English

The faculty

Staff

The English team is a forward-thinking collaborative department which always finds itself at the forefront of school developments in terms of innovations in teaching and learning. The team currently comprises ten highly committed, well qualified teachers. The current members of the team are:

 
Accommodation and Resources

There are seven dedicated, well-resourced English teaching rooms. Five are on one corridor and the other two are on the floor above. All English teaching rooms are furnished with Interactive Whiteboards which are fully utilised in delivering the excellent resources prepared in-house to ensure that the demands of the curriculum are met to a high standard in every aspect.

During the last year the department has benefited from a range of new resources. These include a new online homework resource and class sets of novels. The department is fully equipped with ActivStudio interactive whiteboards, and flexicams, and digital cameras. All Schemes of Work are fully interactive, embracing the wealth of technology in the school.

The ethos of the English department is very much one centred on high expectations and mutual support. The department has operated a system of regular voluntary team meetings which have proved successful and popular because they contribute to the smooth running of the department and result in high quality outcomes which makes the day-to-day work of individual teachers easier. These outcomes include shared resourcing to which all team members contribute.

In addition, the King James’s English department operates a very successful and popular Twitter feed, You Tube channel and Google website which gives regular guidance to students to support them in their work.

Time Allocation

The school operates a 25-period two weekly timetable, with five 60-minute lessons per day.
Currently, in Years 7-9, students have seven lessons per fortnight, in Year 10 and 11, students have nine lessons per fortnight.

Schemes of Work

In Years 7-9, students are taught for seven periods over a two-week period. Schemes of Work are designed to ensure that students have access to as wide a range of texts as possible in each year; each block of work focusing on a different text type. The programme of study for each year group is carefully designed to ensure that all Assessment Focuses are effectively delivered. A comprehensive common assessment programme has been incorporated into the structure to ensure that students’ progress is accurately measured and appropriate action is taken where there is underperformance identified through in-house moderation procedures. In each year students complete a variety of Reading, Writing and Speaking and Listening activities, which build towards the teacher’s assessment of their performance at the end of the year.

In Year 10 and 11, students are taught for nine periods over a two-week period. All students follow the AQA GCSE syllabus in both English Language and English Literature.

Extra-Curricular Activities

The team aims to complement the students’ curriculum experience by offering opportunities to take part in extra-curricular activities. These include a debating club, theatre visits, visits to the school by outside groups and workshops. We have also run successful KS3 residential trips to London which have incorporated a theatre experience in the West End and a visit to the Harry Potter Studios Tour. A similar ‘Woman in Black’ theatre experience has also been run successfully for KS4 students.

The curriculum

Curriculum Intent

The English specific Curriculum Intent can be found here:

• English Intent

Assessment Guidance

The English approach to Assessment can be found here:

• English Assessment

Learning Journey

The English Curriculum Sequences can be found here:

• English Curriculum

Golden Knowledge Organisers

The school defines 'Golden Knowledge' as being the most important content to Remember and Understand, as it represents the main building blocks of the curriculum. 

The English 'Golden Knowledge' for each year group can be found here:

• Year 7 & 8

Year on a page

The summary of each Year Group's curriculum can be found here:

• Years 7-11

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