Over summer I read Alex Quigley’s ‘Closing the Vocabulary Gap’. It has really hit me how the quality of a student’s vocabulary can be indicative of not only what they learn, but what they can access, and how they can respond both verbally and in written work.

After my return to school, I think two more aspects of vocabulary have hit me. The first is seeing the GCSE papers returning, and looking at grade 9 ones from last year, and thinking really hard about what separates a 30/30 response from a 23-25/30 response. I think it’s the vocabulary.

As an examiner myself, I’m not suggesting that the words a student uses can dupe the examiner into thinking they’re more intelligent. And actually, whilst I teach a lot of vocabulary to students, it is only the ones who actively work to apply that vocabulary that can use it seamlessly. I think…

I have said in previous blogs that this is not an academic, research-based approach to blogging. I read a lot of these types of articles, and a lot of books, but I am not the type to type up my own scientific response to these ideas. I won’t be providing a series of detailed references, or any links to back up why I do this. But one thing I can say, is I firmly believe testing works.

By testing, I obviously mean low stakes recall tasks which force students to bring information out of their long term memory, or in same cases, fill in the blanks in that memory. I don’t mean long, summative, extended tasks which require the teacher to provide feedback. I mean activities which are marked by the student themselves, thus allowing them to know what they know, but – more importantly – to know what they…

It appears that paper 2 of the new English Language GCSE from AQA is the greater of two new evils. Many teachers dislike the paper. But with the exception of the 19th century text, it really is a blessing. Honestly. Firstly, it has the most common trends with the old language GCSE. It offers non-fiction texts, which we are used to applying skills of summary and analysis to. It allows students to present their own viewpoint on a subject, and everyone knows teenagers have opinions. It offers a language question with an identical mark scheme to paper 1, allowing students to build on analysis of a short extract to selecting language across a whole source, and offering students an extra 4 marks for doing so. It has a question where students have to literally shade the boxes of statements which are true. So really, the problems lie with questions 2 and…

When the changes to GCSE English Literature were announced, I was outraged. Relatively new to teaching, caught up in the wave of Gove-hatred which I felt was the accepted way to feel, I was indignant about the announced alterations. But, I am not ignorant. I am open to change.

With my year 11s last year I ensured they knew the poems and key texts well enough that they could plan a rough answer without searching through the text. I guess my mindset was that I was doing it with year 10, so why not year 11? And I think their analysis became all the better for it; they were able to adapt quotations, develop their analysis, become more flexible with their understanding of character and theme presentation. It wasn’t necessarily a bad thing. And when a far more experienced and wiser teacher than myself told me that the students not…