UK education system

  • Teaching 1984 in the surveillance culture of schools

    Teaching Orwell’s “1984” as a set text in an examination-obsessed and heavily surveilled school system.

  • The Turn of the Screw: The Study Guide Edition

    This edition of Henry James’s haunting narrative contains a comprehensive study guide as well as activities that stimulate and engage. Aimed specifically at pupils reading the book as an exam text, there are detailed instructions about how to understand the challenging language, to appreciate the novel’s contexts and to write effective essays.

  • Brontë’s Wuthering Heights: The Study Guide Edition

    Aimed specifically at pupils reading the book for exams. The complete text is punctuated by analysis and questions on every chapter with answers provided at the back. Essential reading for all students and teachers!

  • Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein: The Study Guide Edition

    This edition of Shelley’s classic horror novel contains a comprehensive study guide, as well as extensive questions for students to help their understanding. Buy the paperback, and you get the e-book for free, so you can use the embedded web links.

  • Austen’s Pride and Prejudice: The Study Guide Edition

    Aimed specifically at students and teachers reading the book as an exam text, with a detailed introduction that outlines the historical context of the novel, the ways in which it was influenced by the other genres/writers and how it is structured.

  • Analysis and Study Guide: Dr Jekyll & Mr Hyde

    This brilliant edition of Stevenson’s novel may be the answer to your prayers. Written by an experienced teacher and best-selling author, this version is aimed at students who must analyse the text in depth or teachers wanting to deliver outstanding lessons on it.

  • My blogs, YouTube, Soundcloud and Twitter channels…

    Together with a number of other eminent journalists and educationalists, I co-founded and help run the popular educational blog, Local Schools Network. I also blog for Mumsnet on Tales Behind The Classroom Door. My YouTube channel is Wonderfrancis. My Soundcloud Channel is Electric Schubert. I am @wonderfrancis on Twitter. Other blogs: A Streetcar Named Desire for […]

  • Good links for Wilfred Owen’s poetry

    http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/worldwars/wwone/wilfred_owen_gallery.shtml http://www.bbc.co.uk/shropshire/content/articles/2005/03/16/wilfred_owen.shtml

  • Proof that GCSE are more rigorous than O Levels?

    I spent an interesting morning at Television Centre today, appearing on Broadcasting House, the Sunday morning magazine show hosted by the affable Paddy O’Connell. Taking a light-hearted look at the current O Level and GCSE debate, he sat an English O Level question and a GCSE one; they were both ‘writing’ or composition questions. As a […]

  • Academics and teachers, have you met?

    Reform would be smoother and more effective if you worked together, says Francis Gilbert Earlier this month, education secretary Michael Gove said that top academics should reform our A-level system, implying that only the elite Russell Group universities can stop the chronic “dumbing down” going on in our sixth forms. His announcement was on top […]

  • Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, my YouTube Videos on Stevenson’s novel

  • My YouTube videos which explain Wilfred Owen’s Exposure and Spring Offensive

    A blog post containing various videos I made some time ago explaining Wilfred Owen’s poem ‘Exposure’ to my pupils in secondary school, studying it for GCSE.

  • Wilfred Owen’s poetry — a Prezi with links to YouTube explanations of the poems

    Wilfred Owen’s poetry and life on Prezi

  • Louisa Young on her novel about the First World War.

    Louisa Young is the author of the powerful novel, My Dear, I Wanted To Tell You, which is about a soldier who is horribly disfigured during the First World War. This is the video that the publishers made about the book:   This is her explanation of how she came to write the book:

  • The government is wrong to devalue vocational qualifications

    Vocational courses help students develop key skills employers are crying out for. League tables should reflect this The government’s decision to drastically downgrade the value of vocational qualificationsis deeply troubling for teachers like me, and must be sending many schools and colleges into a tailspin of despair. At the moment over half a million teenagers are […]

  • The Machine Gunners — Teaching Activities, links and videos

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qaul5qhenY0 BBC Schools Radio has produced an excellent scheme of work on The Machine Gunners, which can be accessed here.

  • Dream of a lost friend by Carol Ann Duffy

    Dream of a lost friend

  • Using personal experience to improve your writing

    Using personal experience to improve on Prezi

  • Should climate change be dropped from the national curriculum?

    was shocked to read today that climate change may be dropped from the national curriculum. As a teacher in various state schools for 20 years, I’ve seen how much the education on this issue has really improved in the past decade and how everyone has benefited from it being a prescribed part of the curriculum. […]

  • An introduction to A2 Media Studies OCR, Collective Identity

      Task: Devise your own Prezi which explores all the groups you feel a part of and which ones you feel define you, and which definitely do NOT. My collective identities on Prezi