With half a million members across both the primary and secondary sectors, Teachit is a thriving community of teachers and home tutors sharing resources and inspiration. What makes us different? All our resources are written and shared by teachers and checked by our teacher-editors so you know they can be trusted to work.
From free PDFs to PowerPoints, worksheets, quizzes, games and CPD webinars and articles from experts, Teachit has something for you at www.teachit.co.uk
With half a million members across both the primary and secondary sectors, Teachit is a thriving community of teachers and home tutors sharing resources and inspiration. What makes us different? All our resources are written and shared by teachers and checked by our teacher-editors so you know they can be trusted to work.
From free PDFs to PowerPoints, worksheets, quizzes, games and CPD webinars and articles from experts, Teachit has something for you at www.teachit.co.uk
Aimed at developing students’ critical reading skills, Reading non-fiction texts is an anthology of ten literary non-fiction texts from the 19th, 20th and 21st centuries combined with supporting lesson plans and resources.
There are two overview lesson plans for each text, with starter activities, main lesson activities and plenaries which teachers can easily pick up and run with.
What’s included?
10 non-fiction text excerpts with a thematically linked ‘partner’ text
20 lesson plans and ideas along with 41 tailor-made resources to developed students’ understanding of assessment objectives
Exam-style questions for AQA, OCR, Edexcel and WJEC Eduqas for every text.
What’s inside?
Introduction (page 3)
Text 1: Jane Austen’s letter to her sister, Cassandra Austen (pages 4-18)
Resource - Jane Austen: true or false quiz
Resource - uncovering context: What was life like in 1805?
Resource - picture clues
Resource - reading non-fiction text analysis grid
Text 2: The Guardian article: ‘Why teaching table manners can do more harm than good’ (pages 19-27)
Resource - summarise and attack
Resource - exploring food, exploring language
Text 3: Excerpt taken from The Elephant Man and Other Reminiscences by Sir Frederick Treves (pages 28-43)
Resource - pre-reading activity
Resource - unpicking imagery
Resource - whizzy wiki: Factsheet on The Elephant Man and Frederick Treves
Resource - attitudes towards the Elephant Man
Text 4: Excerpt taken from My Left Foot by Christy Brown (pages 44-52)
Resource - exploring and comparing attitudes
Text 5: Charlotte Brontë’s letter to her father (page 53-64)
Resource - word sort activity
Resource - whizzy wiki: Factsheet on The Great Exhibition
Resource - Great Exhibition quiz
Resource - letter writing lingo
Resource - what was the Great Exhibition like?
Text 6: Excerpt from A History of Modern Britain by Andrew Marr (pages 65-77)
Resource - comprehending the text
Resource - caption competition
Resource - what was the Millennium Dome like?
Resource - chain of comparison
Text 7: Excerpt from Henry Morley, Household Words, ‘Our Phantom Ship: China’ (pages 78-90)
Resource - the typhoon unravelled
Resource - views about visiting China
Resource - comparing attitudes about China
Resource - attitude adjectives
Text 8: Excerpt from Behind the Wall by Colin Thubron (pages 91-100)
Resource - comprehending the text
Resource - Chinese cultural revolution
Text 9: Excerpt from Charles Darwin The Voyage of the Beagle (pages 101-114)
Resource - quick recall quiz
Resource - attitudes towards the native tribes
Resource - formal and informal vocabulary grid
Resource - close-up on writing technique
Text 10: Excerpt from Follow the Rabbit-Proof Fence (pages 115-123)
Resource - pre-reading activity
Resource - the language of pain and suffering
Writing for different genres – SEND is a downloadable set of lesson plans that can be used to support students with special educational needs and disabilities at key stage 3. It has been adapted specifically for SEND students and reluctant writers, and is designed to work in targeted intervention sessions.
It features seven comic strips as prompts to engage neurodiverse students, such as those with dyspraxia, dyslexia or ADD/ADHD. The images, alongside simplified definitions of key terms, vocabulary exercises, word banks and writing prompts will also help to support EAL learners (students who speak English as an additional language) and INA students (International New Arrivals).
Seven genres of writing
It includes lesson plans, teaching notes, exemplars, scaffolded writing templates and worksheets to help students to learn about the language, structure and form of seven different writing styles. By understanding the writing process, they will learn how to produce a range of text types, some of which might be new genres for students.
The writing activities are based on themes to appeal to young adults, such as music, football, aliens and pets, and cover a range of different genres:
a fictional diary
a formal letter
a playscript
a fictional recount
a list
a poem
a comic strip.
Each lesson includes suggestions for starters, as well as a range of differentiated activities to develop students’ vocabulary and writing skills. Students will feel more confident developing their own writing style and writing in specific genres. They will also understand the differences between writing fiction and non-fiction texts.
Key features:
It is accompanied by a PowerPoint for use in class, which contains useful checklists of the language features and structure of each writing genre.
Includes a lesson plan and teaching notes for each of the seven different writing genres.
Includes seven original comic strips as writing prompts.
Includes a PowerPoint with 22 slides of checklists and activities, summarising the language features and structures of each text type.
Includes a range of carefully scaffolded activities to take students step-by-step through the process of writing for each particular genre, including vocab exercises and word banks, sentence starters and frames, and planning and writing templates.
What’s included?
There are 57 pages of classroom activities:
‘A Week’s Excuses’ – writing a diary
‘Something Odd Out There’ – writing a formal letter
‘Alien Arrival’ – writing a playscript
‘Jennifer Jones’ – writing a recount
‘Sad I Ams’ – writing a bulleted list
‘StereoHead’– writing poetry
‘The Dark Avenger’ – writing a comic strip
What’s included?
KS3 Comprehension contains 6 self-contained text extracts with reading comprehension worksheet questions, accompanied by model answers.
This pack is versatile enough to be used in class, or as a sequence of homework tasks, end-of-term/year assessments and cover lessons.
KS3 Comprehension helps students complete the transition from primary to secondary level and provides an effective introduction to 19th century and early 20th century literature. The extracts are suitable for year 7 and year 8 reading comprehension lessons and can be used to supplement existing schemes of work.
NB – this pack is an adapted version of Teachit Primary’s ‘Comprehension’ pack, containing newly commissioned KS3 curriculum questions, replacement texts and a selection of supporting resources.
What’s inside?
Introduction (pages 3-4)
Extract 1 – Five Children and It by E. Nesbitt (Pages 5-10)
Extract 2 – The Wonderful Wizard of Oz by Frank L. Baum (pages 11-17)
Extract 3 – Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll (pages 18-23)
Extract 4 – Odin’s Reward by Mary H. Foster and Mabel H. Cummings (pages 24-30)
Extract 5 – The Canterville Ghost by Oscar Wilde (pages 31-38)
Extract 6 – Great Expectations by Charles Dickens (pages 39-45)
Additional resources to support reading comprehension (page 46)
Murder and madness; perfect for engaging your KS4 students!
Designed for the GCSE English Literature specifications for AQA, Edexcel, OCR and WJEC Eduqas, this pack will develop your students’ critical reading skills ready for the exam.
‘In writing this pack, I aimed to make the resources as varied and interactive as possible, drawing on my own teaching methods and my deep knowledge of the text. I firmly believe Shakespeare texts are accessible to all students and should not be taught solely in a desk-bound manner. This pack offers a menu which teachers can select from and there is something for every learning style.’
Angela Topping, writer
Comprising 25 creative lessons, exam-style questions and resources, the work has been done for you.
What’s included?
25 lessons
exam-style questions for the relevant exam boards
activities to develop students’ critical reading skills in preparation for the GCSE exam.
What’s inside?
Introduction (page 3)
Specification summaries (pages 4-7)
Act 1 (pages 8-47)
Lessons 1-5 and accompanying resources
Exam style questions
Act 2 (pages 48-82)
Lessons 6-10 and accompanying resources
Exam style questions
Act 3 (pages 83-125)
Lessons 11-15 and accompanying resources
Exam style questions
Act 4 (pages 126-158)
Lessons 16-20 and accompanying resources
Exam style questions
Act 5 (pages 159-183)
Lessons 21-25 and accompanying resources
Exam style questions
A set of 39 photocopiable home learning tasks mapped to NC objectives and differentiated where appropriate. Includes tasks for reading, writing composition and GPS. Answers included where relevant.
All of your English year 6 homework all in one place!
Embed key reading strategies and comprehension skills in your younger learners.
This beautifully-designed pack focuses on 10 key skills: listening; sequencing; using what you know; checking for sense and self-correcting; making inferences; answering and asking questions; making predictions; discussion; identifying cause and effect and role-play.
What’s included?
12 texts and 72 engaging resources, including answer sheets where relevant
supporting PowerPoint presentations
opportunities to introduce, practise and consolidate key grammar elements
includes starters, main activities, plenaries, assessment opportunities, extension ideas and home learning tasks
links to the curriculum.
What’s inside?
Introduction (pages 4-7)
Unit 1 – Listening skills (pages 8-21)
Session 1 - Retelling Rapunzel
Session 2 - Using precise language
Resource printouts
Unit 2 – Sequencing skills (pages 22-36)
Session 1 - Sequencing Rapping Rapunzel
Session 2 - Story map
Resource printouts
Unit 3 – Using what you know (pages 37-51)
Session 1 - Birds of Prey
Session 2 - An Owl Called Alfie
Resource printouts
Unit 4 – Checking for sense and self-correcting (pages 52-66)
Session 1 - The reader’s tool kit
Session 2 - Character traits
Resource printouts
Unit 5 – Making inferences (pages 67-84)
Session 1 - Reading detectives
Session 2 - Character traits
Resource printouts
Unit 6 – Answering and asking questions (pages 85-101)
Session 1 - Stone Soup – Asking questions
Session 2 - Stone Soup – answering questions
Resource printouts
Unit 7 – Making predictions (pages 102-120)
Session 1 - What happens next?
Session 2 - Jane the Giant Killer
Resource printouts
Unit 8 – Discussion (pages 121-138)
Session 1 - A trip to the zoo
Session 2 - Zoo complaint
Resource printouts
Unit 9 – Identifying cause and effect (pages 139-160)
Session 1 - Cause and effect
Session 2 - Exploring cause and effect with stories
Resource printouts
Unit 10 – Role play to explore characters (pages 165-171)
Session 1 - Role play: An Owl Called Alfie
Session 2 - Role play: The Forgotten Princess
Resource printouts
If you’re teaching year 3, Spellings for year 3 could be just what you need.
The pack is divided into six terms of six weeks. Each week focuses on a different spelling rule and features two differentiated spelling lists, a worksheet and a challenge. The pack also includes ideas for spelling games and useful templates.
What’s included?
Divided into six terms of six weeks, each focusing on a different rule
Weekly differentiated spelling lists and worksheets
Spelling templates and suggestions for games
What’s inside?
Introduction (page 4)
Term 1, week 1 – words ending with -el/-il/-al (pages 5-8)
T1, week 2 – adding suffixes beginning with vowels to words of more than one syllable (part 1) (pages 9-13)
T1, wk 3 – adding suffixes beginning with vowels to words of more than one syllable (part 2) (pages 14-17)
T1, wk 4 – words that contain y as a vowel (pages 18-20)
T1, wk 5 – homophones (pages 21-24)
T1, wk 6 – common exception words from year 2 (pages 25-27)
T2, wk 1 — words containing -dg/-dge (revision from year 2) (pages 28-31)
T2, wk 2 — words containing -ou (pages 32-35)
T2, wk 3 — words beginning with dis- (pages 36-39)
T2, wk 4 — words ending in -ation (pages 40-43)
T2, wk 5 — word families (pages 44-46)
T2, wk 6 — year 3/4 word list 1 (pages 47-49)
T3, wk 1 — words beginning with gn-/kn- (revision from year 2) (pages 50-52)
T3, wk 2 — words beginning with in- (pages 53-56)
T3, wk 3 — words ending in -ly (part 1) (pages 57-60)
T3, wk 4 — words ending in -sion (pages 61-63)
T3, wk 5 — homophones (pages 64-66)
T3, wk 6 — year 3/4 word list 2 (pages 67-70)
T4, wk 1 — words ending in -ness/-ment (revision from year 2) (pages 71-74)
T4, wk 2 — words beginning with il- and ir- (pages 75-79)
T4, wk 3 — words ending with -sure/-ture (pages 80-82)
T4, wk 4 — words ending in -ous (pages 83-87)
T4, wk 5 — word families (pages 88-91)
T4, wk 6 — year 3/4 word list 3 (pages 92-96)
T5, wk 1 — compound words (revision from year 2)(pages 97-101)
T5, wk 2 — words ending in -ly (part 2) (pages 102-106)
T5, wk 3 — words beginning with im- (pages 107-109)
T5, wk 4 — words containing ch that sound like hard c (pages 110-112)
T5, wk 5 — words that are homophones (pages 113-116)
T5, wk 6 — year 3/4 word list 4 (pages 117-120)
T6, wk 1 — words ending in -less/-ful (revision from year 2) (pages 121-124)
T6, wk 2 — words beginning with re- (pages 125-127)
T6, wk 3 — words containing sc that sound like s (pages 128-132)
T6, wk 4 — words containing eigh that rhyme with ay (pages 133-135)
T6, wk 5 — word families (pages 138-140)
T6, wk 6 — year 3/4 word list 5 (pages 141-143)
Spelling games (pages 144-146)
Look/Say/Cover/Write/Check template (page 147)
Word of the week template (page 148)
You might also like Spellings for year 4 and Spellings for year 5.
Help children to develop their understanding and enjoyment of stories and non-fiction with our Comprehension pack for lower KS2.
Featuring six texts alongside engaging comprehension tasks, questions and answers, this pack will encourage your children to retrieve information, draw inferences, make predictions, identify and summarise ideas and analyse language and structure.
All you need to address these key skills!
What’s included?
six original texts and 17 supporting resources, including comprehensions and answer sheets
includes starters, main activities, plenaries, assessment opportunities, extension ideas and home learning tasks
links to the curriculum.
What’s inside?
Introduction (pages 3-6)
Unit 1 – The Little Prince (pages 7-16)
Resource - unlocking words
Unit 2 – The Velveteen Rabbit (pages 17=25)
Resource - old-fashioned to modern day
Resource - what’s in the bag?
Unit 3 – The Little Mermaid (pages 26-36)
Resource - underwater similes
Resource - through the eyes of a mermaid
Unit 4 – Robin Hood (pages 37-48)
Resource - retelling Robin Hood
Resource - Robin Hood’s arrows
Unit 5 – Four square (pages 49-56)
Resource - instruction text detectives
Unit 6 – A letter (pages 57-64)
Resource - a letter in reply
Resource - letter-writing ideas
All you need to develop children’s reading comprehension skills and prepare them for their KS2 reading assessments.
Inspire a positive attitude to reading and consolidate those all-important comprehension skills ready for KS2 English SATs.
Featuring six fiction and non-fiction texts alongside engaging lesson plans, reading comprehension activities and worksheets, this pack will encourage your children to build the comprehension strategies of information retrieval, drawing inferences, making predictions, identifying and summarising ideas and analysing language and structure.
What’s more, this pack is editable, meaning you can tweak questions to suit your UKS2 learners.
What’s included?
six original texts and 21 supporting teaching resources, including comprehension questions and answer sheets
includes lesson plans, assessment opportunities, extension ideas and home learning tasks
links to the National Curriculum Programme of Study for English.
What’s inside?
Introduction (pages3-6)
Unit 1 – Five Children and It (pages 7-20)
Resource - picturing the Psammead
Resource - that’s Greek to me
Unit 2 – The Wonderful Wizard of Oz (pages 21-33)
Resource - pass the parcel words
Resource - he said, she said
Resource - Seen the movie? Now read the book!
Unit 3 – Alice in Wonderland (pages 34-47)
Resource - illustration by Sir John Tenniel
Resource - Alice grows
Resource - comprehension chatterbox
Unit 4 – Odin’s Reward (pages 48-59)
Resource - pairs game
Resource - comic strip format
Unit 5 – Samuel Johnson biography (pages 60-70)
Resource - Dr Johnson’s wonderful words!
Resource - my biography notes
Unit 6 – Newspaper report (pages 71-78)
Resource - fact or opinion?
Resource - complete the headline
Enchant, amuse and inspire your children with our first whole-school teaching pack – Poetry for all.
The pack features 14 poems and a range of engaging teaching ideas and resources for Reception through to year 6, saving you precious time searching for age-appropriate poems and activities.
Including activities for comprehension, drama, creative writing and art and design, this pack is perfect for encouraging your children to respond imaginatively to both modern and classic poems.
What’s included?
53 quality teaching resources, alongside 14 carefully selected poems
seven PowerPoints complete with illustrated versions of each poem
SAT-style comprehensions, when appropriate, including answers
links to the curriculum.
What’s inside?
Introduction (page 3)
Statutory requirements (pages 4-10)
Reception (pages 11-23)
Ye Spotted Snakes by William Shakespeare
Over in the Meadow by Olive A. Wadsworth
Year 1 (pages 24-41)
Bed in Summer by Robert Louis Stevenson
Please Do Not Feed the Animals by Robert Hull
Year 2 (pages 42-67)
The Months by Sara Coleridge
Granny Is by Valerie Bloom
Year 3 (pages 68-87)
Silver by Walter de la Mare
Vegan Delight by Benjamin Zephaniah
Year 4 (pages 88-112)
The Jumblies by Edward Lear
Extinct by Mandy Coe
Year 5 (pages 113-139)
From a Railway Carriage by Robert Louis Stevenson
The Door by Miroslav Holub
Year 6 (pages 140-164)
Jabberwocky by Lewis Carroll
His Nine Sympathies by Carol Ann Duffy
This six-week teaching pack addresses the 19th century text elements of the English Literature GCSE and provides students with a practical, accessible route-through the text – and plenty of exam practice to boot.
Crammed, as always, with engaging activities and resources – including comprehension, language analysis and creative tasks – plus advice for differentiation and sample exam questions, the pack contains all you need to bring Stevenson’s novel to life.
What’s included?
assessment objective mapping
lesson plans and ideas along with 52 tailor-made resources
exam-style questions for all exam boards.
What’s inside?
Introduction (pages 3-9)
Route through week 1: Pre-reading and introducing Chapter 1 (pages 10-36)
Reactions to Victorian London
Book cover predictions
Gothic mini saga
Ethical issues
Introducing Mr Utterson
Gothic literature – style and language
Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde – research topics
Story of the door
Victorian times
Stretch and challenge
Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde – Chapter summary table
Route through week 2: Finishing Chapter 1 and Chapter 2 (pages 37-60)
Nightmares
Design your own villain
Introducing Mr Hyde
Speak to the hand
Questions on chapters one and two
Mr Utterson’s reaction (Chapter 2)
Villain cards
Reputation, reputation, reputation
Practice exam 1
Route through week 3: Chapters 3, 4 and 5 (pages 61-89)
Carew colour coding
An odd relationship
Discussion questions
Analysis of ‘Incident of the letter’ (Chapter 5)
Bingo! (Chapters 1-3)
The detective role?
Silence, secrecy and style – developing themes in the novel
Structuring analytical paragraphs
Evaluating a PEE paragraph
PEE Mobile
Route through week 4: Chapters 6, 7 and 8 (pages 90-104)
Door symbolism
Chapter 7 – focused reading
Dr Lanyon’s change
Questions on chapters 6 and 7
Chapter 8 – true or false
The self and society
Route through week 5: Chapters 9, 10 and summarising (pages 105-123)
Narrative diamond 9
Chapter 9 questions
The duality of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde
Chapter 10 match up
Questions that focus on the popularity of the story
Evil
Practice exam 2
Route through week 6: Revision activities (pages 124-129)
The structure of the novel
Who said what?
Exploring structure
The role of Mr Utterson
The significance of place in Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde
RAG rating
World War One inspired the war poets to respond to the horrors and brutalities of war in new ways, writing some of the most vivid, profound and powerful poetry in English Literature. Help your year 7, 8 and 9 students to appreciate their sacrifices with this thoughtful and engaging scheme of learning.
This student-facing pack includes 8 lessons with a range of classroom resources and activities to develop students’ understanding and appreciation of poetic form, structure and style, while building their core reading, writing, comprehension, vocabulary and oracy skills.
What’s included?
Each lesson includes starter activities, followed by 5-6 main activities, and an extension or homework task, with answers for self- or peer marking in class. There are 8 PowerPoint presentations to help you to deliver each lesson, and a summative assessment with an accompanying PowerPoint to review and check students’ progress and learning.
Activities in this scheme of learning include:
scaffolded writing tasks to develop students’ analytical writing skills
comparative tasks looking at two poems and approaches to tackling unseen poems
comprehension questions to check students’ understanding
discussion tasks, reading aloud and performance ideas to build oral skills and reading confidence
word decoding tasks, glossaries and word banks to build students’ vocabulary
formative assessment tasks and low-stakes quizzes.
There are also carefully scaffolded and differentiated poetry analysis tasks to help students understand how to use World War I poetry quotes in their written work.
The pack aims to bring the context of the poems to life, with a range of historic texts including propaganda posters, soldiers’ diaries and letters sent home, as well as facts about the Great War.
There are 13 famous World War I poems to explore, including ‘The Troop Ship’ by Isaac Rosenberg, ‘Futility’ and ‘Anthem for Doomed Youth’ by Wilfred Owen, ‘First Time In’ by Ivor Gurney, John McCrae’s ‘In Flanders Fields’, ‘Owl’ by Edward Thomas and ‘Recruiting’ by E.A Mackintosh, as well as poems by Henry Smalley Sarson. Women’s poetry from World War I is also recognised, including ‘The Gift of India’ by Sarojini Naidu, ‘Who’s for the Game?’ by Jessie Pope, May Wedderburn Cannan’s ‘August 1914’ and Sara Teasdale’s ‘Spring in War-Time’.
Taking a thematic approach to war poetry throughout the lessons, students will consider the start of the war, propaganda, recruitment and the call-up, before exploring life at the front, the horror of war in the trenches and the camaraderie between soldiers who served on the frontlines. There is also a focus on women’s lives on the home front and a lesson on the significant contribution of British Empire soldiers, looking at Caribbean, Indian and black British recruits.
This 78-page teaching pack includes everything you need to explore the context, power and impact of World War I poetry with KS3 English Literature students.
Take a step by step approach to building your students’ confidence in understanding and analysing unseen poems.
‘The way to understand poems, whether unseen or not, is to get under their skin – and that requires active strategies, which this teaching pack and resources provide.’
Trevor Millum, writer and poet
This time-saving teaching pack includes seven pairs of carefully-selected poems for comparison alongside a resource workbook, providing you and your students with all you need to prepare for the unseen poetry element of the GCSE exam.
What’s included?
7 pairs of poems
a resource workbook for students to complete
detailed teaching notes for each poem
a mix of older and contemporary poems
exam-style questions for all exam boards.
What’s inside?
Introduction
Top tips for approaching an unseen poem
Unit 1
‘At the Draper’s’ by Thomas Hardy
‘Remember’ by Christina Rossetti
Comparison resource
Exam questions
Unit 2
‘Late Love’ by Jackie Kay
‘Love and Friendship’ by Emily Brontë
Comparison resource
Exam questions
Unit 3
‘Finding the Keys’ by Robin Robertson
‘October’ by Robert Frost
Comparison resource
Exam questions
Unit 4
‘Calling Card’ by Tracey Herd
‘For Meg’ by Fleur Adcock
Comparison resource
Exam questions
Unit 5
‘A London Thoroughfare. 2am.’ by Amy Lowell
‘Frost Fair’ by Rowyda Amin
Comparison resource
Exam questions
Unit 6
‘Long Life’ by Elaine Feinstein
‘Fish oil, exercise and no wild parties’ by Beatrice Garland
Comparison resource
Exam questions
Bring this popular and thought-provoking play to life with our comprehensive six-week teaching pack for GCSE.
‘An Inspector Calls is such a popular play at GCSE that I wanted to bring together a mix of teaching approaches and ideas to appeal to a wide range of teaching styles. I had used many of these successfully in my classes, building in activities such as freeze frames and peg puppets, as well as feeding in some of the latest pedagogical trends, like the learning grids. There’s plenty of choice of engaging and active teaching and a close text focus throughout, leaving students with a lasting enjoyment of the play.’
Helen Stacey, writer
Choose from socratic discussions, venn diagrams, game templates, visual learning grids and sequencing activities – tasks to engage even the most reluctant readers!
What’s included?
lesson plans and ideas along with tailor-made resources
practical, student-facing activities.
What’s inside?
Introduction (pages 1-2)
Route through – week one (pages 2-3)
de Bono’s detective skills
Word wall
Play production template
Pre-teaching (intro)
Quiz on BBC’s Text in Context series
Tension graph
Historical context
Jigsaw pieces
Route through – week two (pages 4-5)
Role on the wall
Analysing stage directions
Pyramid
Tricky situations
Act One: Who said …?
Act One learning grid
Point, evidence, explanation technique
Route through – week three (pages 6-7)
Wordplay in Act Two
Gerald’s affair
Chat show: who is to blame?
Describing character
Write Eva Smith’s diary
Bullseye
Whose bag is it?
Route through – week four (pages 8-9)
Theme definitions
An Inspector called
Speaking and listening: The committee meeting
Socialism and capitalism
Links in a chain
Route through – week five (pages 10-11)
Pictures strip exercise
Bingo!
Socratic discussion
Moral message team game
Politics and persuasion in the final speech
Snakes and ladders
Treasure hunt
Route through – week six (pages 12-13)
Engdoku
Taboo revision game
Tension graph
Word analysis quadrant
Revision game
Mind palace revision
Decorate a chair!
Revision calendar
Engage your students in this classic text and develop their critical reading skills with our teaching pack, A Christmas Carol.
The pack takes your students through the five staves of the text, providing social and historical context, discussion points, structured lesson ideas and supporting resources. Tasks include close-text analysis, comprehension, drama and exam-style questions – perfect for preparing your students for their GCSE.
What’s included?
twenty-five lessons
exam style questions for the relevant exam boards.
What’s inside?
Introduction (page 3)
Specification summaries (pages 4-6)
AQA GCSE English Literature
Edexcel GCSE English Literature
WJEC Eduqas GCSE English Literature
Stave One (pages 7-46)
Lesson one – Understanding Dickens and Victorian London
Lesson two – The writer’s craft
Lesson three – Scrooge as an outsider
Lesson four – Contrasting characters and family feuds
Lesson five – Introducing the supernatural
Stave Two (pages 47-69)
Lesson one – Creating atmosphere
Lesson two – Ghostly visions
Lesson three – Memories and regrets
Lesson four – Mirth and merriment
Lesson five – Victorian family ideals
Stave Three (pages 70-95)
Lesson one – A sumptuous celebration
Lesson two – Larger than life
Lesson three – Community: the Christmas spirit
Lesson four – Family affairs
Stave Four (pages 96-123)
Lesson one – Gothic and ghostly
Lesson two – Life in the slums
Lesson three – Reactions to Scrooge’s Death
Lesson four – Intense emotions
Stave Five (pages 117-144)
Lesson one – A second chance
Lesson two – Changing relationships
Lesson three – Themes and characters: revision summaries
Lesson four – Exam skills and final practice
Make sure your students are well prepared for AQA’s GCSE English Language Paper 1: Explorations in creative reading and writing.
‘This student-facing pack is designed to be both accessible and challenging. With top tips, AO breakdowns, detailed activities, exam-style questions and suggested answers, it forms a comprehensive student pack which is ideal for developing skills, pushing students, and providing structured, useful revision. It covers a range of stimulating texts and will help to build students’ confidence when dealing with unseen texts and prepare them for the rigour of the GCSE exam.’
Lyndsey Chand, writer
Our exam skills pack is divided into sections for reading and writing and features four fiction extracts for analysis along with exam questions for each extract.
The pack focuses on key skills and assessment objectives and includes pre-reading activities, matching activities, true/false activities, planning grids, vocabulary tasks, sequencing tasks, creative extension tasks, correction activities and more.
Perfect for revision and preparation for the exam.
Featured texts:
Jamrach’s Menagerie – Carol Birch
‘The Singing Lesson’ – Katherine Mansfield
The Lodger – Marie Belloc Lowndes
The Hampdenshire Wonder – J.D. Beresford
What’s included?
four fiction text extracts
reading and writing sections
exam practice questions.
What’s inside?
Teacher introduction (pages 3-4)
Section A: Reading (pages 5-6)
Practise the exam skills: AO1 (first bullet point) (pages 7-25)
Source 1: Jamrach’s Menagerie by Carol Birch
Practise the exam skills: AO2 (language) (pages 25-53)
Source 2: ‘The Singing Lesson’ by Katherine Mansfield
Practise the exam skills: AO2 (structure) (pages 54-78)
Source 3: The Lodger by Marie Belloc Lowndes
Practise the exam skills: AO4 (pages 79-102)
Source 4: The Hampdenshire Wonder by J.D. Beresford
Section B: Writing (pages 103-104)
Practise the exam skills: AO5 (pages 105-120)
Practise the exam skills: AO6 (pages 121-142)
Recent research shows that one in seven children will begin secondary school as a struggling reader (Martell, 2018). This downloadable teaching pack aims to support upper KS2 children to practise and consolidate their reading skills in preparation for SATs and the transition to KS3.
Based on practical, evidence-based reading comprehension strategies, Raising reading skills will develop children’s reading fluency, building their confidence in - and enjoyment of - reading.
The Raising reading skills teacher handbook - for experienced teachers, non-subject specialists and TAs - will take you through the 12-week programme step-by-step, with detailed lesson plans and practical CPD guidance on how and why these reading comprehension strategies work.
The Raising reading skills workbook provides children with everything they need, including a range of engaging texts, classroom activities and worksheets. Lessons are devised for 1:1, small group and whole group booster sessions or as a complementary resource for English lessons.
(Please note that Raising reading skills is based upon the KS3 English intervention pack, Fix it reading, and contains some of the same content.)
What’s included?
The teacher’s handbook includes 12 detailed lesson plans, starter and plenary ideas, homework tasks and evidence-based teaching notes and CPD guidance.
The accompanying workbook includes carefully selected texts to engage developing readers, as well as worksheets and activities.
Includes fiction and non-fiction texts on a range of engaging themes, with extracts from accessible young adult novels like Home Ground and I, Coriander as well as graphic novels, news articles, websites, and fact sheets.
What’s inside?
Teacher’s Handbook
An introduction to Raising reading skill (page 3)
About the author and how to use the teacher handbook (page 4)
Understanding a child’s reading level (page 5)
What difficulties do struggling readers face at secondary school? (page 6)
The learning experience for developing readers: advice for teachers (page 6)
What does a confident reader look like? (page 7)
Selecting appropriate texts to read (pages 7-8)
Section 1: Practical reading comprehension strategies (pages 9-41)
Section 2: Group reading strategies (pages 42-52)
Teacher observations: Reading confidence and progress (page 53)
Parental tips for supporting reading (page 55)
Student Handbook
Introduction (page 3)
Reading survey (pages 3-5)
Reading strategies (page 6)
Skimming and scanning (pages 7-11)
Predictions and questions (pages 12-16)
Questions and signposts (pages 17-24)
Inference (pages 25-29)
Inference (pages 30-33)
Summarising and note-taking (pages 34-38)
Summarising and note-taking (pages 39-43)
Word detectives (part 1) (pages 44-48)
Word detectives (part 2) (Pages 49-53)
Reciprocal reading (part 1) (pages 54-57)
Reciprocal reading (part 2) (pages 58-63)
Reciprocal reading (part 3) (pages 64-66)
Unseen fiction is a step-by-step introduction to the unseen element of the GCSE English Language exam, developing students’ analytical skills and confidence.
The perfect foundation for KS4 students, this pack addresses AO1, AO2 and AO4 and will help your students develop their skills and confidence in approaching unseen fiction.
With eight detailed lesson plans for each text, the pack includes starter activities, main lesson activities, plenary ideas and extension activities, as well as worksheets and classroom resources.
Featured text extracts:
Kerfol by Edith Wharton
The War of the Worlds by H.G. Wells
My Ántonia by Willa Cather
‘The Christmas Present’ by Richmal Crompton
Mort by Terry Pratchett
‘Printer’s Devil Court’ by Susan Hill
‘Down to a Sunless Sea’ by Neil Gaiman
A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini
What’s included?
Eight text extracts
Exam-style questions
Exam-style practice papers with suggested ‘answers’ for the final extract for AQA, Edexcel and WJEC Eduqas.
What’s inside?
Introduction (page 3)
Specification summaries (pages 4-6)
Top tips (pages 7-8)
Text 1: Kerfol (pages 9-17)
Resource 1 - finding information
Resource 2 - the black greyhound
Text 2: The War of the Worlds (pages 18-28)
Resource 3 - the storm
Text 3: My Ántonia (pages 29-37)
Resource 4 - guess what is being described
Resource 5 - character descriptions
Resource 6 - author’s use of language
Text 4: ‘The Christmas Present’ (pages 38-50)
Resource 7 - structural terminology
Resource 8 - the beginning
Resource 9 - developing the story
Text 5: Mort (pages 51-59)
Resource 10 - venn diagram
Resource 11 - close analysis of Mort
Text 6: ‘Printer’s Devil Court’ (pages 60-68)
Resource 12 - evaluating writing
Resource 13 - exam-style questions
Text 7: ‘Down to a Sunless Sea’ (pages 69-84)
Resource 14 - narrative voice in the story
Resource 15 - imagery
Resource 16 - planning grid
Text 8: A Thousand Splendid Suns (pages 85-107)
Resource 17 - exam style questions
Our comprehensive GCSE teaching pack has been created to support students taking GCSE English Literature for AQA, Edexcel and WJEC Eduqas. Page numbers and extracts relate to the Methuen Drama Modern Classics edition (2001).
‘Blood Brothers is a … favourite with both teachers and students. This pack contains a wide range of activities to encourage exploration of the play’s context, themes, language, structure and characters. Tasks range from starter games to comparisons with Greek tragedy and Romeo and Juliet. It also includes revision grids and practice examination-style questions suitable for detailed and thorough examination preparation.’
Annie Fox, writer
These 23 lessons and wide range of resources are all you need for an in-depth analysis of this tragic story.
What’s included?
23 lessons
49 bespoke resources
Exam-style questions for GCSE English Literature.
What’s inside?
Introduction (page 4)
Specification summaries (pages 5-7)
Lesson 1 (pages 8-17)
Pre-reading: how to read a play and identify drama genres
Lesson 2 (pages 18-25)
Pre-reading: using the context and writing an original script
Lesson 3 (pages 26-31)
The role of the narrator
Lesson 4 (pages 32-42)
Characterisation: Mrs Lyons and Mrs Johnstone
Lesson 5 (pages 43-50)
Themes: superstition and motherhood
Lesson 6 (pages 51-55)
Theme: childhood
Lesson 7 (pages 56-58)
Conflict
Lesson 8 (pages 59-61)
Characterisation: Linda and theme: social class
Lesson 9 (pages 62-65)
Theme: friendship and symbolism
Lesson 10 (pages 66-76)
Revision of Act 1: plot, genre, style and structure
Lesson 11 (pages 77-81)
Characterisation: Sammy, Mickey and Edward
Lesson 12 (pages 82-86)
Themes: education and social class
Lesson 13 (pages 87-91)
Theme: love
Lesson 14 (pages 92-97)
Characterisation: Mrs Lyons and theme: mental illness
Lesson 15 (pages 98-107)
Handling of time
Lesson 16 (pages 104-107)
Characterisation: Mr Lyons and theme: unemployment
Lesson 17 (pages 108-109)
Creation of tension
Lesson 18 (pages 110-112)
Subtext and conflict
Lesson 19 (pages 113-114)
Resolution
Lesson 20 (pages 115-119)
Writing about comedy and tragedy
Lesson 21 (pages 120-126)
Writing about characters
Lesson 22 (pages 127-133)
Writing about themes
Lesson 23 (pages 134-142)
Revision