English

Nature of Subject

English Language is fundamental to every area of study and life skill;  English Literature is the study of one's ability to manipulate this language for effect.  One of the oldest Art forms, it exposes scholars to a rich tapestry of ideas, perspectives and beliefs which broaden the mind and nurture the soul.  It is essential to every career as it teaches the fundamentals of excellent communication, be it verbal or written.  Students of English Literature at degree level go on to pursue careers in a very wide range of industries from the Civil Service to media and broadcasting to events management and more. 

Intent

To empower our pupils to understand, analyse and critically evaluate language from a range of texts, genres and contexts, and to manipulate their own words as powerfully as those in the texts that they have studied.

Design

Our curriculum is built thematically, revisiting each theme each year in different forms in order to develop and deepen knowledge, and broaden skills.  Students are taught to discover the links between the texts studied throughout their school career, and to critique the development of these ideas over time and across contexts.  Our themes are: Tragedy, Social & Political Protest Writing, Women’s Voices in Literature, Representations of Love, and Science and Society in Literature.   We study these themes through reading a wide range of genres and forms, including Classical, Shakespearean and modern drama, poetry, novels, non-fiction and short stories. 

Delivery 

Each English lesson at Coloma centres on one key learning question which students should be able to answer by the end of the lesson.  The students’ responses to this question allow the teacher to review the impact of the lesson, and provide a summary of key knowledge for the student. Recall and retrieval activities develop students’ memory of key knowledge, and the key skills of reading, writing and oracy are developed through shared reading, group discussions and presentations, expert modelling of writing, peer and self review, and explicit teaching of vocabulary, spelling, punctuation and grammar. 

Each week students complete a “big write” where they independently write an extended piece for 40 minutes to build written stamina and confidence; once a term this is assessed by the teacher who then provides written feedback for students to action. Homework is set weekly to develop knowledge taught in lessons.