Finchley Catholic High School

Time Allocation
Students study English for four 1 hour lessons a week throughout Key Stage 4.

Exam Board: AQA

Three Year Key Stage 4: English Department Rationale and Programme of Study for Year 9

Year 9 in English Language and Literature is a foundation year for Key Stage 4 where students have the opportunity to continue to broaden, widen and deepen their knowledge of the subject. Students study culturally varied texts that are currently or have recently been on the GCSE syllabus and to learn to speak and write in a variety of genres. They learn the knowledge and skills that will prepare them for the GCSE exam (for example, by learning the conventions of a Shakespearean tragedy when studying ‘Romeo and Juliet’ to prepare them for the study of ‘Macbeth’ in years 10 and 11). Final assessments for each unit are graded using the relevant AQA GCSE mark schemes.

Year 9 Term	Topic	Preparation for GCSE exam	Key concepts learnt and/ or consolidated for GCSE
Autumn 1	Of Mice and Men	English Literature Paper 2: Modern Texts	Narrative structure, characterisation, themes, the importance of context
Autumn 2	Travel Writing	English Language Paper 2: Non-Fiction reading and writing	Textual genres, sentence structures, parts of speech
Spring 1	Love poetry	English Literature Paper 2: Poetry	Genres: lyric, epic, narrative, dramatic; language and structural devices; sonnet form
Spring 2	Romeo and Juliet	English Literature Paper 1: Shakespeare	Aristotelian conventions of a tragedy; equivocation; gender roles in Early Modern Period
Summer 1	Dystopian Writing	English Language Paper 1: Descriptive and Narrative Writing	4-part default narrative structure and variations on this. Descriptive writing; characterisation; effective use of varied sentence structures
Summer 2	Transactional Writing and Spoken Language Endorsement (GCSE Assessment)	English Language Paper 2: Non-fiction Writing	Adapting writing according to genre, purpose and audience. All students will write and deliver a speech for their GCSE matriculation requirement

GCSE Assessment Summary

Year 10 & 11 Schedule of teaching:

10	Autumn 1	19^th Century non-fiction reading and creative writing
	Autumn 2	British play or novel
	Spring 1	Poetry
	Spring 2	Shakespeare
	Summer 1	Non-fiction reading
	Summer 2	Non-fiction writing
11	Autumn 1	19^th Century novel	(including practice for English Language Fiction and Imaginative Writing)
	Autumn 2	Non-fiction reading and writing
	Spring 1	Shakespeare revision	Poetry revision
	Spring 2	British play or novel revision	Poetry revision
	Summer 1	General revision

GCSE English Language	Fiction and Imaginative Writing	Section A – Reading: questions on an unseen 19th Century novel.	25%
	Fiction and Imaginative Writing	Section B – Writing: a choice of two writing tasks. The tasks are linked by a theme to the reading extract.	25%
	Non-fiction and Transactional Writing	Section A – Reading: questions on two thematically linked, unseen non-fiction extracts.	25%
	Non-fiction and Transactional Writing	Section B – Writing: a choice of two writing tasks. The tasks are linked by a theme to the reading extracts.	25%
GCSE English Literature	Shakespeare and the Nineteenth Century Novel	Section A – Shakespeare: a question based on an extract of approximately 30 lines for analysis of language, form and structure. Students should also address how a theme reflected in the extract is explored elsewhere in the play.	25%
	Shakespeare and the Nineteenth Century Novel	Section B – 19th-century novel: a question based on an extract of approximately 400 words for analysis of language, form and structure. Students should also address how a theme reflected in the extract is explored elsewhere in the novel.	25%
	Modern Texts and Poetry since 1789	Section A – Post-1914 British play or novel: ONE essay question.	25%
	Modern Texts and Poetry since 1789	Section B – Part 1: ONE question comparing a named poem from the AQA Poetry Anthology collection to another poem from that collection. The named poem will be shown in the question paper. Part 2: TWO questions analysing and comparing two unseen contemporary poems.	25%

Key Stage 4

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