1. How to support children to approach the English Language GCSE AQA

2. English Language Specification and Exam Papers

3. Assessment Objectives

4. Long Term Plan – Year to 2019
Year Group
Autumn 1
Autumn 2
Spring 1
Spring 2
Summer 1 11
Paper 2 Section A and B Non-Fiction– Accounts of Famous Events (19th and 20th century texts)
Paper 1 Section A and B Fiction – (20th and 21st century texts) Appearance and Reality
Paper 2 Section A and B Non-Fiction – (19th and 20th century) Conflict Natural Events
Paper 1 Section A and B - Exam Extract Based
Paper 2 Section A and B - Exam Extract Based
GCSE EXAMS
Bespoke Revision

5. Information on the course
For GCSE English Language students should: • read fluently, and with good understanding, a wide range of texts from the 19th, 20th and 21st centuries, including literature and literary non-fiction as well as other writing such as reviews and journalism • read and evaluate texts critically and make comparisons between texts • summarise and synthesise information or ideas from texts • use knowledge gained from wide reading to inform and improve their own writing • write effectively and coherently using Standard English appropriately • use grammar correctly and punctuate and spell accurately • acquire and apply a wide vocabulary, alongside a knowledge and understanding of grammatical terminology, and linguistic conventions for reading, writing and spoken language • listen to and understand spoken language and use spoken Standard English effectively. GCSE English Language is designed on the basis that students should read and be assessed on high- quality, challenging texts from the 19th, 20th and 21st centuries. Each text studied must represent a substantial piece of writing, making significant demands on students in terms of content, structure and the quality of language. The texts, across a range of genres and types, should support students in developing their own writing by providing effective models. The texts must include literature and extended literary non-fiction, and other writing such as essays, reviews and journalism (both printed and online). Texts that are essentially transient, such as instant news feeds, must not be included. The number and types of texts, and their length, are not prescribed.

6. Revision benefits:
Reinforces what they have learnt.
Identifies weak points and problems areas.
Helps them gain a solid understanding of the subject.
Bolsters exam confidence.
It is also important to not leave revision to the last minute. The earlier your child starts their GCSE revision, the better. Many students underestimate the time needed for proper revision; this adds more stress and anxiety to the situation because they begin to overextend themselves to make up for the lack of time.
Here is a simple way to work out the least amount of revision time needed: For one GCSE subject, allow 1 hour of revision per topic. Therefore, the least amount of revision time needed for one subject is “1 hour X total number of topics”. If a subject covers 50 topics, then that subject would require at least 50 hours of revision time. If your child is doing 8 subjects, he/she would need at least 400 hours of studying. Then, set aside 3 hours every day for revision. Your son/daughter will therefore need to start revising at least 5 months before the GCSE exams to cover all topics.
Do this exercise with your child to let them appreciate the number of hours it will take to revise their subjects and understand why it will benefit them to begin GCSE revision at the earliest possible time. 

7. Revision in the Home Environment
Most revising will be done at home; having a good environment while studying will help your child stay focused. Ensure that they have a quiet and private place in the home to revise. A simple desk and chair in their room can suffice. Or it can even be at the dining table. Whatever space it is, make it their private zone at revision time and keep the distractions to a minimum. If there are other siblings in the house, ensure that they respect the revision time of the sibling doing their GSCEs. Keep the television turned down, no loud music and certainly no arguments. To show solidarity, you can make this a quite period for the entire family – reading books or having other children study too.
You will also need to equip your child with the proper revision instruments. Here is a list:
Stationery – pens (GCSE examiners prefer black), pencils, rubbers, sharpeners, rulers, and highlighters
Special tools for certain subjects e.g. a compass, protractor and calculator for Mathematics
Time keeper – watch, clock and alarm clock
Access to a computer with internet
Printer with paper
Dictionary
Textbooks
Online GCSE Revision access
GCSE exam past papers
Post it notes
Pin board
Note cards
Notebooks
Files and folders
Personal Organiser or daily journal
Calendar

8. How to support your child
Have an open door policy where they can talk to you at anytime. Listen to their concerns. Let them talk freely about their issues and struggles. Take their minds off GCSE for a moment by taking them out, letting them do the things that they enjoy or cooking their favourite meals. Reassure them that you love them unconditionally.
Here are some more tips to help minimise your child’s anxiety:
Always encourage your child to ask for help at school on any parts of their work they do not understand.
Be positive even if they aren’t.
Stay supportive.
End every conversation on a good note.
Cut back on their chores to afford them sufficient study time.
Offer praise and treats when they have reached revision milestones.
Have regular one and one conversations. Let your child talk more than you and be attentive.
Regularly inquire if they need anything of you.

10. GCSE Revision Styles and Methods
Revision boils down to personal preference – what works best for the individual. It is not just about reading a textbook. There are many interesting revision methods your child can include in their daily routine. People learn in different ways and revision methods should reflect their preference.
You’ve watched your son/daughter grow up and know their personality. This would give you an idea of what type of learner he/she is. Below are the three main types of learners. You and your child can determine which group he/she belongs to and guide them to the best revision methods to suit.
Visual learners: they learn better by sight; by seeing and observing. They prefer:
Images
Drawings
Diagrams
Charts
Graphs
Colour
Best revision tools: cue cards, timelines, notes on a pin board, colour coded revision notes, mind maps, creating drawing of topics, practice diagram labelling, highlighting and annotating important keywords, facts and definitions.
Auditory learners: they learn better by hearing the information. They prefer:
Watching and listening to lectures and lessons
Hearing explanations and answers
Listening to recorded notes
Talking out loud to themselves or to other people about the topics

11. GCSE Revision Styles and Methods
Best revision tools – reading the notes out loud, watching and listening to videos and podcasts, recording their own notes and playing it back, discussions with study group, discussion with parents about a topic, and making a song or rhyme about the revision notes.
Kinaesthetic learners: they learn better with practical and hands-on experience. They prefer:
Writing things down
Creating models and diagrams
Being active while studying
Explanations with real life examples
Best revision tools – writing revision notes over and over, creating revision flash cards, taking walks and talking about the topics, study group discussions, revising with real life examples e.g. when revising force = mass X acceleration they can picture an object falling off a tall building, using mnemonics, and taking part in activities that involve the subject such as visiting a coastal area for the Geography topic Coastal Landscapes.
If these revision tools are unfamiliar to you, a simple online search will provide you with all the information you need to understand them.

12. The Revision Power Hour
This is what the revision power hour does for you:
Forces you to balance the time between learning the content and practicing your exam technique
Stops you from spending too long in one sitting on revision techniques that don't work. You mix up your activities to make it more likely you'll remember stuff when you've finished your revision session.
You don't have to revise for too long. It's a maximum of one hour, but you can break it down into 20 minute chunks with 5 minute breaks between each session. (Although you can extend it for essay based subjects like English Literature).
You're forced to use an active revision technique: writing down what you know and analysing your work to see how many marks you've earned.
In addition to these benefits the revision power hour:
Encourages you to get feedback from your teacher about the things you're struggling with
Helps you to think about how you can continuously improve to raise your grade
Makes you repeat the things you're learning in different ways so you're more likely to remember them.

13. Metacognitive Strategies
Metacognitive strategies refers to methods used to help students understand the way they learn; in other words, it means processes designed for students to ‘think’ about their ‘thinking’. As students become aware of how they learn, they will use these processes to efficiently acquire new information, and consequently, become more of an independent thinker.

14. Metacognitive Strategies
Think Aloud
Great for reading comprehension and problem solving. Think-alouds help students to consciously monitor and reflect upon what they are learning. This strategy works well when teachers read a story or problem out loud and periodically stop to verbalize their thoughts. This allows students to follow the teacher’s thinking process, which gives them the foundation they need for creating their own strategies and processes that can be useful for understanding what they are trying to comprehend.
Checklist, Rubrics and Organisers
Great for solving word problems. These organisational tools support students in the decision-making process because they serve as an aid for planning and self-evaluation. Typically they ask what students know and need to know to arrive at an answer, and emphasize the need to reread the problem and self-check responses. (Rubrics a scoring guide used to evaluate the quality of students' constructed responses". Rubrics usually contain evaluative criteria, quality definitions for those criteria at particular levels of achievement, and a scoring strategy. )
Explicit Teacher Modelling
Explicit teacher modelling helps students understand what is expected of them through a clear example/model of a skill or concept. When a teacher provides a easy to follow procedure for solving a problem, students have a memorable strategy to use for approaching a problem on their own.
Reading Comprehension
Truly comprehending reading involves students actively engaging with a text and accurately deciphering the layers of meaning. It is very important for students to develop solid reading comprehension skills because statistics show that people who have low reading comprehension ability suffer in academic, professional, and personal pursuits.

15. Thinking Aloud/Checklist
Chapter 1 - (from the opening of Nineteen Eighty Four by George Orwell) It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen. Winston Smith, his chin nuzzled into his breast in an effort to escape the vile wind, slipped quickly through the glass doors of Victory Mansions, though not quickly enough to prevent a swirl of gritty dust from entering along with him. The hallway smelt of boiled cabbage and old rag mats. At one end of it a coloured poster, too large for indoor display, had been tacked to the wall. It depicted simply an enormous face, more than a metre wide: the face of a man of about forty-five, with a heavy black moustache and ruggedly handsome features. Winston made for the stairs. It was no use trying the lift. Even at the best of times it was seldom working, and at present the electric current was cut off during daylight hours. It was part of the economy drive in preparation for Hate Week. The flat was seven flights up, and Winston, who was thirty-nine and had a varicose ulcer above his right ankle, went slowly, resting several times on the way. On each landing, opposite the lift-shaft, the poster with the enormous face gazed from the wall. It was one of those pictures which are so contrived that the eyes follow you about when you move. BIG BROTHER IS WATCHING YOU, the caption beneath it ran. Inside the flat a fruity voice was reading out a list of figures which had something to do with the production of pig-iron. The voice came from an oblong metal plaque like a dulled mirror which formed part of the surface of the right-hand wall. Winston turned a switch and the voice sank somewhat, though the words were still distinguishable. The instrument (the telescreen, it was called) could be dimmed, but there was no way of shutting it off completely. He moved over to the window: a smallish, frail figure, the meagreness of his body merely emphasized by the blue overalls which were the uniform of the party. His hair was very fair, his face naturally sanguine, his skin roughened by coarse soap and blunt razor blades and the cold of the winter that had just ended.
WE DO
As a class, read and discuss what is taking place in the whole of the extract and identify whether it links to the predictions made in the DO NOW.

16. Modelling – PETAL/PETER STRUCTURE
Point – Produce a detailed point using the language of the question. Evidence – Select relevant evidence from the text which supports your point. Technique – Select and explore specific language or structural devices from the quote. Analysis –Provide at least two detailed inferences which show new knowledge from the writer’s use of craft. Link – Make links the effects of language use or reader impact.
YOU DO - Question 2
How does the writer use language to show the harsh world/environment Winston Smith inhabits?
You could include the writer’s choice of:
• words and phrases
• language features and techniques
• sentence forms.
[8 marks]
The writer uses language in a negative way to show the harsh world Winston inhabits when…The evidence…uses the (device) (word/phrase) to imply…It also indicates…This is effective as…

18. Shows detailed and perceptive understanding of language
Modelling
Marking Criteria
Shows detailed and perceptive understanding of language
Analyses the effects of the writer’s choices of language
Selects a range of judicious quotations
Uses sophisticated subject terminology accurately
WE DO – Peer assess model response
How does the writer use language to show the harsh world/environment Winston Smith inhabits?
The writer has presented a world of torment when describing the environment which surrounds Winston as he is exposed to a dark reality and only objects which highlight authority such as the ‘red’ posters are his only access to colour. The quote “the dark eyes looked deep into Winston’s own” uses a metaphor to indicate the severity of the harsh world as those lower in society are continuously reminded that they are watched and it can’t be avoided. The lexical use of ‘deep’ infers that Winston has been warned through intense and extreme reminders that those above are aware of his feelings and waiting to cause controversy. This is further supported by the abundant use of adjectives such as ‘dark’ ‘cold’ and ‘red’ as Winston has become subjected to a life of no ambition of sense of being. It is effective as the environment has shown to have a clear impact on the way that people are forced to live as conditions are deprived and ‘eyes’ are always watching, forcing people to live in a specific way.

19. Modelling – thought process Example Paper 2 Non-Fiction Task Pupils can use texts such as newspapers and magazine articles to identify examples of where each device has been used and interpret how it presents writer’s attitudes and thoughts.

20. PLAN (Can be used for Question 5 Paper 1 and 2 – Fiction and Non-Fiction)
Read the question below and identify the form, audience, purpose and tone for the task. Mind map ideas of what to put in your response.
“More funding is needed in schools to create the future sport stars of tomorrow and to ensure the nation’s health well-being”
Write a speech in which you persuade your head teacher of your viewpoint on funding for sports in schools. P1 P2 P3 P4 P5
Direct address
Alliteration/Anecdotes
Fact
Opinion
Rhetorical question/Repetition
Emotive language
Statistics
Triplets
Success Criteria
Content
Register is convincing and compelling for audience
Assuredly matched to purpose
Extensive and ambitious vocabulary with sustained crafting of linguistic devices
Organisation
Varied and inventive use of structural features
Writing is compelling, incorporating a range of convincing and complex ideas
Fluently linked paragraphs with seamlessly integrated discourse markers
Technical Accuracy
Sentence demarcation is consistently secure and consistently accurate
Wide range of punctuation is used with a high level of accuracy
Uses a full range of appropriate sentence forms for effect
Uses Standard English consistently and appropriately with secure control of complex grammatical structures
High level of accuracy in spelling, including ambitious vocabulary
Extensive and ambitious use of vocabulary

21. Knowledge Organisers
What are knowledge organisers?  They are a one page (sometimes double sided) document that has key terminology, vocabulary, exam approaches and content information for each of the GCSE units you will study on them. We have created these as a department to ensure that everything we want you to know and remember (without thinking about it) is on these documents.  What do I do with them?  You use them in lessons, at home and as part of your learning to ensure that you know the information on them automatically. We will focus in lessons on the information contained in the organisers and we will apply tasks to help you learn the information. Some suggested KO tasks will be uploaded below to help you revise using these as well.  Why do I need to learn this information?  If you know all this information before you go into the exams at the end of year 11 you have a better chance of being able to perform well. Knowing the core knowledge will allow your working memory to be freed up to focus on the task instead of worrying about what you can remember. If we have ensured that you have learnt this information to the best of your ability and it is stored in your long term memory, then you are going to be at an advantage when it comes to focusing on the tasks in the exams. 
The Knowledge Organisers are designed to help you learn a wide range of knowledge which in turn will mean you are more prepared for your lessons as well as the new style GCSEs that you will sit in the future.
To get the most out of your Knowledge Organiser, you should be learning sections and then self testing in your workbook.

22. Knowledge organiser tasks to test your knowledge
These are just some suggestions of things you can do to ensure you are learning this information Quiz with someone using the KO
Set up mini quizzes – very quick and easy feedback on knowledge – quizlet etc. are good for this
Create your own questions from the knowledge on the KO
Write a letter to a parent to explain what you absolutely must know in relation to (whichever KO you are studying KO).
Create KO bookmarks using the different sections
Create a visual presentation or poster using the information on the KO
Writing tasks – E.g. Write an acronym poem to explore the skills in the KO, or write about a time when you knew less about ________(insert topic)  than you do now and wow me with your current knowledge, or write a diary entry as character explaining all the things other characters have said and done using the information on the KO
Reading task – create a red herring information about the KO and get students to identify the herrings
Create flashcards using the information
Write the information in your own words
Create an information leaflet using the KO
Discuss the knowledge with a friend or a parent
Use the multiple choice quizzes to help you
Draw a picture or symbol to remember the quote/terminology or information on the KO

27. Other Revision Techniques
Read, Cover, Remember and Tell – using knowledge organisers for both Language Paper 1 and 2.

31. Extra Revision
Spelling Tests – most common misspelt words in knowledge planners
Reading a wider range of texts – pupils can use the library to access reading materials
Attending period 6 on a Thursday in B19 every week
Ask for extra Past Papers to complete – they can be downloaded on the AQA website
All pupils have been given an AQA language device glossary to enable them to identify the correct devices when analysing texts and responding to questions
Timed Responses with self-assessment