I have shared with you all of my best lessons I have developed over the last 11 years. I'm a Teacher of English with excellent achievement rates making me among the top 2% of the GCSE English team and a consistent strong grade 2 in observations. I have taught a wide range of English qualifications within FE including Functional Skills (English and Maths) and GCSE. I hope you find these resources as useful to your students as I have.
I have shared with you all of my best lessons I have developed over the last 11 years. I'm a Teacher of English with excellent achievement rates making me among the top 2% of the GCSE English team and a consistent strong grade 2 in observations. I have taught a wide range of English qualifications within FE including Functional Skills (English and Maths) and GCSE. I hope you find these resources as useful to your students as I have.
This resource is excellent for revision, workshop or homework sessions. In current times, it can also be useful for remote / online sessions. This session breakdowns question 4 of paper 1 in a way that both supports the low ability and stretches the more able students. It is designed to calls on each student to actively use their developed knowledge and prior learning to successfully engage with the session.
This session is designed with a variety of short build up tasks, larger revision and recall tasks which lead up to the final analytical, examination writing task. The powerpoint is open and adaptable to be used in whichever was works for you. You can add in timed or paired activities if you plan of delivering this session or you can leave it to be used by the student as homework. Please keep in mind that the TES preview does at time distort the look of the resource and tis is not always a true reflection. Hope it helps.
This fast paced and fun lesson is designed to support a low level or mixed level Functional Skills English class with their writing skills. A great lesson to use at the start of the academic year, this lesson revolves around a article about a 5 year old body builder who made it into the Guinness book of Records and focuses on using direct speech, alliteration, puns and hyperbole to show bias and make writing more interesting. Many tasks are group are pair based to help support lower ability learners, but has some higher ability elements to stretch and challenge stronger learners. Vocabulary focus begins with the starter and is reinforced as you move forward, so students are thinking about language and words from the very start.
This resource comes with a full PowerPoint, and 3 worksheets including the article, worksheet and a planning scaffold. TES preview often distorts the look of the resource and this is not always a true reflection of the material. Feel free to play with and amend this resource to fit your teaching style and / or needs of your cohort. Hope it helps.
This is a small starter which can be tagged onto any lesson you wish which looks into how thoughts, feelings and behavior are interlinked. This quick activity uses CBT methods to help manage negative thoughts by asking the students to look at a situation from a different angle and analyse how this impacts our feelings and our actions.
This resource comes with a full a powerpoint and worksheet. It contains paired activities and a group discussion. This resource has been created to be adaptable, so please feel free to amend in a way which suits the style of your learners. Please keep in mind that the TES preview can sometimes distort the look of the material and this is not a true reflection. Hope it helps.
This resource looks at writers use of language to reflect opinion and bias in journalism. It can be used in relation to the AQA GCSE English Language exam (8700) for questions 3 and 4 from paper 2 but can also be used in the delivery of L1 and L2 Functional Skills. This resource includes an article with some read and obtain questions which range from simple retrieval of information to questions which require deeper thought and inference, which helps those teachers with mixed ability classes. It also includes a discussion element which looks at gender stereotypes and roles of women and motherhood, which the article touches upon. I have personally found that by including these deeper social and stereotypical elements into my classes helps students to navigate their own thoughts and feelings on certain topics, but also allows them to have their ideas challenged and to work towards accepting diversity. Female stereotypes and sexism is very topical at the moment in the light of the Weinstein scandal and so this is a resource which could be expanded upon. Hope it helps
This is a fast paced session, filled with videos, team and individual exercises. It is designed to reinforce prior learning and is best used closer to the summer exam. It is designed to fill 2 - 3 hours of teaching time, which can be broken and modified into two sessions if desired. It covers paper 2 questions 3 and 4 ( writers viewpoints and comparison of two texts). Both texts are modern day texts in order to help illustrate and use the skills learned (language and structure) to answer these questions, although in the actual exam one of the texts will be older.
The session is based around the life of Winston Churchill, his highs and lows. The session slowly builds, developing knowledge and information about Churchill, both the good and the bad, and recapping exam skills as it progresses. All tasks are scaffolded to help those with mixed ability classes and challenges students to think analytically and answer the two questions as they would in the exam itself. The resource can be modified to cater for your own cohort or for different exam boards and leaves room for group discussions as extensions or can be cut back if you have short timetabled sessions. I work within FE and this is a session which has worked well with my 16 - 19 students. Please keep in mind that the TES preview can distort the look of the resources and this is not always a true reflection. Hope it helps
This session was designed for a L2 student F/S who’s first language wasn’t English but was strong enough to not be put in a ESOL class. They struggled with writing, using a range of vocabulary and sentence structures.
This session was designed to try and broaden their skills in this area and their confidence with writing. The session looks at using synonyms, LY / ING sentence starters, language features and descriptive writing techniques such as using the senses to describe. The tasks all combine together to build up to a short piece of descriptive writing, piecing all elements together, with the session ending with a Functional English styled question. This session was designed for a 1-2-1, but can be adapted to suit your own cohorts. Please be aware that the TES preview only gives a sample of the materials and can at times distort them, and this is not always a true reflection. Hope it helps
I support at risk student with 1 hour support sessions in GCSE English, my materials are simplified and designed to be used in a 1-2-1 capacity. These materials are easily adaptable to suit your own cohort and timetable.
This resource is a small section of text taken from the Hunger Games book and I have structured questions which reflect those found on paper 1, questions 2, 3 and 4. This is a quick and easy revision tool, can be used as homework or self study or in support sessions. Hope it helps
I run 1 hour long support sessions in GCSE English for students who are more vulnerable. I have short and simple sessions to support these students with their learning. This session cover paper 2 question - the compare question and focuses on how to structure an answer (point, quote, infer - you may use a different format).
The materials start simply with the analysis of two images and works it way up to two short samples of different era texts.
The materials are enough to fill an hour support session, feel free to adapt to suit your own timetable and cohort. Hope it helps
I have created a series of writing prompts for learners of L2 functional English in response to limited past papers / mocks. I teach in an areas where learners are offered multiple resits and so need a wide range of practice materials. Tasks range from full 35 min writing tasks to starters where the learner is asked to write only the opening paragraphs. Types of question covers persuasive letter writing, formal and informal writing, report writing, online forums, letters of complaint and articles.
Please keep in mind that the TES preview often distorts the look of the materials and is not always a true reflection. I hope it helps.
This resource is developed to allow scaffolding and differentiation. I have used a review of The Hunger Games and structured questions, based on the L1 and L2 reading papers. One is a scaffolded and chunked piece of reading, breaking the review at each paragraph followed by questions, the other is a full page of reading with questions levelled slightly higher. Resources like this can help the students in class who’s reading skills need further development and are struggling with the rest of the class, whilst also supporting those progressing well in class and allowing some exam practice. Resources can be adapted to suit your cohort and student needs. Please keep in mind that the TES preview is limited, and so I have added screenshots to give you a fuller look at the resource. Hope it helps
This resource is a 5 page resource centered around the theme of UK wildlife and sustainability. Students can engage via a quiz and answer / information pages, and then move on to answer questions which are based along the style of questions on the functional skills reading paper.
This resource can form a part of a larger lesson on the theme of sustainability or be used as homework or quick revision. You can adapt the resource to accommodate your own cohorts and teaching style. Please keep in mind that the TES preview is limited and can at times distort the look of the resource, and this is not always a true reflection. For this reason, I have included screen-shots of the resource. Hope it helps
This resource has been designed to be incorporated into sessions or to be used as homework or revision. Based around a news article about a female drag queen, the resource has both reading and writing practice with language and vocab focus.
Tes provides a limited preview, so for this reason I have included screen-shots to help give you a better view of the material. The resource is designed to be altered to suit your own cohort or sessions. Hope it helps.
I have created 3 texts (1 being a quick quiz) around sustainability to help increase students awareness and also practice some key questions in the F/S reading exam, largely organisational and language features. I use it as a recap / reinforcement task at the start of my session, however it can be adapted to suit your own needs. Please be aware the the TES preview is a limited preview and can at times distort the look of the material. Hope it helps.
I have created this sessions to help support those FS learners where English is not their first language. One area I find many struggle with is the application of plurals, and area which lets them down at L1 and L2. This session has been created to follow initial delivery of plural rules and is designed to practice the application of plurals within the learners own writing.
This session is learner lead and recaps plural rules, asks the learners to proofread / correct plural errors. We then move towards different types of text (article vrs eye witness account) and asks the learner to further develop writing in that style. Underpinned is need to take ownership of learning and we take the time to demonstrate and create ideas on how to take a class task and expand on it in order to use for meaningful self study.
I created this session for a specific learner in mind, however you can adapt this session to cater to your own cohort. Please keep in mind the TES preview is limited and may not give an accurate reflection of the resource as a whole. Hope it helps.
I find teaching functional skills English , I’m getting more and more students who in fact need ESOL specialist classes. I’m not an ESOL tutor but due to the increasing demand to teach English as a second language and fill ESOL gaps in students knowledge I have developed a number of resources of common problems ESOL student have, which I have complied into a 35 page support booklet which I now give my ESOL learners. The idea is the students use this booklet to support their own self-study and English language development or I use it to set targeted and individual homework. The booklet has explainers and tasks to comeplete and ideas on how to further develop own self-study. I find it quite useful and I hope you do to. You can adapt the booklet to suit your own cohort or levels. Please be aware the the TES preview can distort the look of the resources, and this is not always a true reflection.
I support vulnerable students with their English with weekly 1-2-1 hour long sessions. The sessions I create are designed to create interest in the student and to revise skills taught in their main session. This session starts with developing Haikus to engage the student and get them thinking of different vocabulary and sentence structures, it is also useful for underpinning spelling techniques and proofreading. We work our way up to L1 reading practice with a piece of text about Frida Kahlo.
Feel free to adapt for your own needs. Hope it helps
I support vulnerable students with their Functional English in 1-2-1 hour sessions. The materials I create are designed to be simplified, to support their main learning and be used as revision or guided homework, however feel free to adapt to your own cohort.
This session supports the reading paper at L1 and is based around the painting, the raft of Medusa. We start simple and focus and read and obtain questions and work our way up to exam style questions. Hope it helps
Based on the Pearson model of Functional English - I have created a L2 reading Mock - as close to the original Pearson versions as I can. There not that many Pearson mocks in circulation (possibly only 3 officially). The texts are based around the benefits of wellness and being outdoors and includes all 15 questions found on the exam. Please keep in mind that the Tes preview can distort the look of the resource and is not always a true reflection. Hope it helps.
CV writing unit, comes with PPT and workbook. I deliver the session using the ppt and workbook at underpinning, after wards the students create their own CV from scratch. Feel free to use as you need for your cohort.
This unit is ran along side a short course designed to support people back into work. It’s aim is to promote confidence and foster leadership skills in low ability / EAL learners. The session covers hard and soft skills, what are and what makes good leaders and ends with the learners delivering a demonstration, in where they lead a group of people through a simple activity. This session comes with a workbook, ppt and worksheets. Feel free to adapt for your own cohort, hope it helps.