1. ‘The Sign of Four’ The Statement of the Case
Learning Objective
Should: Read and understand Chapter 3 of ‘The Sign of Four’
Could: Understand what Victorian London was like.
Might: Begin to understand how Doyle uses language for effect and how to write about it.

2. This lesson you will need…

3. Starter (10 mins) Write down 10 things that you learn about Victorian London from these extracts
London in the era of Queen Victoria was a fascinating place to live. Flickering gas lamps lit the squalid streets, casting eerie shadows. Horse drawn carriages clattered along, carrying the wealthy and well to do. Crime was rife in the slums of London. Prostitution, drug abuse and murder were commonplace. There was much poverty and ill health; poor people lived in cramped, dirty and squalid conditions. Smog caused by the factories weighed heavily on the city, creating a dark, dreary place.
Victorian London was the largest city in the world for much the era. Its population grew from about 1 million people in 1800, to about 6.7 million in 1900 although many of the city’s residents lived in poverty. Many of London’s most famous buildings and landmarks were built during the 19th century, including Trafalgar Square, the Houses of Parliament, Tower Bridge and Victoria Station and the first lines on the London Underground were constructed in Victorian London was well known for its fog, which was often extremely thick. Because it had a slight green colour to it, the fog was often known as a pea-souper. Apparently, people regularly walked into the River Thames because they couldn’t see where they were going.

4. Techniques authors use
Copy and complete this table adding in definitions for the techniques authors use in their writing to create meaning.
Technique
Definition
Effect – why writers use this technique
Groups of effective adjectives
Alliteration
Personification
Effective use of verbs
Simile
Emotive vocabulary
Listing
Repetition
Pathetic fallacy

5. Chapter 3 In Quest of a Solution
As we continue to read make sure you:
Listen carefully
Use your glossary to check any key words as we go along
Put your hand up and ask if there are any extra words we need to add to our glossary
Read to: “He held his open note-book upon his knee, and from time to time he jotted down figures and memoranda in the light of his pocket lantern”

6. Techniques authors use
"It was a September evening, and not yet seven o'clock, but the day had been a dreary one, and a dense drizzly fog lay low upon the great city. Mud-colored clouds drooped sadly over the muddy streets. Down the Strand the lamps were but misty splotches of diffused light which threw a feeble circular glimmer upon the slimy pavement. The yellow glare from the shop-windows streamed out into the steamy, vaporous air, and threw a murky, shifting radiance across the crowded thoroughfare. There was, to my mind, something eerie and ghost-like in the endless procession of faces which flitted across these narrow bars of light,—sad faces and glad, haggard and merry. Like all human kind, they flitted from the gloom into the light, and so back into the gloom once more"
AO1 – Read, understand and respond to texts
AO2 – Analyse the language form and structure, used by a writer to create meanings and effects, using relevant subject terminology where appropriate
AO3 – Show understanding of the texts and the contexts in which they were written
Techniques author’s use.

7. Techniques authors use
Think about Victorian London and what Doyle was saying it was like.
Techniques authors use
Read your quote carefully.
Annotate on the sheet EVERYTHING you could comment on within that quote.
In a different colour annotate the effect of that technique:
why has Doyle used that technique?
what is the exact effect created by it at this point in the novel?
Be prepared to feedback your group’s ideas back to the class

10. “It was a September evening, and not yet seven o'clock, but the day had been a dreary one, and a dense drizzly fog lay low upon the great city.”

11. “Mud-colored clouds drooped sadly over the muddy streets.”

12. “Down the Strand the lamps were but misty splotches of diffused light which threw a feeble circular glimmer upon the slimy pavement.”

13. “The yellow glare from the shop-windows streamed out into the steamy, vaporous air, and threw a murky, shifting radiance across the crowded thoroughfare.”

14. “There was, to my mind, something eerie and ghost-like in the endless procession of faces which flitted across these narrow bars of light,—sad faces and glad, haggard and merry.”

15. “Like all human kind, they flitted from the gloom into the light, and so back into the gloom once more."

16. Chapter 3 In Quest of a Solution
As we continue to read make sure you:
Listen carefully
Use your glossary to check any key words as we go along
Put your hand up and ask if there are any extra words we need to add to our glossary
Read to the end of the chapter.

17. More on this next lesson
Plenary
A tweet must be completed in 120 characters.
Summarise your learning from today’s lesson on the techniques authors use in one tweet. Can you include a hashtag?
More on this next lesson

18. Homework Should: Complete chapter summaries for each of
Go on!
Challenge yourself.
Homework
Should: Complete chapter summaries for each of
the chapters we have read so far.
Could: Add some quotes to each chapter summary that are important for that chapter.
Might: Read the first three chapters again – can you add any more detail to your summaries based on your second reading and the work we have done so far?

19. ‘The Sign of Four’ The Statement of the Case
Learning Objective
Should: Read and understand Chapter 3 of ‘The Sign of Four’
Could: Understand what Victorian London was like.
Might: Begin to understand how Doyle uses language for effect and how to write about it.