Making writers sexy and appealing - Part 1 (author's intent)

'We conclude that children appear to prioritise efficiency over completeness when reading, generating inferences spontaneously only when they are necessary for establishing a coherent representation of the text.’ Joseph , Wonnacott, Nation (2021) 

The above piece of research is probably the one piece that has stuck with me. The emphasis of efficiency over completeness. We see that so much in our subject. The student who finishes first and there’s not a simple full stop in it. The student who has answered every question on a paper and simply guessed everything. The student who views watching the film as reading the text for revision. This pattern is played out again and again. 

Efficiency is a problem that’s hidden in English. Students feel they are doing well in English because they know the plot and they know what the characters think or feel. Completeness comes when you understand the writer’s reasons and patterns behind the choices made. We see students thinking plot and character knowledge as being a sign of completeness. The same applies to techniques. The efficiency is spotting the technique. The completeness is explaining at length why the writer has used that technique in that specific context. Therefore, we are surrounded by this efficiency problem. And, if we are not careful, it becomes a poor proxy for learning in English. 

As humans, we are programmed to recall stories and explore inferences around feelings and thoughts. It starts from an early age. Why is Mr Bear sad? What do you think he wants? What do you think he could do to make himself happy? The way we interact with stories is quite second nature. We could watch a 30 second clip of Eastenders and work out the feelings, the story, the conflicts, the hidden tensions quite easily. We use our knowledge of life and experiences. So, when we study Macbeth or Romeo and Juliet the students can connect with this idea of wanting something so badly or disobeying your parents' rules. There’s always something to connect or identify with. Even if you haven’t personally experienced it, then there’s your story knowledge where you have seen it somewhere before. Normally, people would do ‘this’ in stories. 

The unnatural aspect is thinking of the writer. When I say unnatural, I don’t mean witchery business, but that it isn’t an automated and natural process. When I watch a TV show, I am not thinking about the writer’s intent and purpose behind things. It isn’t at the forefront of my mind as I am stuffing myself with popcorn. I am thinking and hoping that the dog survives to the end. The writer is far from my thoughts. In fact, I am not thinking of them at all. 

Completeness comes when we connect the writer to the plot and characters. To do this, we need to make the writer a bigger presence in reading and lessons. We need to make them celebrities and not the characters in the books. We need to make the invisible visible. In fact, they need to be the bigger things in the lessons. Bigger than the texts. Bigger than the quotations. Bigger than the facts. When we read ‘A Christmas Carol’, we are learning about Dickens and Victorian society and not Scrooge and Tiny Tim. They are only vehicles for us to understand the writer. 

Look at any study guide or revision guide and the emphasis is on plot and character with an occasional sniff of themes. Any reference to the writer is vanilla or hidden. They focus on efficiency - know the characters and know the plot. 

My daughters are big Taylor Swift fans and they can wax lyrical on her songs and the intent behind the songs. In fact, their understanding is led by the intent and not by the content of the songs. Of course, they can recall the songs, but the understanding is focused around intent. Therefore, the discussion of the song is more complete because it starts with the intent. 

I’ve struggled over the years with teaching writer’s intent because it relies too much on speculation and making large inferences that students lack the body of knowledge. Therefore, when we are asking students to use a verb like ‘challenges’ it doesn’t create the desired impact. It is a very different type of inference we are expecting that moves beyond obvious markers like a trembling voice or tears in their eyes. They are making inferences based on often subtle aspects or things that are not openly visible. This is quite a leap. 

I tend to give students one sentence which encapsulates what the writers overall purpose is: 

• Priestley thought it was time to rebuild society.

• Stevenson highlights the complexity of what others think is simple.

• Shakespeare wants us to understand the problems in Elizabethan society.

• Dickens wants to change society – Victorian society.

The reason for this is that it gives a starting point to make inferences as we go along in the text. Plus, it gives them something to frame ideas around. Take the Dickens one. When you read the opening of Stave 1, it is quite clear that the world needs changing. As much as we might like looking at the description of Scrooge, the overall message is that the world is bad. That sort of reading of a text is then built from the start. The writer’s intent is always an afterthought. Look at the dreaded PEE or equivalent. The writer’s intent was always at the end. Systematically, we are disadvantaging students because the intent comes second. Look at how we teach novels or plays. Plot first and intent second.  

The second thing I do is give students a selection of key ideas around authorial intent. See below:  

  

They are not a definitive list, but they highlight the plurality of ideas. A writer isn’t just talking about one thing. Students need to see that plurality in lessons. This sheet I get students to stick in their books and we constantly refer to it as we go along. 

The beauty of this is that the writer’s intent can be viewed as something more concrete and not so abstract. But, it also allows students to see that moments in the text can reflect differing views of the author or playwright. Take Mrs Birling’s refusal to help Eva Smith. That reflects the idea of ‘with power comes responsibility’ or ‘women are disadvantaged in society’. Instead of lessons being the searching of the one student who understands the intent, the lessons are about exploring and developing the intent. They can build, construct, amend, blend or rewrite what is provided, but they are starting with something rather than nothing. 

We have to actively teach students about authorial perspective and intent. It is ok to give students space to speculate and form their own opinions, but unless you have the background knowledge and experience of the writer's intent, students are simply guessing. 

We need to make the writer alive. We need to get better and support students to explore and discuss intent. We need to actively shift students from efficiency to completeness. 

Thanks for reading, 

Xris 

Spelling and word fluency

 I have experience of working with students of all levels, but one of the biggest issues I find with writing fluency is not often related to the content but it is spelling. Now, this isn’t a ‘bash spelling’ blog but it is about exploring our relationship with spelling. 

The two easiest things to spot with any piece of writing are handwriting and spellings. Parents often mention handwriting or spelling as being an issue or something they have noticed. They are the most visible things about writing anyone can spot. You don’t need to be an expert to see if handwriting is neat or if the spelling of words isn’t accurate. Because they are the most obvious things, they are the things that students are hyperconscious of. And parents! They can, if we are not careful, be the markers of success in subjects. For example, how many subjects, other than English, cite spelling and handwriting as key issues when marking a class set of work. 

The problem with things like handwriting and spelling is that come to the final exams they count for so little in terms of the overall mark. Something we have subconsciously built as being so important collectively is of little value compared to other things such as ideas, sentence structure, control of punctuation and crafting of writing. Handwriting and spelling have some value but not that much value in the big picture of things. 

When handwriting and spelling are seen as having a higher priority in terms of writing, it warps the way students think.  It controls the way they write. 

What do you do when you want to use a word that you know is perfect but you are not sure of how it is spelt? 

Your response to that one question is quite telling. Do you guess? Do you think about it? Do you practise spelling it different ways? Or, do you go for the less effective word because you can spell it? 

The response depends largely on the type of student, but if you have been trained to be conscious of handwriting and spelling is paramount, then you are going to select the less effective alternative. There’s safety in it. Better to spell an ineffective word correctly than an effective word incorrectly. Then, there becomes a hidden process for the student. They select safer words rather than effective words. There’s a built in hindrance for fluency and communication. Not only is the student trying to write, but they are trying to second guess their spellings and word choices. They are not thinking about what the best word to use is, but they are thinking what is the word in their vocabulary that they can spell and use in this context. 

Let’s take this further. What if you were a student with dyslexia and you know that spelling is one of your struggles? Are you going to be able to write continuously when writing a story? No. You will be stopping, depending on the severity of the issue, every few words. This is the hidden problem for a lot of students. Because it isn’t an explicit process, we don’t know it is happening. 

For me, this internal issue is such a problem for us at the heart of a lot of our fluency issues in writing. Not only are they slowing their writing down, but they are tactically reducing the impact of their choices at the hands of spelling. 

What can we do to combat this internal oversimplification of vocabulary? Speaking to specific students is one way. Or, a far more simpler approach is to view other things as more important in writing. What we place an emphasis on becomes what the students place an emphasis on? If the first thing a teacher picks up on is spelling, then the first thing a student will focus on will be spelling. 

There is a place for spellings in school’s curriculums, but, maybe, we need to think of it last rather than think of it first when looking at all forms of work. 

Thanks for reading, 

Xris

Oracy - The infamous ‘I don’t know’.

One of the things about oracy is that we often focus on the what rather than the how students speak. Communication is much more than words and phrases. It is how we control the flow of speech. Or, more importantly, how we empower students to dive in and swim in the spoken discourse. 

One area I have been working on, with some success, is dealing with the infamous ‘I don’t know’. The blanket answer for a lot of things in school. But, under that ‘I don’t know’ there is so much more. It isn’t just a simple ‘I don’t know’. Here are just some possible things going on: 

I can’t be bothered to answer 

I genuinely don’t know the answer

I am scared of getting it wrong 

I wasn’t listening to the question 

I don’t want attention drawn to me

I know the answer but I don’t want people to think less of me  

I have an idea but I am not a hundred percent sure it is right 

A simple ‘I don’t know’ is never that simple. There’s the issue of the social implications to factor in too. The fear of getting it right can be as equal to getting it wrong. The positive affirmation of the teacher is negated by the negative comments of their peers. 

All too often ‘I don’t know’ is the quick way out. And, in fairness, the problem is repeated again and again in lessons. Largely, it is a communication problem rather than a knowledge question. Yes, they might lack the knowledge, but there’s a problem with what to do when there is insecure knowledge. We are all hazy at times about knowledge, but we’ve learnt strategies to cope or deal with this haziness. People are people. 

One thing a student did this week, that I really liked, was to boldly prefix a comment with ‘In my opinion’ when discussing an idea about a text. The great thing about that was that she was ringfencing the comment. By framing the comment as an ‘opinion’ there’s wiggle room. It is now an opinion, which, as we know with opinions, they are there to be agreed or disagreed. They are not right or wrong. That framing of answers is such an important thing for students and adults to do. Another one is ‘This is a guess but…’. Both examples show how students can frame answers to support them. 

How we deal and articulate answers is crucial. Education is awash with knowledge retrieval but I fear how we do it can be quite narrowing in terms of communication. Compare these two options: 

[1]  Tim, answer question 4 for me. 

[2] Tim, which question would you like to answer for me? 

Number 1 is very limiting and relies on the student having an answer or guessing if not sure. Number 2 puts the student in control and helps ensure confidence in the answering process. They might have questions they are not sure of, but it gives them the option of which one they pick. They are still answering the question, but on their terms. This is my preferred way and I only switch to 1 if I want to check a precise student has got a precise bit of information. 

We’d all like confident students and I think as teachers there’s things we can do to create that confidence, but there is a space for doubt in the classroom. And, there’s something we can teach students about ‘doubtful answers’ and more importantly ‘doubtful answering’. A large majority of students will only answer a question if they are a hundred percent certain  the answer is correct. You can see that on exam papers. Why did they leave a large number of questions unanswered? They were unanswered because they were ‘doubtful answers’ and the student only feels comfortable answering with ‘certain answers’. This becomes such a difficult thing to unpick.  

Instead, we need to help students deal with ‘doubtful answering’ on a regular basis and in every lesson. Not every question needs to be answered with the confidence of a god. In fact, we need to embrace ‘doubting Thomas’ in our lessons. That caution. That hesitancy. That uncomfortable feeling. The language we and the students use need to build in ‘doubtful answering’. To start this off, I have produced a list of things for students to say instead of ‘I don’t know or not sure’.

Could you give me a minute to think about it? 

Could you reword the question for me? 

Could you give me a clue about where I can find the answer to the question? 

Could you come back to me with another question later? 

This is a guess but I think it is … 

This is all so students can work around this doubtful answering questions. Students need options and largely in the classroom they feel like there are no options. It is either right or wrong. We need to help students answer questions and that happens at the point of questioning. That’s why the above questions are on a poster next to my board. We do something instead of saying ‘I don’t know’. We give students options to reframe the question. 

Communication is about options. Part of oracy is highlighting the options available to a student. 

Thanks for reading, 

Xris 

Precision and laser sharp thinking

I’ve discussed at length how English cannot be reduced to a simple checklist of things. There seems to be an endless desire to homogenise subjects. Something that works in one subject must always work for another subject. That isn’t the case. 

One area that English struggles with is identifying the top elements of our subject. We have these phrases like ‘flair’, ‘confidence’ and ‘creativity’ which are aspects of the subject that are blooming hard to pinpoint, describe and teach. They are the fruition of large bodies of knowledge, skill and experience. You cannot cover them in one lesson. You cannot teach them explicitly. They are the product of time. 

The one area that separates students from one another is precision. The best students are able to capture an idea precisely. The weaker of students tend to over generalise or simplify an idea to the point of beyond obviousness. In English, we can teach knowledge to imitate this precision but unless students are able to be precise with the rest of their thinking, then it amounts to very little. For most of what we do in English amounts to moving from the general to the specific. That applies to writing too. Weak writing will be very general in content and construction.. The strongest describes things specifically. On most pieces of work we can write the target - be more precise and specific. 

God, or the Devil, depending on your version of the line, is in the detail. That’s why an English teacher’s job is about making students care about the details! They are fastidious with it. The problem we have is helping students to be more precise in their thinking. How do you teach students to care about the finer details? 

One thing I have used which is working is helping students to declutter texts. Any text we use is overwhelming. Every text is crammed full of ideas, points or techniques. The large majority of students struggle to pinpoint key or salient ideas. Why? Because they cannot channel the less important from the more important things. It is such a hard skill. And, something that comes with experience and maturity. This inability to filter is a hidden problem in lessons. It is the reason why students default to retelling the plot or point out basic things. It is because they have been so overwhelmed that they default to simplifying. 

Question 4 on Paper 1 is one example of this problem. That fact that there isn’t enough time on exam papers to do the question justice compounds the problem further. Dear AQA, when you decide to make some amendments to the exams again, please consider the timings as well. Anyway, Question 4 is generally a straightforward question. Students supporting an interpretation of the text. It is the bread and butter of a lot of lessons, yet when it comes to the exam, it is usually a sea of bland statements, speculative comments and very little meat. 

 

This part of the story, where Alice is sent back along the road to find what has fallen from the roof and returns with the chrysanthemums, shows how hard and cruel Hartop is, so that all of our sympathy is with Alice.’

• Hartop leaned across his wife and shouted: ‘Go back a bit and see what it was.’ 

• ‘Something dropped. We’ll stop at Drake’s Turn. You’ll catch up. I know something dropped.’

•  He let in the clutch as he was speaking and the van began to move away.

• The wind was behind her; but repeatedly it seemed to veer and smash her, with the rain, full in the face.

• She could see nothing.

• ‘Only?’ he said. ‘Only? What d’ye mean by only? Eh?’

• Alice stood mute. Then Hartop raised his voice.

• ‘Well, don’t stand there! Do something. Go on. Go on! Go and see who wants a bunch o’ chrysanthemums.

• Alice obeyed at once. 

• She picked up the flowers, walked away and vanished, all without a word.

When there is so much text, it is important to filter and sift things for students. We find that in preparing for Paper 1 it helps to give students a filtered version of the section. This way they can spot precise aspects. You don’t just get precise. You have to teach it. Show them how to approach a text and look at sifting things out for themselves. 

What elements show that Hartop is cruel here? Where do we feel sympathy? Once students can see it clearly and specifically they can attach methods and terminology. The stumbling block is the precision around finding things.  Remove the nonessential things and it is easier to spot. You could even get students to highlight the cruel and sympathy elements. Then, get them to explore each example. 

The same applies to literature texts. We expect students to be precise and remember specific and precise moments in the text yet sometimes they’ve only had one or two interactions with that moment. Once reading or watching it and the second might be the teacher teaching an aspect with it. We seem to see lots of exam style questions given to students in Year 10 and Year 11, but really the only time, in theory, students should be working fully from memory is in the mocks and finally exams. Otherwise, how else are we going to help students be precise? We are treating everything as a memory test and cognitive load too much. Why not have the following alongside an exam question extract? 

1: "O, brawling love, O, loving hate,

O, anything of nothing first create!"

2:"Love is a smoke raised with the fume of sighs..."

3: "I fear too early, for my mind misgives

Some consequence yet hanging in the stars."

4: "O, she doth teach the torches to burn bright!"

5: "If I profane with my unworthiest hand

This holy shrine, the gentle fine is this:

My lips, two blushing pilgrims, ready stand

To smooth that rough touch with a tender kiss."

6: "Call me but love, and I'll be new baptized;

Henceforth I never will be Romeo."

7: "With love's light wings did I o'erperch these walls;

For stony limits cannot hold love out."

8: "O, I am fortune's fool!"

9: "I defy you, stars!"

10: "Thus with a kiss I die."

If we are truly expecting students to think, then we need them to build up that thinking. Making precise connections needs time and space in the curriculum. In fact, we need to explore how to do it. The knowledge of text isn’t the answer alone. Students can have a great knowledge of the text, but unless they have been taught or shown to connect precise or subtle aspects together, then they’ll never progress, regardless of the knowledge they know. 

To be precise is something we need to actively teach students. You cannot rely on chance for it to happen. We need to be precise in our teaching to allow it to happen. Model it.  Show it. Enable views of the text for it to happen. 

Thanks for reading 

Xris 

 

An Inspector Recalls

In terms of metacognition, cognitive load and cognitive load theory is one of the biggest concerns of any English teacher. We might not dress it up with a fancy term, but we know that how much or how little we present of text can make or break a student’s understanding of a text. Too much of a text and you can overwhelm them with too much information. Too little text and you can strip the meaning away from a text.  

For me, the key to building knowledge around texts is not death by a thousand quotations or endless DVDs of varying quality filmed versions of the play or novel. It is about building interesting ways to read the text in different ways. That might be through a number of different ways. Images. Clips. Extracts. Drawings. 

One of my favourite ways is to do a reduced version of the text. A ten minute version of An Inspector Calls. Here’s a copy. Simply, I take a text and reduce it down. Thank a colleague from a previous school for the idea. Now before you start chucking copies of the text at me, this is after the class has read the play twice through already. Then, we simply read it when we have a spare ten minutes. 

Holidays are always a problem for memory. At the end of last term, students could be well versed in reciting sections of the play, but after two weeks they can barely remember character’s name unless prompted heavily. That’s why I like to start the term off with this quick ten minute read. It will never have the flair of the original text, but it is a great reminder and way to recall what is hidden in the recesses of their mind. 

Familiarity breeds confidence. Unless we look at ways to make texts more familiar, then we are always going to struggle. A weak student’s natural default is to retell the plot in an essay. They lack confidence in relation to the text so assert they are confident in it they retell the story.  One reading of a text is never enough.  

Thanks for reading, 

Xris