One of England’s leading school exam boards has asked teachers to shape the future of GCSE and A-level English literature by voting on which texts should be studied, as well as suitable names for the modules covered.
The OCR exam board has asked teachers to vote in an online survey on which texts should be studied for the qualifications, as part of a move towards making the GCSE and A level more diverse and inclusive.
Tes has explored OCR’s survey in detail to see what exactly English teachers are being asked to consider:
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Module names may change
At A level, the survey asks whether the topic name “Women in Literature” should change to “better enable students to access the contextual elements of the topic”, with alternative suggested titles including “Gender in Literature” and “Representing Gender”.
And the survey also asks whether the topic “The Immigrant Experience” should be renamed “in order to more accurately reflect the stories and writers studied”, with suggested alternatives including “Literature of Migration” and “The migration novel”.
Improving diversity in GCSE English literature
Teachers face some difficult choices, with additional suggested texts for American literature at A level including Zora Neale Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God and Nella Larsen’s Passing, a novel that influenced Brit Bennett’s recent work The Vanishing Half.
New choices for Gothic literature include Salman Rushdie’s 1983 novel Shame, as well as Wide Sargasso Sea, Jean Rhys’ reimagining of Jane Eyre.
And for “Women in literature”, teachers might choose from Bernardine Evaristo’s Booker Prize-winning Girl, Woman, Other, Patricia Highsmith’s The Price of Salt, Ali Smith’s How to be Both, and Anne Brontë’s The Tenant of Wildfell Hall.
Drama texts may change at GCSE
At GCSE, teachers can choose additional texts from contemporary drama, such as Zia Ahmed’s I Wanna Be Yours and Tanika Gupta’s Love N Stuff.
The board is also refreshing its GCSE poetry anthology “with a range of new poems by authors of colour”, adding new authors to sit alongside Meera Syal, Jackie Kay, Derek Walcott and John Agard.
The surveys are running until 6 May, and the board will announce the final list of new texts in June.
English teacher Jennifer Webb said: “Diversity in our English curriculum is about saying loud and clear to our young people that everyone has a voice and a place in the creation and enjoyment of art.
“Great writers come from every colour and creed across the globe; restricting ourselves to a narrow range of authors does a disservice to literature.
“I have been delighted to engage in the challenging discussions around diversity in the OCR specifications and I feel confident that English teachers will feel supported and inspired by the proposed changes and OCR’s commitment to ongoing work in this area.”
The board has also been named as a partner in the “Lit in Colour” campaign, which was launched in 2020 by Penguin Random House UK and The Runnymede Trust “to explore how to increase students’ access to books by writers of colour and those from minority ethnic backgrounds”.
Jill Duffy, OCR chief executive and an English literature graduate, said: “We’re honoured to join the excellent Lit in Colour campaign and to play our part in helping to give young people greater access to works by authors of colour.
“We plan to work shoulder to shoulder with our Lit in Colour partners to support access to a more diverse English literature curriculum in a number of ways. It’s an exciting time to be joining the campaign and for OCR’s broad approach to improving diversity.”
Zaahida Nabagereka, Lit in Colour programme manager, said: “We’re really excited to bring OCR on as a named partner for Lit in Colour.
“This campaign is all about starting a conversation and then following through with meaningful actions that will result in students having more access to literature by writers of colour; OCR has already started those conversations, and we want to do our best to support them through the rest of the process as the campaign develops.”
The board is also expanding its recipe lists for GCSE food preparation and nutrition so that students can cook more diverse dishes as part of their practical work.
