​Who we are

Mr A. Easton
Mrs H. Bavin
Mrs N. Broomhall
Ms S. Jafferi
Mr A. Meek
Ms N. Tank
 
About English
The English Department is passionate about sharing the best stories, poetry and plays with the Kings’ students. We want to give our young people a love of language that they can use to unleash their ideas and imaginations upon the world. Our great desire is for English classes to be as engaging and enjoyable as possible so that our students not only gain the skills to pass exams and to succeed as citizens but also have some fun along the way.
 
KS3

Students in KS3 study a varied curriculum in preparation for the expectations at GCSE.

• In Years 7-8, all students take part in the Accelerated Reader programme designed to boost their comprehension and encourage them to read as widely as possible.
• A range of novels are studied such as The Boy in Striped Pyjamas, Harry Potter and The Chamber of Secrets, Private Peaceful, Stone Cold, Of Mice and Men, A Roald Dahl Selection.
• Students read and perform plays such as Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream and Romeo and Juliet.
• There are creative projects such as writing stories in a particular genre, inventing a theme park and marketing a brand new car.
• Our young people experience a range of poetry and learn it off by heart for an annual poetry speaking “Oscar”.
• Visits and extra-curricular activities enhance learning such as trips to The Harry Potter Studios, the theatre and Stratford upon Avon; there are also visiting theatre groups and we run both a creative writers’ workshop and a book club for our many gifted students.

 
GCSE
 
Examination Board: Edexcel
 
Course Outline:
 
English is an integrated course leading to 2 GCSE qualifications: English Language and English Literature. Taught over 5 lessons a week by a well-staffed and experienced department, we not only aim for students to fulfil their potential in the subject but to lay the necessary foundations for success in other subjects and throughout life.
 
The course involves the study of a range of non-fiction texts and a variety of novels, plays, and poetry including that from the English literary heritage.
 
Exams are taken at the end of the course.
 
Summary of Assessment
 
English Language Edexcel (1EN0)
 
Paper 1: Fiction and Imaginative Writing
External examination – 40%
Paper 2:  Non-Fiction and Transactional Writing
External Examination– 60 %
 
Non-Examination Assessment: Spoken Language. Students will be awarded a pass, merit or distinction for this element and it will be reported on their exam certificate.
Year 10
 

• Transactional Writing-Pop Festival Unit
• Unseen reading (non-fiction and Literary
  non-fiction)
• Non-fiction and literary non-fiction text comparison
• 19th-century unseen fiction reading-Frankenstein/Dracula extracts/
  Edgar Allen Poe
• Imaginative writing based on gothic stories-generation and organisation of ideas

Year 11
 

• Reading unseen non-fiction texts
• Writing skills-practise how to plan/develop ideas, use of rhetorical devices, variety of sentence structures, punctuation, “mining” reading material for good vocabulary.
• Final Spoken Language assessments filmed/recorded
• Revision

 
English Literature Edexcel (1ET0)
 
Paper 1:
Shakespeare and the Post-1914 Literature
External examination 50%
Paper 2:  19th Century Novel and Poetry since 1789
External examination 50%
 
Texts to be studied likely to include “Macbeth”, “An Inspector Calls”, “A Christmas Carol”, “Pride and Prejudice”, “A Woman in Black” and an anthology of poems on the theme “Conflict”.

 

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