Latest Posts
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Refresh your planning and teaching in the English classroom with this helpful tool
An intuitive sequence of learning can simplify your planning, provide your department with a common language to talk about teaching and learning and help ensure progression for your students. Software engineers at Apple – so the story goes – had… Continue reading
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How can we make sure our Key Stage 3 English curriculum sequencing doesn’t put the brakes on progress?
In a subject as multi-dimensional as English, it’s crucial that our focus on curriculum sequence and substantive knowledge doesn’t limit strong disciplinary practice I learned to drive in my early twenties. I was a bit older than many of my… Continue reading
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Transform your students’ writing by teaching them how to blog
Crafting a blog post is a great way for students to learn about the impact of their language choices I had laboured for hours on my music review. I was sixteen years old and so convinced that Mrs McCleary would… Continue reading
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‘Follow the forest trail: walking in the North York Moors’
The forest trail is gently yielding. And the forest is a place where the imagination is allowed to wander too. The woods of the North York Moors are, without doubt, my favourite place to walk. Yes, a hike up a… Continue reading
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Teach your students to be more insightful readers with lots of productive talk about texts.
The knowledge and skills to be an astute reader are best developed with lots of talking as well as lots of reading, as I discovered with guest blogger, Jude Macadam. With over thirty years of teaching experience, my colleague Jude… Continue reading
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Five tricks to help your students get to grips with a new poem
[Traveling In The Dark] is not a poem that is written to support a position that I have chosen, it’s just a poem that grows out of the plight I am in as a human being. William Stafford The poem… Continue reading
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The indispensable guide to what makes a great feature story
The feature story is a potent and vital form of literary non-fiction. Here, Anthony Cockerill charts its evolution through the years. Of all the different ways to tell stories, the feature article is one of the most compelling, especially when… Continue reading
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Literacy and film: learning about storycraft with M Night Shyamalan’s The Village
The auteur’s 2004 film works brilliantly in the classroom. I’ve explored some possible ways to use this great film below. The Village (2004), M Night Shyamalan’s beautifully shot, atmospheric film, is great for the classroom. It’s a rare beast: often… Continue reading
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A Christmas miracle for the English classroom (it involves a film, but students are learning too!)
Writing about Robert Zemeckis’s motion-capture adaptation of A Christmas Carol teaches students to develop an individual response to a ‘text’. It’s that time of year again. The last week of term arrives and Merry Christmas erupts into merry hell as… Continue reading
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Teach your students to ace AQA’s GCSE English Language P1, Q2
Essential advice that draws on examiners’ reports, past papers and students’ responses, with some great downloadable extracts and helpful resources. 1. Encourage your students to explore deeper layers of meaning. ‘Some [students] offered a basic, generic comment, for example, ‘it… Continue reading
Anthony Cockerill 