11 Plus Exams Forum

Or Highgate or anywhere else.

I have a little aspiring JK Rowling....

Please tell me what their English depts are like? Lots of really long posts pls!

I have DD1 at NLCS and DD2 starting in September (happy dance!).
DD1 loves the English Dept. and does a lot of creative writing. There are book clubs and lit soc and several student run magazines to write for including a poetry magazine. DD2 is also a tremendous reader/writer and has already mapped out which clubs she's going to join. If this is any indication of the level they expect of students, NLCS no longer does GCSE English or A level. In yrs. 10 and 11 they do AS English and Pre-U in 6th form or IB. They found that many girls had read the books on the GCSE syllabus for fun by that age and needed a bigger challenge.

Habs Girls has a strong English department. One of the Deputy Heads is n English teacher, as are the Heads of Middle School (years 7-9) and Upper School (years 10-11). In Year 7 they have a creative writing competition with prizes, in memory of a former teacher, who passed away.

There is Los a strong tradition of drama at the school and pupils are encouraged to write their own material.

If you want more information, you could try speaking to the Deputy Head, Mr James-Robbins, who is a gifted English teacher.

As well as the usual clubs and some excellent English staff, and a general liberal arts ethos, SHHS currently has a writer in residence in every autumn who workshops intensively with girls over a fortnight or so, culminating in some truly exciting poetry. And in year 9 there is also a chance to spend a week on a residential writers course run by the Arvon foudation - working with two professional writers - and a guest speaker - which my dd found absolutely inspirational.
I have pm'd you with further thoughts.

Wow they all sound fantastic! Better keep hitting the books especially maths (sigh). At least she is willing to work and it won't be a waste, regardless of what school she ends up in, but I think some visits are in order to see if we can get up some enthusiasm - losing touch with old pals worries her even though she's seen first hand how it's all change in year 7 in any case.

I hope the schools themselves can do a better job of selling than I.

Shootmenow, that is really interesting about NLCS no longer doing GCSE and A Level English though if they are doing AS English then they are doing the first year of A Level English so I am interested to hear their reasons for not doing the second year. GCSE English is a very broad syllabus with lots of choice. If the girls have read some of the texts, then why not just choose others? I am surprised to hear that they had read Of Micen and Men and Great Expectations and An Inspectors Calls for fun. Do you have many girls going on to read English at University? DG

Like DG I am really surprised at schools not doing GCSE English. My son is doing some controlled Eng assessments at the moment and the level of detail is absolutely amazing. I thought I had read and understood Of Mice and Men until I started discussing it with my son! They unpack it in an amazingly detailed and interesting way. He is currently doing a part of the Eng Lit GCSE which involves comparing a Shakespeare play with a certain gothic novel. I have read both books, but would have been highly challenged by the essay title he has been set. I won't reveal any more details but happy to pm. The teaching and group discussion with peers has brought the books alive.
Anyway what an interesting thread, good luck Silverysea.

Yummiemummie wrote:He is currently doing a part of the Eng Lit GCSE which involves comparing a Shakespeare play with a certain gothic novel. I have read both books, but would have been highly challenged by the essay title he has been set.

As someone who had to teach that exact topic, I think perhaps therein lies the answer. Comparing one Shakespeare play with one gothic novel is such a crazy idea that many teachers hate the whole idea. What is the point? That is why the essay title is challenging - doing that kind of thing puts so many children off, and as a teacher I was very frustrated by it. As I was when I had to teach a comparison between Wilfred Owen's 'Dulce et decorum est' and a scene from Macbeth. It's one reason I'm not currently teaching at all. Study great works of literature in context and in their own right, but once we reduce them to glib and meaningless 'comparisons' across several centuries, with young people who may have barely read beyond Harry Potter, then in my view we really have lost the plot.

So while I know nothing of the schools here, I imagine the staff took a brave decision to move beyond formulaic and ultimately useless comparative analysis of works which if studied on their own would have yielded far more rewarding results.

Ooh I so disagree. My son seems to have got so much out of this. The angle they have taken is to look at how the two authors develop particular characters during the course of the novels and in the case of the two novels how particular characters traits (eg mental instability) are developed. We have had some fascinating discussions. His teacher also teaches at the local University and he has made it extremely challenging and certainly not 'meaningless', 'glib' or 'ultimately useless'. That is quite offensive Amber. IMHO it hasn't been any of those things for my DS.
Anyway OP, good luck to you with your decision.

I'm sorry I cannot see how that is offensive. I've taught it and it's my opinion. It is a criticism of the syllabus and not of your son or his school or his teacher. You have another opinion which is fine and not offensive to me. I was trying to offer insight into what might have motivated a school to stop teaching GCSE English.