English
Harris Academy Chafford Hundred – English Curriculum Philosophy
Stories are the fabric of life and literature is the human attempt to understand the world around us. The study of literature explores the depths of human emotions. It has the power to open our minds beyond our own circumstances towards our diverse world, its people, and experiences. The study of literature can educate us of ancient societies, open our imagination to fantastical lands, communicate to us profound emotions, and ultimately teach us the pillars of empathy.
Through the centuries, literature has been a symbol of freedom. Knowledge liberates us and therefore the ability to read literature from different time periods and places educates us about our own rights and opinions. The knowledge we can find in books is liberating. Charles Dickens is undoubtedly a literary genius, and yet his education was poor, but his ability to read and read widely is what gave him the knowledge and skill to succeed. In a world of misinformation and rapidly evolving political propaganda, literature affords us the opportunity to develop critical reading skills and healthy scepticism through study of narrative voice, characterisation, language, writer’s purpose and the audience’s reception.
‘The limits of my language mean the limit of my world’
Ludwig Wittgenstein
Language is a powerful tool in communication, developing vocabulary and rhetoric equips young people in expressing themselves. Without it, the essence of what we want to say is restricted or even silenced entirely. In the study of literature young people are given a critical voice and are encouraged to in turn develop their own creativity in developing their own ideas.
‘Maybe ever’body in the whole damn world is scared of each other.’
John Steinbeck, Of Mice and Men
The study of literature is also a matter of social inclusion. The ability to communicate our truth, respect different viewpoints and appreciate the many different experiences of life are key to a world where people are free, happy and safe; the sole aim of any education system. Reading is not just a skill to be acquired for the workplace, it should not be a high brow activity that some are excluded from but instead gives everyone the dignity to understand and engage in culture.We are passionate about the importance of literature and therefore our curriculum philosophy states that through the exploration of the literary canon and its contemporary and diverse adaptations, students will be explicitly taught to master and remember rich and powerful knowledge and how to use this knowledge in a structured and articulate way to develop scholarship, bridge literacy gaps and increase cultural capital to ensure success both inside and outside of school.
How has the curriculum been designed at HACH?
In English lessons at Harris Academy Chafford Hundred, teachers think hard about the powerful knowledge that makes up the ‘what’ of our subject. This is the declarative and substantive knowledge which drives our selection of the canon of texts we study and write about. Equally, teachers think about how disciplinary skills are broken into chunks of procedural knowledge that make up the ‘how’ of our subject. The five strands below run throughout the English curriculum from Year 7 to Year 13 and grow in complexity as the curriculum is a progression model. Each year group has its own distinct end points to support students developing a nuanced love of English and gain confidence with ambitious texts and developed skills.
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What? |
How? |
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Methods |
Context |
Vocabulary |
Reading |
Writing |
Oracy |
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Structure
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Historical
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Language of argument |
Fluency
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Analytical writing
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Physical
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Language
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Political
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Tier 2 words |
Reading for meaning
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Transactional Writing
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Linguistic
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Form
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Ideas and Themes
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Tier 3 terms |
Analytical reading
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Creative writing
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Cognitive
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Grammar
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Social and Emotional
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Year 7 - How does English excite and inspire our imagination?
Myths, mystery and magic Accuracy and fluency in reading and writing
Year 7 will be introduced to narrative poetry and myths as they begin with the origins of the language and understanding the structure of a narrative as whole. Students will learn how to explore characters and different voices in a range of settings and forms – poetry, prose and drama. Students will focus on grammar to inform their oracy and writing building on their knowledge from KS2.
Our knowledge-rich curriculum takes students on a journey through the ages of literature, in Year 7 this begins with the Ancient Greeks, exploring the birth of theatre and the stories of the Gods before the English Language even existed. This journey begins with students exploring Greek mythology and Ancient Greece, learning about ancient civilisation from Homer’s The Odyssey to the many mythological creatures and moral lessons of this period. Building on this study, students will develop their own writing with a granular approach to grammar, sentence and text construction and build understanding of a writer’s conscious choice of the written word.
As the term progresses, students will begin to explore the meaning of poetry exploring metaphorical meanings and symbols in more complex detail. Students will learn about the key elements of a metaphor and be introduced to a range of narrative poems to develop their understanding of the abstract. Exposure to the conventions of the genre, the structure of a shorter text and building an understanding of poetic conventions will then lead to students developing further their own written style in the form of the gothic. Their writing will focus on detailed and high-quality descriptions of weather and setting and will take inspiration from their study thus far. Students will then go on to study poetry in more depth, focusing on the strength of female writers and female protagonists developing their understanding of poetic form, genre and structure as well as language and word choice for effect.
As students develop their knowledge of metaphor and meaning they will then delve into the mythical world of Shakespeare. Using their classical allusions already gained from study this year, students develop their study in year 7 by exploring The Renaissance with their study of William Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream, consolidating their understanding of mythical setting and allusion through the fairies and magic in the text as well as understanding the complex language of Shakespeare. To finalise their study of mythical allusions and classical introductions to literature, students will apply this knowledge to their reading of the fantasy text Coraline where students will develop their understanding of the gothic, genre and how texts influence each other across time periods and literary periods learning how to notice allusions and compare writer’s craft.
Year 8 – How does English help us to determine who we are as people?
Power, Social Commentaries and breaking conventions Connecting, tracking and linking ideas
Year 8 will explore writer’s voice and intentions more by tracking ideas through a text and exploring poetry and prose with social commentaries. Year 8 will build on their knowledge of grammar with development of sentence structure for purpose in their writing for a transaction.
The journey through literature continues in Year 8 where students develop their critical reading skills of complex themes and symbols from modern fiction. The importance of understanding writer’s messages, context and use of symbols and methods is developed in the exploration of rhetoric and the spoken word in the beginning of Year 8. Students will explore the link over centuries between speeche3s and oral poetry to understand the power of rhythm, rhetoric and form. Having understood the regular patterns of poetry and the rules associated with certain structures, Year 8s will then seek to break conventions and explore how structure and form can make meaning. Students will study Aristotle’s Art of persuasion noticing the appeals of rhetoric in a range of canonical speeches through history from recent memory of Amanda Gorman’s inaugural message to Churchill’s rhetorical wartime call to action. Complementing these pivotal speeches are poems from the past century echoing similar themes of identity, hope and power using both rhetoric and a range of irregular methods to deliver messages. Students will explore a diverse anthology of speakers and writers relying on context such as Windrush Generation, African and Asian diaspora and the link between national identity and personal. Students’ exploration of identity poetry concludes with celebratory poetry of identity through development of their own spoken word creations and rehearsals for a classic Poetry Slam competition.
Students developing knowledge of theme and social commentaries will be developed further by their reading of Shakespeare’s Merchant of Venice. Students will develop their knowledge of form through drama with a play that has complex characters and subplots with a rich contextual knowledge underpinning the characterisation. Students will develop their knowledge of marginalised communities and characters and notice how language and context interlace. Students will develop their understanding of narrative structures, themes, motifs and allegory as well as critical literary theory to enable them to analyse texts through a variety of lenses.
Students end the year with an exploration of modern drama through Miller’s modern tragedy, A View from the Bridge. Students will bring together their knowledge of rhetoric from this year and their knowledge of form and convention to explore how Miller takes classical form and applies to 1950s America. Students will learn to comment on writer’s intentions, complex context of post-war America and notice how themes such a power, hierarchy, love and identity are explored in another text with differing form and structure. Throughout Year 8 students will have a strong grounding in how a text takes on political meaning whilst also having opportunity to perform and read aloud to develop their understanding of the spoken word and the power of audience.
Year 9 – How does English help us to decide on our beliefs about the world?
Revolution, Persuasion and Complex Characters and Plots
Structuring extended responses
Year 9 will explore the writer’s meaning and how a range of contexts inform the choice of language, structure and form. Year 9 will learn to develop integrated responses and essay skills by exploring a more complex political canon of literature and non-fiction texts from the 19th century and beyond.
The voyage through literature continues in Year 9 where students develop their critical reading and analytical skills with more complex texts, themes and historical knowledge. Students will take their knowledge of social commentaries in the modern ages and understand how revolution and change throughout the past centuries have influences key phases of literature.
Year 9 students begin studying the Romantic period of literature to develop their reading of pre-19th century texts and to understand the cross-over between key artistic, philosophical and literary movements. Students will bring together their knowledge from Year 7 and 8’s poetic structures and use to analyse abstract concepts in complex poems from sonnets by Shelley, verse by Blake and early poems from Shakespeare. Students will explore love poetry and then develop their knowledge of the power and love of nature developed through Romantic poetry in the time period of Industrial Revolution. As analytical writers, students will begin to develop confidence in developing theses on texts and making comment son authorial intent linking to key historical movements and thematic ideas.
Students will develop this skill of tracking ideas and themes by exploring more complex analytical questions relying on an intricate network of knowledge from Key Stage Three to finetune their critical responses to complex texts. As the year progresses, students will apply their knowledge of tragedy to Romeo and Juliet becoming critical in how this play is structured, the many social messages and symbols crafted by Shakespeare and how noticing the various classical influences in this piece of drama. Whilst developing their knowledge themes such as chaos and order, civilisation and morality students will develop a stronger understanding of authorial intent. Alongside the study of the play, students will develop their knowledge of writing rhetorically developing their own viewpoints by writing from a range of perspectives.
To conclude Key Stage 3 study, students will then study Frankenstein and bring together their knowledge of the Romantic period to explore character development, rich themes and natural imagery through this canonical text as a development of pre-19th century novel study and analytical writing. Students will develop their creative writing style to ensure they can set and change mood when describing their own narratives inspired by the settings and characters of this novel. Students will build on the firm foundations of grammar learned in previous years to ensure that punctuation, grammar and vocabulary are selected for effect to create clear writing pieces. Having ensured practice of both transactional and creative writing, students will be assessed on a range of cumulative topics and knowledge from across the key stage in their final term.
Year 10: How does English incite and inspire change in the world?
Big Ideas – Exploring morality texts and power and conflict
Introduction to GCSE analysis and response, developing grammar for writing and reading skills
Year 10 will focus on text-level understanding, reading texts at pace and commenting on the journey, tracking and development of character and plot. Year 10 will also focus on structuring of writing and the arc of the story or argument.
Students will build on the foundation of literature they have learned in Key Stage Three as they move into Key Stage Four where they will be challenged to develop a critical voice, be more adept at understanding the writer’s purpose and context in each text studied. Students will also develop their independent writing skills and develop their own creative ideas and build confidence in their voice.
In Year 10 students begin their GCSE journey with An Inspector Calls by JB Priestley. They will build on their knowledge of modern drama from A View from the Bridge by exploring the stagecraft and dramatic meaning of this play. They will build on their previous knowledge of industrialisation and hierarchy having explored the theme of power in Key Stage Three, students will develop their knowledge of hierarchies by considering the political landscape in pre and post war Britain in the 1900s and understand how this text comments on the change in political tide of the time. Alongside their study of literature, students will also build familiarity at reading unseen texts of a range of genre and ensuring their knowledge of how to craft analytical writing with clear thesis and developed connotations will be studied. The art of creative writing will be developed with students, bringing together previous study of character, place and narrative arc will see students planning and creating their own narratives with a focus on accuracy of writing.
As the GCSE course progresses, students will then be introduced to a range of poems to explore. Firstly, learning how to apply reciprocal reading strategies from Key Stage 3 to reading unseen poems in Year 10. Building from this understanding of literal to figurative meaning, student will then move into the study of the GCSE Poetry Anthology: Power and Conflict. They will first explore the war poems and understand the difference between modern and traditional warfare, understanding the vast experiences of combatants and non-combatants through this selection of poems. Rich historical knowledge and political context will be taught alongside the poems to develop students’ critical understanding and analysis of each text. Alongside this study of poetry, students will also learn the power of tone in non-fiction writing whilst learning how to analyse texts in Paper 2 of the Language GCSE. Noticing similarities in tone and mood in poetry and perspective will build on the work of Key Stage Three.
The art of creative writing will be developed with students, bringing together previous study of character, place and narrative arc will see students planning and creating their own narratives with a focus on accuracy of writing. Students will build on the Key Stage Three knowledge of Shakespeare in Year 10 with an in-depth study of Macbeth, a more complex tragedy than previously studied. Students will learn about the Jacobean era of Shakespeare’s writing, the medieval context of the setting and will be stretched to develop their own critical voices. Students will then begin exploring rhetoric at a high level to complement this text and understand tone and viewpoint in modern articles and speeches, they too will express their own viewpoints in response to a range of stimulus and current affairs.Students will also focus on building ideas about current affairs and their own hobbies to create a speech to be performed for their GCSE Speaking and Listening Language exam in the final summer term.
Year 11: Deepening textual knowledge, layered connotations and writing skilfully
Deliberate practice, revising core knowledge and increasing depth of analysis
Year 11 will deepen understanding of patterns in texts and develop their analytical craft through additional interpretations and explorations. In writing, they will develop finetuned arguments and plots and focus on use of sentence and word level development to bring the structure to life.
Year 11 students will continue to explore a range of poems and consolidate their learning in Year 10. Students will be challenged to think in more depth about texts, make key knowledge stick in long term memory and practise their own writing style to prepare for their examinations.
Students will begin the year studying A Christmas Carol building on their knowledge of worker’s rights, industrialisation and social commentaries with this text. Students will develop their theses creation and structuring of essay to track key themes, motifs and ideas. Alongside this study, in Language students will develop their reading of fiction by noticing how mood is set and shifted and how information being released and withheld can manipulate the readers.
As the year progresses, students will explore the more conceptual connotations of Macbeth, An Inspector Calls and the poetry unit learned in Year 10 to not only revise key content but to deepen textual knowledge and create more perceptive academic arguments. Students will also practise responding to a range of stimulus in their writing covering political strands such as gender, equality, the environment and a range of other important issues in order to develop a critical voice in their transactional writing and build ideas for their own creative writing. The development of writing and reading skills of both fiction and non-fiction will be the focus of the development of English Language GCSE skills. This will be developed throughout the year as students read a range of articles and unseen texts to build stamina.
As part of revision, students will be taught the procedural knowledge to craft well-argued essays, create compelling narrative structures and transactional arguments with creative opinions. There will be opportunity to deliberately practise writing and reading skills to develop their criticality thought throughout the year. Students will be given specific revision and revision techniques to complement their study and support home learning.
Year 12: Responding to Tragedy and Modern literature
Year 12 will develop their knowledge of the conventions of literature and drama responding to patterns, themes and arcs across a whole text. They will be developing theses about complex plot structures, multi-faceted characters and a range of form beginning to make comparisons.
The GCSE Literature course will have provided a sound foundation for the advanced study of Literature in Key Stage Five, when English is no longer a compulsory subject. The choice of this A level should be informed by students’ genuine enthusiasm for reading literature and exploring texts through discussion and written analysis. We have chosen a range of texts to reflect the diversity of English literature, to enable students to develop their own reading tastes and to provide a secure basis for the possible study of this subject at university.
Learners will begin their KS5 journey by studying Shakespeare’s ‘Othello’ in Term 1 whilst considering how contextual factors affect the playwright and intended audience. Learners will consider the viewpoint of other critical readers and really ‘dig deep’ in their discussions and depth of analysis using all prior knowledge and awareness of Shakespearean texts studied at KS3/KS4.
Students will also study Poems of the Decade before moving onto their NEA which consists of an equal comparison of two texts selected by learners to explore their respective questions using a range of references and wider reading to reinforce points raised. Learners will finish their Year 12 journey with a close study of their final Drama text- ‘A Streetcar Named Desire’ which will focus on critical views, how to identify effective methods and how to use the construct to write an analytical essay.
Throughout the year, students are encouraged to read widely and independently, developing their own literary preferences in preparation for choosing their coursework texts. Enrichment lessons will broaden the curriculum beyond the study of examination texts: introducing students to literary theory; exploring key aspects of narrative (including genres not represented in the exam texts); acquiring an understanding of key periods in the history of literature.
Year 13: Canonical Literature
Year 13 will fluently analyse a range of language, structure and form integrated within its context and the various interpretations of a text. They will develop a critical voice and respond to a range of criticism around the text.
Year 13 students will complete their study of the exam texts, developing their own critical voice in response to literature.They will develop their insights through critical reading, evaluating other responses in order to arrive at their own interpretation.They will consolidate their essay-writing skills in order to produce controlled and critical arguments, in both coursework and examination questions.
Students will begin Year 13 with a close study of A Thousand Splendid Sun by Khaled Hosseini and Tess of the D’Urbevilles by Thomas Hardy. This prose comparison has a clear focus on Women and Society and learners will explore the ways in which both constructs represent women and their oppression despite contrasting contextual backgrounds and different time periods.
As the course progresses, students will also study Metaphysical Poetry which will facilitate their understanding of the world whilst ensuring they are continuing to make connections and exploring the relationships between literary eras. Additionally, learners will continue to identify and develop how different attitudes and values are expressed in all the literature they study.
Students will be supported to be independent and critical with their coursework essays, completing this part of the component in the second year of the course. Students will also be revising their exam texts, with appropriate guidance and resources, developing their own ability to shape an analytical argument and evaluate the achievements of the writers they have studied. All the skills developed through this course, and the rich knowledge of the wide literary canon will aid students in the study of a University degree.
Documents
| English LTP | Download |
