A booklet featuring 25 poems for students to practise analysing ‘unseen poetry’ for the AQA GCSE Literature exam. Each poem is accompanied by a question emulating the style of AQA’s exam questions. Some poems are coupled together to allow comparative essays, as per the final question of the exam. Poets include Armitage, Blake, Heaney, Larkin, Plath, Sassoon and Whitman.

This 20-slide lesson explores Fleur Adcock’s poem, ‘The Telephone Call’. Starter activities probe students to think about their attitude to the lottery and its anthropological implications. We then learn about the life and work of Fleur Adcock before reading the poem. Students are prompted to think about the two juxtaposing characters in the poem before delving into Adcock’s use of language, imagery, form, structure and rhyme. The significance of the poem’s 1980s context is also considered. Key themes and sophisticated vocabulary are listed to enable students to conduct precise analysis. We also ask what the poem’s true message may be, posing a variety of interpretations. This resource is ideal for those studying the poem as part of Cambridge IGCSE’s ‘Songs of Ourselves’, but is useful for anyone looking at the poem. Two versions of the lesson are attached: one is a PDF to save the best aesthetics and formatting; the other is a standard PowerPoint where fonts and formatting may be lost but can easily be edited.

This 33-slide lesson on Philip Larkin’s ‘Going, Going’ explores the poem in comprehensive detail. Examining Larkin’s seemingly impassioned warning against the dangers of capitalist industrialisation against the sardonic satire of his poetic persona, this lesson unpicks the poet’s masterful use of language, form, structure, and imagery. Questions and discussion points are featured for students throughout, encouraging them to unpick the poem in great detail. Other Larkin poems to which ‘Going, Going’ might be compared are suggested, and the lesson ends with an extended essay question for students to complete either in class or as a homework. This lesson is aimed primarily at A level students, but could be used for high-attaining GCSE sets. ‘Going, Going’ is particularly rich for pupils reading poems through an ecocritical lens. PowerPoint saved as PDF.

This 17-slide lesson explores Stevie Smith’s poem, ‘Not Waving But Drowning’. Students are asked challenging but important questions about how conscious we are of the feelings of those around us - our family, friends, and even neighbours, colleagues, and acquaintances. We discuss the nature of Smith’s poetry - her recurring themes, styles, and subject matter - before reading her famous poem. We think about how the poem might be read as an allegory, reflecting on important ideas surrounding mental health and compassion. The language, imagery, structure, and rhyme of the poem are then deconstructed in detail. Students explore the poem’s key themes, and ambitious vocabulary is introduced to facilitate sophisticated analysis. At the end of the poem, an exam-style question is included. Please note: this poem (and lesson) explores some mature themes regarding mental health. PowerPoint saved as PDF.

For those studying AQA GCSE English Language, here is an extract from and 4 exam-style questions on John Steinbeck’s ‘Of Mice and Men’. Perfect practice for the AQA exam. Structured and ‘scaffolded’ starter questions are included to help SEND students, as well as step-by-step guidance for how to tackle questions 3 and 4, which are notoriously more challenging.

This 43-page workbook is a thorough and comprehensive unit of work analysing poems about animals. The workbook contains various tasks and questions for a variety of animals, prompting students to consider how the poems interact with cultural stereotypes and how poets have used language and form to great effect. There are 12 poems included in this workbook. Poets featured include Ted Hughes, Chinua Achebe, Elizabeth Bishop, Carol Ann Duffy and Marianne Moore. At the end of the booklet is a project for students to complete. This workbook is easily adaptable and teachers can study each poem at their own discretion and in their own manner. Some poems are more complex than others and so teachers may wish to differentiate accordingly. Pupils could work on this unit in class or independently at home. The workbook is designed for use at KS3 but could be easily adapted to specific needs and preferences.

This bundle of resources is a comprehensive, detailed, and academic exploration of all scenes from Shakespeare’s ‘Othello’ to provide the ideal companion for studying the play. Five presentations are included - one for each of the play’s five acts. Each presentation introduces the setting and context for each of the play’s scenes, before providing step-by-step supportive notes for the scenes. These notes not only explain what is happening as the scene progresses, but key dialogue, images, and stage directions are deconstructed with academic scrutiny. Questions are also posed for students at regular intervals to encourage a thematic and holistic understanding of the play. These resources can be used to support class readings of the texts, or made accessible to students at home to facilitate their understanding of each scene. In addition, students have found them extremely useful as revision resources to review in their own time. Act 1 Notes - 54 slides Act 2 Notes - 42 slides Act 3 Notes - 50 slides Act 4 Notes - 40 slides Act 5 Notes - 38 slides These resources are ideal for GCSE or A level study of ‘Othello’. 224 slides in total. PowerPoints saved as PDFs.

This extract from Caryl Churchill’s ‘Top Girls’ is perfect for analysing elements of political and social protest as per the AQA A level paper. This extract is particularly effective for considering Feminist theory and gender politics.

This word search is a fun and stimulating activity for those studying ‘Romeo and Juliet’ to help consolidate knowledge of characters, key themes, and their spelling.

This word search is a fun and stimulating activity for those studying ‘An Inspector Calls’ to help consolidate knowledge of characters, key themes, and their spelling.

This three-part workbook on the key themes of ‘Macbeth’ is an ideal revision or consolidation task. The first page asks students to annotate images representative of key themes in the play. Students could surround each image with words, quotations, analysis, etc. The second page asks students to retrieve key quotations from the play linked to each theme. The third page is another series of images, this time linked to key quotations from the play. Students are asked to write down the quotations beside the image.

A series of mock questions on Ibsen’s ‘A Doll’s House’ designed to emulate AQA’s exam style in the Political and Social Protest Paper (Section B). Sixteen questions in total. Perfect for revision and practice assessments.

How does Shakespeare present attitudes to gender in ‘Macbeth’? Students so often write about gender dynamics in ‘Macbeth’ with clumsy generalisations that examiners can’t abide. This lesson aims to encourage specific and mature contextualised understanding of gender in the 1600s and within the play itself. This 30-slide PowerPoint explores how Shakespeare exploits and subverts attitudes to gender throughout the play, encouraging students to comment with precision and perception on masculinity and femininity. Ideal for KS4 students in particular but easily adaptable for other ages. PowerPoint saved as PDF.

This is a thorough and comprehensive introduction to the context of Shakespeare’s ‘Julius Caesar’. The 21-slide lesson details Caesar’s life and role in the Roman Republic, outlining key terminology, politics, and history that will help explain his downfall. Shakespeare’s own life is also explored alongside the plot and focus of the play itself, and Elizabethan parallels with the play’s themes are explained. Questions and tasks are included for pupils, including a research (potential homework) task at the end of the lesson. The lesson is ideal for GCSE pupils, but could easily be adapted for other Key Stages. PowerPoint saved as PDF.

This 26-slide lesson explores the major themes of violence and crime in Stevenson’s novella, ‘Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde’. The lesson documents key examples of violence and crime in the story, analysing Stevenson’s language, symbolism, setting, and intentions, and making links to the Gothic genre as well as the Victorian fascination with criminality and criminology. Questions and discussion points are included throughout, and the lesson ends with a mock exam question on the theme of violence and crime. This lesson is ideal for those studying the text at GCSE (particularly those with AQA), but could also be used for KS3. PowerPoint saved as PDF.

This lesson is focused on helping students to analyse literary ‘structure’ using an extract from Suzanne Collins’ ‘The Hunger Games’. The lesson is focused on Question 3 (‘How has the writer structured the text to interest you as a reader?’) from AQA’s GCSE English Language Paper 1. Students are presented with methods of tackling this notoriously challenging question. Exemplar paragraphs on ‘The Hunger Games’ are also included. The resource includes a lesson PowerPoint and the extract from the novel. This lesson is aimed at GCSE pupils but could be used for KS3. PowerPoint saved as PDF.

This 25-slide lesson explores Tennyson’s poem, ‘The Eagle’. The lesson includes a zoological, historical and mythological overview of eagles, considering their connotations and status in various cultures, as well as biographical information on Tennyson. Students are presented with numerous questions, tasks, and discussion points to analyse Tennyson’s poem. Close attention is paid to Tennyson’s language and technique. Students are tasked with an analytical response to the poem (an exemplar paragraph is included) before the lesson ends on a creative writing activity (which could be used as a homework task). This lesson is ideal for KS3, but could be used to help GCSE (particularly SEND) students with poetry too. PowerPoint saved as PDF.

This 32-slide lesson explores Vernon Scannell’s poem ‘Nettles’. The lesson provides detailed study of the poem and includes: biographical information on Scannell, analysis of the poem’s use of language and linguistic/poetic techniques (including extended metaphor), analysis of the poem’s structure, form & rhyme, as well as questions, discussion points, and tasks for students to complete. The final task at the end of the lesson is a piece of creative writing in which students write their own poem. This lesson could be used for KS3 or GCSE pupils. PowerPoint saved as PDF.

Here are 22 mock essay questions on Shakespeare’s ‘Twelfth Night’ for students to practise their exam technique and sharpen their analysis of the text. These questions are particularly aimed at those studying the play within the comedic genre with AQA at A level, but they are easily applicable to any course offering detailed analysis of the play.

This is a thorough and comprehensive 26-slide lesson on Simon Armitage’s poem ‘Mother, Any Distance’, which is studied as part of AQA’s GCSE Literature anthology on ‘Love & Relationships’. This PowerPoint unpicks key themes of distance, growing up, independence, family bonds and letting go with close analysis of language, form and structure. Also included are many small questions for students and a ‘mock’ essay question in which students must compare ‘Mother, Any Distance’ to another poem, just like in the real AQA exam. PowerPoint is saved as PDF.