English
Mrs Simcoe - Director of English
Welcome to the English Department where a broad, engaging and diverse curriculum awaits, that challenges all students. Our curriculum is designed to inspire and support students to be the best that they can be allowing them to fulfil their potential and become informed and confident communicators. Our curriculum is structured to foster a love of Literature and reading as well as to encourage creativity and confident communicators.
Throughout each academic year, we aim to broaden the horizons of our students; our objective is to enhance students’ knowledge and understanding of the world through the study of a range of literature and non-fiction texts.
The curriculum structure will allow for students to build on previous learning each year and ensures that new knowledge is relevant, challenging and engaging. We have a large team of subject specialist leaders, teachers and teaching assistants to ensure that no student gets left behind.
As a faculty, we intend to ensure equal and aspirational futures for all by having high expectations in all areas. We will strive for quality first teaching, which includes well planned lessons showing differentiation and success criteria which all pupils can achieve. Progress of groups is tracked carefully, and levels of intervention to plug gaps in knowledge is rigorous. We also intend to develop opportunities for extra-curricular activities.
Our rigorous QA cycle means that the progress of all groups will be tracked carefully, and levels of intervention put in place to plug any gaps in knowledge.
Expert subject knowledge delivered by English specialists will ensure that our curriculum develops pupils’ skills from KS2 to KS4, as well as inspiring a love of learning. Timely and challenging assessments will be embedded into our curriculum plans. We will develop an interleaved prep programme to consolidate key knowledge.
We intend to enable young people to develop character and make meaningful contributions to the community by enabling our pupils to become good communicators; developing skills of reading, writing and speaking and listening through our programmes of study. We will teach our pupils how to present balanced arguments and justify their responses. We will challenge misconceptions through choices of text. We will also uphold British cultural values throughout our programmes of study.
As our pupils leave Park, we envisage that they will be successful communicators who have achieved the very best that they can in our curriculum area. In turn, they will be able to access the next stage of their lives.
Key Stage 3
Throughout Key Stage 3 students will be taught a curriculum that is Literature based and takes them on a journey through time beginning with Greek Mythology and stories from the Bible right through to modern times and beyond. English Language written tasks, as well as non-fiction texts, are interweaved throughout the curriculum and based around the Literature texts and topics that they are studying at the time.
Year 7 will begin by drawing upon topics covered at KS2, where students will begin with a unit of work on 'Me, Myself and I,' where students will study a range of biographies and autobiographies whilst considering their own identity. They will then move onto applying their knowledge of morphology and etymology from KS2 whilst studying Greek Myths and Legends. The remainder of Year 7 will focus on building reading and writing skills whilst studying a range of character types through various literature texts, including poetry and Shakespeare.
Year 8 will draw upon their knowledge from Year 7 and will study a Brave New World of Literature. They will start by building their reading skills through studying a breadth of literature from the Romantic period, and then getting their creative juices flowing through the study of some gothic literature. They then move through to Victorian times, studying how major historical events affected writers and how their views are expressed through Literature. Towards the end of the year, students will build on previous knowledge through studying Shakespeare’s Macbeth.
In Year 9, students will be exposed to Literature through a critical lens. They will be shown a Modern World of Literature and exposed to cultural diversity, identity and societal issues. They will draw upon their knowledge of Literature used as a tool in Year 8 as well as modern day issues such as climate change, refugees, and war to enhance understanding. This will feed into the study of An Inspector Calls in the summer term.
Key Stage 4
At Key Stage 4 all students follow the Eduqas specification for both GCSE English Language and English Literature, which will be introduced in the latter part of Year 9 but will be taught and assessed throughout Year 10 and 11.
Students will be taught a number of set texts for GCSE English Literature including Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet, an anthology of 18 poems, JB Priestley’, An Inspector Calls and Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol.
Year 10
Year 11:
Year 11 follow an interleaving programme of study that consolidates all knowledge and understanding from Year 10. They will focus on applying this knowledge and practising exam skills. They will cover all key events, characters and themes from all literature texts studied and will also consolidate skills in all areas.