why it is effective.
2. Break down the individual components of assessment for learning.
3. Observe and evaluate a model of assessment for learning
4. Collaborate in developing your own assessment for learning strategies.
Included in this pack are: Full PowerPoint presentation, videos for analysis, hyperlinks to Youtube videos, resources for CPD activities, instructions and guidance for trainers/ presenters.
All images and videos are licensed for commercial use, and are cited on the final slide.
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Macbeth: Lesson Bundle! (All Lessons, Plans, Resources, Everything!)
This engaging, varied, and informative scheme of learning is designed to help students gain understanding, assessment skills, and key interpretations of William Shakespeare's tragedy 'Macbeth.' Made up of a wide-range of interesting and exciting lessons, students should complete this scheme having gathered vital skills in: interpreting the significant meanings of the text, understanding the writer's ideas within the text, identifying the traits of key characters, settings, and themes, understanding dramatic and language devices, and relating the text to its social and historical context.
Stimulating, visual, and easily adaptable, these lessons provide suggested learning objectives and outcomes for students of a wide-range of abilities - The vast majority of tasks are differentiated to allow for different abilities and needs in your classroom. Each lesson loosely follows this logical learning journey to ensure that students learn in bite-size steps:
- Engaging
- Defining/ Understanding
- Identifying/Remembering
- Analysing/ Creating
- Peer or self evaluating.
All of the lessons are interactive, employ a variety of different teaching and learning methods and styles, and are visually-engaging. Resources, worksheets, and lesson plans are all provided, in addition to a fun Pointless game!
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The Huge History Knowledge Organisers Bundle!
These clear, detailed and visually-appealing resources offer a complete reference point for students learning or revising knowledge relating to a wide range of history topics, including:
The Ancient Egyptians
The Ancient Greeks
The Vikings
The Romans
The Victorians
The Aztecs
Baghdad c.900AD
World War I
World War II
Tudors and Stuarts
The Great Fire of London
Anglo-Saxons
The Holocaust
The Cold War
Each organiser contains a number of comprehensive sections to guide learning and revision including:
Overviews of the era;
Annotated maps/ diagrams;
Timelines;
Rulers/ Emperors/ Prominent People;
Daily Life at the time;
Important facts/ dates
The resources are designed to be printed onto A3, and are provided as both PDF and Word versions (so that you can edit if you want to). All images used are licensed for commercial use and are cited on a separate document (included). The knowledge organisers may be used for students of all ages, but are most suitable for children in upper KS2 and lower KS3.
Social Media Blog Writing Template
This writing resource is perfect for use in literacy/writing lessons across the curriculum. Bright, colourful, and realistic, this resource enriches students' writing experiences whilst enabling them to showcase the skills and knowledge that they have picked up throughout their learning.
This lesson is also available as a part of a larger multi-media writing template bundle from TandLGuru that includes: Facebook page template, email template, messenger template, tabloid template, broadsheet template, and a postcard template. Most are easily editable and visually stimulating for students.
New GCSE English Language - Comparing and Contrasting
This informative and engaging double lesson aims to improve students’ ability to compare and contrast two different texts based on a similar subject. They will focus particularly on the purpose, audience, language, and structure of texts, and will learn to use comparing and contrasting connectives to highlight any similarities and differences. This has always been a crucial skill in English, but has an increased importance in the new GCSE for English Language, as there is a greater requirement for students to be able to make links and comparisons between texts.
The lesson follows a clear and logical learning journey, with students learning to:
- Understand the key terms 'compare' and 'contrast', and the importance of these skills in English;
- Categorise the different features that they can compare, under the headings 'Purpose', 'Audience', 'Language' and 'Structure;'
- Read (and identify the key features within) two morally and ethically intriguing texts, offering diverse views of young people in the media;
-Compare the two texts, using a clear and concise template, and newly-acquired knowledge of different types of connectives;
- Peer-assess each other's comparative essay attempts.
Included in this resource pack are:
- Whole double lesson, colourful and engaging PowerPoint presentation (Including assessment for learning referral slides)
- Cards for card-sorting activity;
- Two interesting and thought-provoking non-fiction media extracts (one a newspaper extract from The Evening Standard, and another a persuasive leaflet, both focused on the issue of how young people are perceived.)
- Template for main comparative analysis task;
- Full teacher guidance plan.
All images are licensed for commercial use and are cited on the final slide of the PowerPoint presentation
Animal Farm: Old Major's Dream and The Revolution!
These resources enable students to understand and analyse the Old Major’s dream and the events of the animal revolution, in the opening two chapters of George Orwell’s Animal Farm. More precisely, students learn to make clear and accurate interpretations about events and characters, with appropriate links to the Orwell’s allegory and relationship to context.
Students learn through the following tasks:
- Gauging and collaborating previous knowledge through a discussion-based starter task;
- Reading the first two chapters and demonstrating their understanding through a related activity sheet;
- Developing their understanding of characters and context through a a making links activity;
- Analysing the allegorical nature of the opening chapters by further exploring the connections between characters and contexts;
- Peer assessing their partners’ learning attempts.
The following resources are provided:
- Engaging and colourful step-by-step PowerPoint (includes links for video)
- Teacher lesson guidance/plan;
- Chapters 1 and 2 worksheet;
- Making Links Activity Sheet (1x more difficult, 1 x easier);
- Copies of Chapters 1 and 2.
All images and videos are licensed for commercial use, and are cited on the final slide of the PowerPoint. Note - internet connection is needed if you plan to use the video.
Animal Farm: The Ending (Orwell's Message)
These resources enable students to understand and analyse the significance of the ending in George Orwell’s Animal Farm. More precisely, students learn to make clear and accurate interpretations regarding the increasing inequalities on the farm. Furthermore, students analyse how the final events of the novel help Orwell to get his message across to the reader. It is likely that there are enough resources here to be used over at least two hour-long lessons.
Students learn through the following tasks:
- Gauging and collaborating previous knowledge of ‘equality’ through a discussion-based starter task;
- Reading chapters 9 and 10 with a particular focus on the increasing inequalities between the different animals, and demonstrating their understanding through a related activity sheet;
- Gauging the inequalities between the animals through the design and explanation of an ‘equality graph’ (template and instructions provided);
- Understanding how the events of the final chapters help Orwell to get his message across to the reader;
- Analysing how the inequalities between the animals are evident through either a character analysis of Boxer or Napoleon (template and success criteria provided);
- Peer assessing their partners’ learning attempts.
The following resources are provided:
- Engaging and colourful step-by-step PowerPoint
- Teacher lesson guidance/plan;
- Equality graph template;
- Two analysis template: Boxer and Napoleon;
- Chapters 9 and 10 worksheet (plus teacher answer sheet);
- Copies of Chapters 9 and 10.
All images and videos are licensed for commercial use, and are cited on the final slide of the PowerPoint.
Animal Farm Pointless Game! (and blank template to create your own games!)
Based on the popular game show ‘Pointless’, this resource is perfect for use as a whole lesson resource, enrichment option, or revision tool. Editable, so that you can change to any other topic or change questions. (I’ve also added a blank template so that you can make your own games from scratch). Containing almost 30 slides of sound clips, interesting tasks, and suitably challenging questions, this resource is effective at both promoting engagement and enhancing learning. There are several full rounds of questions to build or revisit knowledge of characters, plot, and themes in ‘Animal Farm.’
Round 1. The characters in Animal Farm
Round 2. Quotations from the text
Round 3. Settings and Objects
Round 4. Themes in Animal Farm
The nature of this game ensures that the resource can challenge students of all levels.
A blank template has also been added, so that you can create your own games!
Of Mice and Men: Characterisation of Crooks
This engaging and informative lesson aims to improve students’ knowledge and understanding of the character of Crooks in Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men: His dreams, his loneliness, and how his plight is a product of living in 1930s America. The lesson also aims to improve students’ analytical skills, so that they can demonstrate sustained and sophisticated interpretations of the character.
This pack includes the full lesson presentation, with tasks and key information, an extract from the text with close reading questions, a writing to analyse help-sheet, and full teacher guidance. The learning journey is clear and progressive, following a pathway of increasingly more difficult tasks, including:
- An opening task to ascertain what is known about Crooks, and racism in 1930s America
- An extract from the text that highlights some of his characteristics and his loneliness.
- Questions to encourage students to infer and deduce hidden meanings, and understand Steinbeck’s message,
- Joint creation of an analysis success criteria;
- An opportunity to answer an exam style question based upon the character of Crooks;
- A chance to peer assess against the success criteria.
All images are licensed for commercial use, and are cited on the final slide of the presentation.
You can choose to buy this resource alone, or as part of the ‘Of Mice and Men - All Lessons and Scheme’ bundle, which contains seven full lessons, resources, teachers notes, and PowerPoint presentations, plus a Pointless Of Mice and Men game, for just £5!
Travel Brochure Writing!
This engaging and stimulating lesson enables students to create travel brochure texts containing appropriate and imaginative language choices, utilising a range of different language techniques with subtlety in order to craft writing that serves the dual purpose of being descriptive and persuasive. In particular, students learn how descriptive language such as of similes, metaphors, and personification, in addition to persuasive devices such as statistics, rhetorical questions, and personal pronouns, can help to create truly authentic and effective travel brochure pieces.
The lesson follows a clear, logical, bite-size learning journey, which guides students towards differentiated learning objectives. Over the course of this journey, they become able to:
- Define what travel brochures are and understand their purposes;
- Identify the persuasive and descriptive language devices that travel brochure writers employ
- Analyse the effects of the language in a model travel brochure text;
- Utilise a clear and challenging success criteria document in order to construct their own travel brochure pieces;
- Self/Peer assess travel writing attempts.
This resource pack includes:
- A visually engaging whole-lesson PowerPoint presentation;
- An interesting and ambitious travel writing extract (with a highlighted version for teachers):
-A logical and challenging worksheet, encouraging students to analyse key features;
- A detailed lesson plan, complete with what the teacher and students should aim to achieve at each stage of the lesson.
All images are licensed for commercial use, and are cited on the final slide of the PowerPoint.
Written Communication with Parents - CPD Session!
I delivered this CPD session to all members of our staff team who maintain regular contact with parents and other stakeholders, in a bid to improve the quality, accuracy, and clarity of our written communications. I'd recommend that the session takes about 1 hour to 1 hour 30 minutes to deliver.
We had received some negative feedback comments, regarding our communications, varying from examples of poor grammatical accuracy, to instances in which the tone of emails, letters, and other forms of correspondence were perceived as rude. It is surprising how common this is across schools, and how little training is provided on these forms of interaction. Following this training, we are receiving far fewer complaints, and many staff members now keep the help-sheets pinned up by the desks to refer to when communicating with parents.
Participants learn through:
- Participating in a fun pub-style quiz to eradicate common spelling, punctuation, and grammar misconceptions and errors;
- Considering the role of parents, their needs and interests, and what they expect from their child's school, as a means to understand why schools sometimes receive difficult communications;
- Reading and analysing examples of poor written correspondence, considering how both the tone and the accuracy can be improved;
- Exploring different language strategies to create a personal, polite tone within emails, by considering the connotations of different words;
- Taking away help sheets that can be referred to whenever written communications are being drafted.
The resource pack includes:
- Colourful and engaging whole-session PowerPoint presentation ;
- Examples of written communications for participants to analyse;
- Quiz answer sheet;
- Accurate Written Communication help-sheet;
- Polite Written Communication help-sheet.
All images are licensed for commercial use, and are cited on the final slide.
(Please note that the only section of the PowerPoint that you may wish to modify is with regards to the distinct features of parents at your own school - Aside from this, the resources are good to go!)