English Subject Overview

As stated by C. S. Lewis: “Literature adds to reality, it does not simply describe it. It enriches the necessary competencies that daily life requires and provides; and in this respect, it irrigates the deserts that our lives have already become.”

This perfectly encapsulates the English curriculum intent at St Mary’s Catholic Academy; we aim to enrich every students’ life through reading and writing experiences.

At the heart of the English curriculum at St Mary’s is the development of the individual person. We aim to offer every student who enters the English classroom a rich and broad experience of both English Language and Literature. We aim to create the very best communicators, readers, writers and thinkers. By exposing students to a plethora of text types, literary styles and writers, we not only develop literacy skills; we are also able to enrich students’ lives by augmenting their cultural capital and life experiences.

The functions of literature and language in enabling students to lead the best possible lives are at the forefront of the curriculum. Through English Language, we seek to provide students with the language capacity to navigate and succeed in their daily lives, encouraging students to be able to apply English functionally and accurately in the wider world. Furthermore, we wish to inspire those students who wish to pursue more language-based careers, such as writing, journalism, speech therapy, education and media production. Through English Literature we seek to develop students’ ability to think deeply about humanity and to discover the riches of their Literary Heritage, whilst developing the critical faculties to evaluate the ideas and the craft in these texts. We challenge students to think, act and speak like those working in the field would: to read like writers, to write like readers, to speak like orators.

Our curriculum goes far beyond what is taught in lessons, for whilst we want students to achieve the very best examination results possible, we believe our curriculum goes beyond what is examinable. We do this by regular exposure to a wide range of the finest fiction and non-fiction texts, exploring them through practical, creative and analytical approaches (consolidated through the whole Academy reading programme – The Literary Canon). We offer extra-curricular clubs in creative writing and debating. We support productions and take students to the theatre and poetry events and work with writers both in and out of the Academy. Participation in local and national competitions is also supported; we are proud to have our very own Poet Laureates within our Academy. We even encourage some healthy competition between our own Hogwarts style ‘Houses’ – our 4 Literary Houses are The Brontes, Dickens, Shakespeare and Shelley! World Book Day is celebrated each year and through this, we aim to capture the imagination of our students and teachers alike.

Our Key Stage 3 curriculum is designed to engage our students and fuel their love of English. Whilst we begin working on the skills required for GCSE at the very start of Year 7, GCSE examination success is not our driver; rather, we teach students how to appreciate a range of literary and non-fiction texts, using these reading experiences as ‘springboards’ for students’ own writing and speech. In doing this, we are able to build on students’ skills in each of the threshold concept areas. Each of our topical modules covers both reading and writing; skills are developed cumulatively.

To allow students to build up their skills across the 3 year curriculum, we begin with a focus on the writer’s craft in Year 7, developing the students’ ability to analyse language. In Year 8, we introduce students to the concept of evaluating and analysing narrative structure. By Year 9 students are equipped to tackle synthesis and comparison across multiple texts. Interleaved along these analytical reading methods is the development of a student’s ability to write creatively, accurately and for stated audiences and purposes.

Our chosen topics allow us to open up each one of our young person’s mind to the world beyond their own. Seminal world literature, texts across time, modern media and non-fiction texts and writing styles, as well as classic canonical texts, all feature across the 3 year curriculum. Some schools choose a chronological approach, taking students on a linear journey through historical literature. For us, the structure of the course is designed so that the skills progressively increase in challenge, and thus sometimes, text types may seem to regress in difficulty. This is to allow students to become comfortable with applying more challenging skills to less challenging reading material and writing stimuli.

When students reach Key Stage 4, they will have a strong foundation to help them tackle the demands of GCSE. We follow the AQA GCSE English Language and English Literature specifications. Schemes of learning for each of these are interleaved, with lesson starters and home learning tasks revisiting previously taught topics for revision. This spaced practice approach, and interleaving between Language and Literature, helps us to support students’ retrieval practice whilst also teaching new content and skills. All students are taught the same Literature texts, regardless of MTG or class teacher.

As a Catholic academy, our ethos runs through everything we teach; English is the perfect subject to encourage our students to be caring members of our community. Through English lessons, we challenge prejudice, equip students with the skills needed to express their thoughts and beliefs; we use literature as a window to explore humanity across the world. It is not possible to teach English at St Mary’s without incorporating the essence of our Catholic ethos.

By the end of Year 11, we hope to see as many of our students continue their English studies at A-level, and we offer both the Language and Literature A-Level courses. For those pursuing alternative pathways, we believe that the English curriculum experienced at St Mary’s will have enriched their lives whilst also allowing them to succeed as communicators in their future endeavours.