Lockdown (not) Literature 13

Hello Y10,

Thanks to those of you who have sent essays. I’ll be sending feedback as soon as I can – hopefully in the next few days. Don’t worry if you’re a bit behind schedule – as long as you get it done.

At the end of this post, you’ll find some results of the survey from last week and my answers to some of your questions. Make sure you have a look.

In the last two weeks, we’re focusing on planning your spoken language task, which takes the form of a speech or presentation. We’ll break this into two parts: Week 1 (Brainstorming & Planning) and Week 2 (Writing & Preparing).

In the end, you’ll be speaking for around 5-7 minutes before taking questions. Your presentation overall should be no more than 10 minutes.

Here’s your work for this week:

1) Answer the questions on this brief questionnaire.

2) Familiarise yourself with the mark scheme. Please note, achieving a MERIT or DISTINCTION grade depends on setting yourself a challenging task and being organised and effective in delivering your speech.

3) Get some inspiration and some advice from great speakers. Here are some clips to help you:

• The Speech That Made Obama President
• Obama’s acceptance speech: Yes We Can
• Gender Equality: Emma Watson at the UN
• Michelle Obama on Donald Trump
• Martin Luther King: I have a dream
• Susan Cain: The Power of Introverts

This last speech is particularly useful viewing. We are a quiet class, and I’m guessing that there are a fair few of you who would describe yourselves as introverts (not sure if you are an introvert? Take this quiz to find out!) Susan Cain’s book, ‘Quiet’, is all about how to make the most of your life as an introvert ‘in a world that can’t stop talking’. She used to get terrified by public speaking, but now does it regularly – and the TED talk above has been viewed 10 million times. Check out this advice if the idea of doing a speech on your own fills you with horror.

4) Decide on a purpose for your speech and brainstorm ideas. 

Are you going to inform the class about something that you know a lot about or that you care about?

Or are you going to persuade us about something or make an argument?

Either of these ideas can work well. Consider these possibilities…
 

INFORM:

• You could tell us about something that you are already an expert in.
• You could research a topic which you think is important and try to raise awareness about it.
• You could present a humorous or light-hearted story from your life.
• You could tell us about something deeply personal and important in your life that maybe other people don’t fully understand about you.

Here’s an actual example of a student’s speech on dyslexia which has been posted to YouTube.

Ideas for topics from previous years:

• Climate change
• Deforestation
• The Golden Age of Drag
• Selective Mutism (I had a student who spoke brilliantly about how she wouldn’t/couldn’t speak when she was in primary school. It was amazing.)
• Dyslexia (I had a student explain what it is like to be dyslexic. I’ve had teacher training on this before, but this student explained it so much more effectively than anybody else I’d heard before.)
• Cystic Fibrosis
• America’s Gun Problem: The shocking facts…
• Is Paul McCartney my grandad? The evidence…   (This was amazing. I was genuinely convinced by the end, although it was done in a half-jokey way)
• Flat Earth Theory – why do people believe it?
• The History of Barbie
• The Manchester Arena Bombing (I had a student who was present at the Ariana Grande concert in 2017 talk to us about her experiences)

PERSUADE/ARGUE:

• You could research an issue and persuade your audience to help/donate/take it more seriously.
• You could do a Room 101-style rant about your pet hates, persuading the audience to abolish them forever.
• You could persuade us to try something you love – or to give something a go. It might be a movie series, or book, a sport… anything.
• You could tell us what you’d change to improve life in the 21^st century.

The good thing about speaking to persuade/argue is that you can employ the things you’ve learnt about rhetoric (remember the Nuclear Weapons argument?) and you can go completely over the top – either seriously or for comedic effect.

For some inspiration, check out David Mitchell’s series of mini-rants (David Mitchell’s Soapbox) or look at the articles of Charlie Brooker.

Ideas for topics from previous years:

• Why we should abolish the monarchy
• It’s time to change our habits to combat climate change
• Why you should go Vegan.
• Don’t call us ‘Generation Snowflake’!
• Why everybody should play a musical instrument
• Why weddings are over-the-top
• Why I believe we’re living in a dystopia
• Why the arts must be protected in schools

Choosing your topic/purpose. Some guidance:

• Don’t be boring. Don’t be obvious.
• Don’t be afraid of controversy. Choosing a controversial topic can raise the level of challenge and improve your chances of achieving a distinction.
• Ask yourself: is your information/argument needed? Don’t try to persuade us of something we already agree with (e.g. that racism/sexism is bad – if you want to tackle those kinds of topics, you need to think carefully about what you want to say and what you want to achieve). Always ask yourself: what am I trying to do?
• Think about what’s topical. What’s in the news? Coronavirus, lockdown, Black Lives Matter, issues around feminism/trans rights etc. These could all provide interesting topics.
• Is your topic the right size? When you’ve brainstormed ideas, you might find you have too much or too little to say. That’s easily fixed!

• If you have too much to say, too many ideas, focus on one aspect and narrow the focus of your speech. For instance, you might decide to speak about the gender-pay gap and find you’ve got too much to say. So you could focus it on one area – for example, the gender pay gap in football.
• If you have too little to say, make your idea just one part of a wider speech. For instance, you might decide to speak about something you would change to make life better in the 21^st century and come up with a good idea, but it’s not quite enough. In that case, choose three different ideas and turn your original idea into just one paragraph of your speech.

5) Once you have chosen an idea, fill out this planning sheet.

• You’ll need to come up with an introduction which catches our attention (don’t just say what your speech is about – save that for the end of the intro!)
• You’ll need three main arguments or reasons or points.
• You’ll need a strong conclusion and a clear sense of how you end the speech and get across a clear final message to the audience.

When you’ve completed your plan, share it with me so I can give you some advice.

OPTIONAL:

If you feel ready, feel free to start writing/drafting. You can always re-draft/tweak in response to my advice next week.

That will do for now. Next week, we’ll focus on writing skills, we’ll recap what we’ve learnt about rhetoric and the art of persuading and influencing audiences with words, and we’ll get writing. Then all you’ll have to do is create prompt cards and practice/learn the thing!

As ever, if you have any questions, please get in touch.

Mr M

P.S. Thanks for taking part in my poll/survey last week. I should have done it much earlier. The results were quite encouraging and positive:

And finally, some answers to your questions:

Are we going to go through things we have learnt in lockdown when we go back? Or will we just carry on as normal ?

We will have to go straight into Macbeth at the start of Year 11. There will still be quizzing on Y10 texts. After Christmas, probably at some point in January, we’ll start revising for the exams, so there will be plenty of time to revisit Great Expectations. Despite all the weirdness, we’re still in a good position to finish the course as normal. And you’re still as well prepared as anybody. I’m confident!

Will exams be as normal or will they be easier than normal?

They will be normal.

Is the English exam going to be hard?

You have four exams. Some are harder than others. But you’ll be ready. Year 11s are always quite upbeat by the end of the course, I find.

Will we need a copy of Macbeth? When? Is it a good idea to look at it in advance?

You will need a copy of Macbeth to annotate in September. These copies tend to be popular:

• CGP Macbeth – The Complete Play (don’t get it confused with the similar-looking study guide)
• Cambridge School Shakespeare (the ones we have in school)
• Oxford School Shakespeare (this looks okay, but the Amazon reviews suggest some people were sent the wrong one and it may have been mislabelled)
• Collins Classroom Classics (cheap and cheerful, with good notes alongside the text)

Ideally, you want space to annotate and helpful notes alongside the text. This one is okay but you have to flip to the back to find the notes.

Any questions about Macbeth texts, ask!

I'm really concerned about GCSEs next year... it feels like we've been out of school for too long to get decent grades in the exams :(

Nope. I’m confident. We haven’t missed anything, we’ve still got plenty of time and we’ll have plenty of revision time in class before the exams.

Any advice on how to write everything you want in an essay without running out of time?

You can’t write everything you want. You’ll have to accept that. One of the things we have to practice next year is making decisions about what to include and what to leave out. It’s not about writing all of your relevant ideas. It’s about choosing the best ones and writing about them well. This is what we’ll be doing in the second half of Year 11.

That’s all. If any other questions occur to you, please email me.

Mr M