Barbara Bleiman, Co-Director of The English and Media Centre, clarifies the issues around the de-coupling of AS and AL. The new AS and AL reforms are raising difficult questions about how best they should be implemented. Why? Because not only are different suites of subjects being reformed at different times, resulting in a muddling mix of…
Barbara Bleiman, Co-director at The English and Media Centre, considers interesting areas for debate about English as a subject The blogosphere and twittersphere are both full of impassioned arguments and discussions around education, many of them sustained by English teachers or Headteachers with a background in English teaching. English teachers have always been at the forefront…
Some of the media coverage this week has suggested that the draft OCR/EMC Language and Literature specification is dumbing down, pandering to students’ interests and putting celebrities like Russell Brand in the same category as Shakespeare. In response we thought it important to set the record straight and provide some basic, factual information to help…
Starting with a look at ‘knowledge’ in relation to Great Expectations, Barbara Bleiman, co-director at The English and Media Centre, explores the debates around knowledge versus skills. Great Expectations 1. Dickens was writing in the 19th century. 2. Pip’s sister was called Mrs Joe Gargery. 3. Dickens wrote his novels in instalments as weekly serials.…
It is currently rumoured that the criteria are about to change again; if they do, then we will update our response. The consultation comes in two parts, one from OFQUAL, giving the overarching structure for all A Levels, with specific sections on each subject. The focus is assessment and its implications. The key element…
What do English teachers do best? Pore over the minutiae of the latest proposed changes to GCSE specifications? Commit to memory the most recent accountability system by which schools are measured? Or argue about what makes a good book? The answer is obvious so, to provide material for debate, EMC has produced a list of…
Barbara Bleiman is Co-director at The English and Media Centre We have entered a new phase in education, the ‘Research-led Education Phase’. In principle that’s an excellent thing. Drifting along doing things in classrooms without considering their impact is not a good way of making sure that pupils get the most out of their education. The…
English & Media Centre 