As you’ll have gathered from my previous posts, I’m all for slow writing. It makes for thoughtfully-composed narratives and descriptions. However, when all is said and done, only 45 minutes are available to write a story in an exam, and this includes planning and proof-reading. If your teen is in year 10 or 11 and has […]
5 STORY WRITING ‘HACKS’ YOUR TEEN CAN USE TO CRACK CREATIVE WRITING Read More »
As part of world book day, the public has voted on their favourite stories to share for teens. Interestingly, several of the books are GCSE set texts, or commonly feature in the KS3 curriculum. Below, I share my thoughts on why I think these books are great and how they can benefit your teen. Of Mice
WHY YOUR TEEN SHOULD READ THESE BOOKS Read More »
I’ve recently started tutoring a student who works incredibly hard between her GCSE English lessons. She reads around a particular text or topic without even being told to. She is completely focused on attaining the very highest grades. The trouble is, that when she came to writing an essay (on Macbeth), her thoughts were exceedingly
WHY YOUR TEEN’S ESSAYS MIGHT NOT BE GETTING TOP MARKS Read More »
A student shouldn’t try to attempt all these steps at once: they’ll need to re-read sections of the poem and backtrack a few times before they have a detailed annotation. I’d recommend colour-coding to ensure clarity. Here’s a copy of The Soldier by Rupert Brooke that I’ve annotated to give you an idea of the
HOW TO PLAN A GCSE ENGLISH POETRY COMPARISON ESSAY Read More »
Did you know that there is one skill that GCSE English students can use with all language and literature texts that will make a huge difference to their final grade? Its … drumroll please … learning how to annotate! Why is annotation necessary? Now, I know it’s difficult for you to believe, but a teenager
THE KEY SKILL THAT YOUR TEEN NEEDS TO SUCCEED IN ENGLISH Read More »
