Opening Doors to Quality Writing E-Book

Bob Cox

• Herausgeber: Crown House Publishing
• Kategorie: Bildung
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2016

Beschreibung

In the course of his educational consultancy work, Bob has seen many teachers successfully use the scope and depth which literature can offer to inspire high standards, mastery learning and, above all, a love of language in its many forms. Schools using the 'opening doors' strategies told Bob they led to: More teacher empowerment and confidence. More knowledge building for pupils and teachers. A growing confidence with literature, including poetry. Planning from the top becoming a norm. Planning for mastery learning becoming a norm. Improved comprehension skills. Improved quality writing and associated excitement. They also asked Bob for further examples of inspiring, quality texts, and more ways in which all abilities can access them. Bob was only too happy to oblige. These 15 units of work cover poetry and prose: each unit provides exciting stimulus material, creative ideas for writing projects, and differentiation and support strategies, meaning all pupils can achieve the quality writing objectives. All the units should help teachers facilitate understanding of the challenging texts and maximise the huge potential for quality writing. Discover a multitude of ready-to-use ideas, inspired by classic literature and great writers' works, along with plenty of new strategies and advice. All of the extracts and illustrations you will need to begin opening doors in your classroom are downloadable a link to the download web page is provided in the book. Units include: (Click on the links below to view a collection of written work produced by school children aged 10 to 13 who are following the passages and exercises related to the texts included in this book) Part 1: Opening doors to prose 1. Night Encounter - The Woman in White by Wilkie Collins 2. Spooky Scientists! - The Phantom Coach by Amelia B. Edwards 3. The Strongest Looking Brute in Alaska - That Spot by Jack London 4. Mr Knickerbocker's Notes - Rip Van Winkle by Washington Irving 5. The Portrait of Doom - Tess of the D'Urbervilles by Thomas Hardy 6. The Hell Hound - The Hound of the Baskervilles by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle 7. Sinister Spaces - Metamorphosis and The Castle by Franz Kafka 9. All in This House is Mossing Over - From 'Mementos' by Charlotte Bronte 10. Dancing the Skies - 'High Flight' by John Gillespie Magee, Jr 11. The Mystery of the Lonely Merman - 'The Forsaken Merman' by Matthew Arnold 12. Making Magic Talk - 'The Magnifying Glass' by Walter de la Mare 13. The Spirit in the Garden - 'A Garden at Night' by James Reeves 14. A Shropshire Lad - 'Blue Remembered Hills' by A. E. Housman 15. The Silver Heel - 'I Started Early - Took My Dog' by Emily Dickinson The Opening Doors to Quality Writingseries won the 2017 Education Resources Awards in the Educational Book Award category. Judges' Comments: "Described as two gems which provide innovative approaches to exploring quality texts as stimuli for children's writing. Judges described The Opening Doors to Quality Writing series as an invaluable resource, particularly for non-specialist teachers. Excellent literary choices contained within very attractively produced books." Opening Doors To Quality Writing: Ideas For Writing Inspired By Great Writers For Ages 6 To 9

Leseprobe

OPENING DOORSto QUALITY WRITING

Ideas for writing inspired by great writers for ages 10 to 13

BOB COX

For Becky, with love

Contents

Title PageDedicationAcknowledgementsEpigraphIntroductionPart 1:Opening doors to prose1.Night Encounter –The Woman in White by Wilkie Collins2.Spooky Scientists! –The Phantom Coach by Amelia B. Edwards3.The Strongest Looking Brute in Alaska–That Spot by Jack London4.Mr Knickerbocker’s Notes –Rip Van Winkle by Washington Irving5.The Portrait of Doom–Tess of the D’Urbervilles by Thomas Hardy6.The Hell Hound–The Hound of the Baskervilles by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle7.Sinister Spaces–Metamorphosis and The Castle by Franz Kafka8.The Mirror and the Window–Wuthering Heights by Emily BrontëPart 2:Opening doors to poetry9.All in This House is Mossing Over –From ‘Mementos’ by Charlotte Brontë10.Dancing the Skies–‘High Flight’ by John Gillespie Magee, Jr11.The Mystery of the Lonely Merman –‘The Forsaken Merman’ by Matthew Arnold12.Making Magic Talk –‘The Magnifying Glass’ by Walter de la Mare13.The Spirit in the Garden –‘A Garden at Night’ by James Reeves14.A Shropshire Lad –‘Blue Remembered Hills’ by A. E. Housman15.The Silver Heel –‘I Started Early – Took My Dog’ by Emily DickinsonAppendix: ‘Ice Paths: A Fetcham Tale’ by Bob CoxGlossaryBibliographyAvailable ResourcesCopyright

Acknowledgements

I have been able to develop ‘Opening Doors’ into a series of books thanks to the feedback and encouragement from schools across the UK, and their trialling of materials. It is much appreciated and, indeed, inspiring to hear from so many schools using the ideas.

In particular, I would like to thank staff and pupils from:

St Augustine’s Catholic Primary School, Frimley, Surrey

Balcarras School and associated teaching alliance schools, Cheltenham, Gloucestershire

Boxgrove Primary School and teaching alliance schools, Guildford, Surrey

Broadstone First School, Poole, Dorset

Church Crookham Junior School, Fleet, Hampshire

Churchfields Junior School, South Woodford, Redbridge

Crofton Hammond Infants School, Hampshire

Epsom Partnership in Surrey

Fort Hill Community School, Basingstoke, Hampshire

Frogmore Junior School, Hampshire

Furze Platt Infants School, Maidenhead, RBWM

Furze Platt Secondary School, Maidenhead, RBWM

Hawley Primary School, Hampshire

Hook Junior School, Hampshire

Netley Abbey Primary School, Hampshire

Portsmouth Grammar School, Hampshire

Ravenscote Junior School, Camberley, Surrey

Ringwood National Teaching School, Hampshire

Robin Hood Junior School, Sutton, Surrey

Roch Community Primary School, Pembrokeshire

Saturday Challenge Enrichment Centre, Fleet, Hampshire

St Francis RC Primary School, Maidenhead, RBWM

St Teresa’s Catholic Primary School, Wokingham, Berkshire

The Grange Community Junior School, Farnborough, Hampshire

Wandsworth Local Authority

Westfields Junior School, Yateley, Hampshire

Wicor Primary School, Fareham, Hampshire

Teachers and schools in Poole and across Dorset, Surrey and Wandsworth

Also:

Potential Plus UK

Osiris Educational

And especially:

Crown House Publishing for their continued amazing support and enthusiasm.

although [the Brontës] don’t write many novels … they’ve tried lots of different genres, they’ve experimented. It’s been like a literary kind of workshop – the four of them working together and so by the time they’re writing Wuthering Heights or Jane Eyre, they’re very sophisticated users of those forces.

John Bowen and Ann Dinsdale, ‘The Brontës’ Early Writings: Combining Fantasy and Fact’

Introduction

Opening Doors to Quality Writing is a companion book to Opening Doors to Famous Poetry and Prose (2014). There are two books, one for ages 10 to 13 and one for ages 6 to 9. The idea is that teachers will be supported, in flexible and creative ways, to use quality literary texts to stimulate quality writing. My theme has continued to be the exploration of poetry and prose from long ago, sometimes termed ‘literary heritage’ texts. My aim is to suggest ways in which the evident quality of the writing can be exploited by schools to develop exciting journeys in reading, writing, speaking and listening for their pupils. I am seeing many teachers successfully using the scope and depth which literature can offer to inspire high standards, mastery learning and, above all, a love of language in its many forms. My criteria for choosing the texts has been that they support the need for greater knowledge of literature from the past and provide the scope needed for deeper learning in English

All the units should help you to make links from understanding the challenging texts to maximising the huge potential for quality writing. I hope your pupils will enjoy the writing ideas suggested and that you and your pupils will be inspired to devise your own! You should find the level of expectation goes up and, with it, the children’s writing should become more quirky, creative and unusual – after all, it’s great writers who have inspired the class! In this book, I have been able to include examples of remarkable pupils’ work, of all abilities, and have included a story of my own. I am always encouraging teachers to write with their pupils, so it’s a way of showing that it can be a natural thing to do. Writing creatively maintains my own awareness of how difficult and enjoyable it can be and, since we are encouraging quality writing, we can all be partners in the process.

In my extensive travels as a teacher and an educational consultant, I have often found that progress is limited either by a model which becomes too much of a straightjacket or by an unwillingness to adapt the model to suit particular classes or pupils. Feedback from Opening Doors to Famous Poetry and Prose has frequently emphasised the confidence which can develop when ideas are used as a starting point, not an end game – for example:

Thank you for reigniting our love of quality texts and giving us fantastic planning and teaching ideas to encourage all abilities to access the texts.

Churchfields Junior School Conference, 2015

Support and enthusiasm from teachers is essential. It is the teachers who will take ideas deeper, invent new questions and present their lessons in new planning shapes. The books (and the conferences I run) are designed to signpost ways to access a harder curriculum so that confidence and self-evaluation can grow. When challenging texts become the norm in classroom practice, there are significant implications for methodology and resourcing, so the ‘Opening Doors’ series is a complement to approaches being trialled in schools which involve all learners working on the same content and with the same objectives.

Overwhelmingly, however, teachers have been asking for more of the quality texts themselves and more ways in which all abilities can access them. So, here are fifteen units of work which should help to stimulate many innovative ways for all your pupils to enjoy literature and write with originality. Schools working with the ‘Opening Doors’ strategies have tended to report:

 More teacher empowerment and confidence.

 More knowledge building for pupils and teachers.

A growing confidence with literature, including poetry.

A tendency to move to using ‘English’ as the subject name rather than ‘literacy’.

Planning from the top becoming a norm.

Planning for mastery learning becoming a norm.

Improved comprehension skills.

Improved quality writing and associated excitement.

‘Opening Doors’ is intended to add a more challenging dimension to English teaching, but all learners can find that doors have been opened because access is always emphasised. The diagram on page 4 provides a framework for the many ways in which quality writing can be achieved.

The pattern you will find across the units marks out the major principles which can support a richer diet in English:

Texts with scope for creativity and curiosity.

The need for a range of access strategies.

The recommendation to write early on in the process via taster drafts.

Using a range of assessment for learning strategies and ‘excellent responses’ criteria.

Emphasising the wonder of the text revealed.

Offering harder, evaluative questions sooner.

Linking the learning about quality texts with the application required for quality writing.

Including ‘beyond the limit’ reading and writing ideas at appropriate points.

Planning lessons in shapes which suit the objectives.

Both the diagram and the questions across the units are set out in a radial way with choices, options and routes critical to differentiation methods which can be planned according to progress. At all times, great writers and great writing lead the way so the inspiration comes from them, with pupils guided by the immense talent of their teachers. There is no need to be limited by any single pedagogy. Approaches can be constantly evaluated and altered according to outcomes. I love the feedback I get from teachers telling me they have linked the text with a more modern one, negotiated fresh questions or converted the task into a different medium.

At the heart of the ‘Opening Doors’ concept is the need for the teachers to use literary texts as starting points for their own invention. That mindset is bound to spread to the pupils. They will be suggesting approaches too – and why not?

All of the extracts and illustrations are available at https://www.crownhouse.co.uk/featured/opening-doors-10-to-13

Part 1

Opening doors to prose