Departmental Aims
Our over-riding aim is to ensure that each student, whatever their ability, should reach their full potential. Developing their English and Literacy skills is of course fundamental to unlocking their potential across the academic curriculum.
General Aims
- To encourage the development of each student’s range and competence in all areas of language.
- To ensure students leave school with strategies in place to cope with their literacy problems in the wider world.
- To encourage an enjoyment of reading and critical understanding of what is read.
- To encourage thoughtful and sensitive writing and listening.
We pursue these aims by providing a balanced, interesting, varied course geared towards students’ individual needs. The course blends elements of literacy, creative and reasoning work. This principal applies whether resources are drawn from fiction or non-fiction media.
Specific Aims
- To promote the basic literacy of each student, with decoding and reading taking priority.
- To promote a good working vocabulary of common words.
- To enhance students’ knowledge of language and how it has developed.
- To develop, within their capabilities, legible handwriting in which the student can take pride.
- To stretch and challenge intellect while also attempting to moderate weaknesses in literacy.
- To assist students with receptive and/or expressive language problems to overcome these difficulties.
- To repair damaged morale by encouraging sympathetic, friendly, yet firm teacher/student relationships.
- To encourage communication of thoughts, opinions and ideas which may have been buried or trapped because of literacy breakdown, lack of confidence or blocked opportunities.
- To be aware of the importance of listening to and appreciating the opinions of others.
- To engage students and give them an opportunity to express their own personalities by following their own interests and enthusiasms in part of the course, for example using a hobby as the basis for speech exams or choices of reading material.
- To enable each student to experience success related to English through appropriate target setting and exam success. This may be through steady improvement of literacy skills, the entry of a piece of work in the English Department Anthology, success in a speech examination or an appropriate grade either in GCSE English/ English Literature or Entry Level Certificate English.
