Helps Y9 produce a piece of creative writing based on the opening 20 minutes of Saving Private Ryan (an old coursework / controlled writing task). You can also use the resource to help prepare Y9 pupils for Q5 paper 1, looking at details on images and helping them to write creatively in response.

This is a right laugh to do with Y9 kids, to stimulate creative writing, writing for a purpose or as an introdution to GCSE Media / Film studies.

Scheme of work for Y7 or Y8 depending on your school. That sounds a bit drab doesn’t it; there’s loads to do and you can add what you want. It’s free.

This is really useful for a disengaged GCSE class, using banned music videos as a starting point for spoken language or a piece of transactional writing. I’ve suggested some really interesting videos (all on Youtube) but I’m 50 now, and not as down with the kids as I used to be, so you’d probably want to augment the unit with some gangsters shooting each other or scantily clad dancers with gold teeth smoking decidedly dodgy looking Vape machines. Or something.

This resource is a sample of a comprehensive scheme- there is a PPT with a worksheet for each chapter.

My favourite author. You’ll need the whole story, which I’m not allowed to sell obviously.

A fun intro to being playful and experimental with poetry.

Based on Seamus Heaney’s ‘Follower’, the lecture tackles the key methods pupils need to identify and comment on in Literature Paper 2

Can be delivered to a whole year group or class by class to absolutely nail the method aspect of paper 1 Lit.

A one size fits all powerpoint to revise the importance of method when analysing Dickens in Q1 AQA English Literature Paper 1

This is a well-crafted, highly visual, lecture for middle to upper ability kids who need to move from band 2 to band 3 - focusing explicitly on Priestley’s dramatic methods and effects on an audience.

Basically these are my resources for the last specifications and before, which is why they are cheap. They will get you sailing towards the new specs for sure, helping the kids to get fully familiar with the basics, including language, themes, context and characters.

A lesson introducing structure in Dystopian Fiction focusing on ‘The Road’ by Cormac McCarthy. Suitable for an able GCSE class or as an introduction to Dystopian Fiction for a top set Y9. Worksheet and Powerpoint.

A fun one-off, or introduction to Science Fiction, for an able Y7 or mixed ability Y8/9 - the ppt is the springboard for a week’s creative writing and group work, leading to a speaking and listening or presentation. The unit could also be set as a project based half term homework.

A fun way of introducing writing to instruct, using the scenario of a Zombie Apocalypse.

Full lesson with PPT allowing middle to high ability pupils to closely analyse the poem in all its fantastic depth. I used this lesson to get myself a job in a prestigious school; the class were very able and super responsive. It’s not didactic, that’s not how I teach, so expect the pupils to get stuck in and give you plenty of feedback. It’s what they think that matters.

Tackles the use of Shakespeare’s Method - the serious flaw in pupils’ responses. Can be delivered to a whole year group or class by class, to make sure that this key factor in teaching is sorted.

This is a brilliant little unit for a Y7 or low ability class who need ‘grabbing’. It’s self contained in one ppt, extremely easy to deliver and results in some excellent display work if you choose. You could use it as a starter for Gothic Literature.

Complete unit of work beginning with KS3 work on ‘A Modest Proposal’, using ‘Viz’ comic and articles by Jeremy Clarkson to develop understanding of rhetorical devices, parody, satire and irony - then introducing KS4 work on Spoken Language presentations with examples and non-fiction based activities that in turn link to writing for a purpose for Paper 2 Q5. 4 long PPTs to support 12 activities and display work should yield 20 or more lessons depending on the ability of your group. Text based work is suitable for cover work as well, including comprehensions and exam practice based on examples easily accessible to a non-specialist.

Mostly suitable for Y9 but would challenge an able Y8 class. It could be taught as part of your regular schemes of work, put together as a self-contained study booklet or used to support absent colleagues with its ‘copy and teach’ format. Each text has a PPT version of the poem to support class reading. Included: Introductory and all supporting Powerpoints Worksheets on all the following: (Including all source material) Extract from ‘The Iliad’ by Homer Extract from ‘The Knight’s Tale’ by Geoffrey Chaucer (2 lessons) ‘Before Agincourt’ – from ‘Henry V by William Shakespeare ‘Fears in Solitude’ – Samuel Taylor Coleridge ‘Napoleon’ – William Thackeray ‘Come up from the fields Father’ – Walt Whitman ‘The War Prayer’ – by Mark Twain ‘What the Bullet Sang’ – Brett Harte ‘In Snow’ – William Allingham ‘A soldier’s battle’ by Arthur Conan Doyle ‘Dirge of the Dead Sisters’ - Anon ‘Vitae Lampada – Sir Henry Newbolt ‘The City Clerk’ – J.A Nicklin ‘Who’s for the Game?’ – Jessie Pope ‘Fall In’ – Harold Begbie ‘I shouted for blood’ – Janet Begbie ‘The Hyaenas’ – Rudyard Kipling ‘The World in Armour’ – William Watson ‘Counter Attack’ – Siegfried Sassoon Extract from ‘All Quiet on the Western Front’ by Erich Maria Remarque ‘Statement against the continuation of the War’ – Siegfried Sassoon