her breath.
There can be a certain schadenfreude about shopping in this baker's: she has to be at least polite. However, more often I feel a shame and intimidation that turn me from the door. This was one of those days. I ended up with a dull, healthy, wholemeal-with-bits loaf from Tesco Express, and trudged home in a state of rueful self-disgust.
Then I cheered up. It occurred to me that the lessons I had offered my baker-nemesis had needed a little leavening, and that the new draft national curriculum would be no more digestible to her than what I had tried to cram down her throat. So, I decided to sit down and write my own Notional Curriculum for English, a development out of the framework I mixed and baked years ago and is now enshrined in many English teaching materials published by Smart Learning and Heinemann.
See what you think of my realistic, minimalist Notional Curriculum for English. It's for everyone - not just those currently destined for a life among baked goods.
The Notional Curriculum for English 2013
What it is
It is an attempt to package English in a form
that respects the integrity of the subject but also provides something of a
practical teaching framework.
The core of the curriculum
This 'notional curriculum' is divided into ten learning focuses (or
'foci'). Six of these focuses are identified as 'foundation' focuses: these are
not the 'fancy stuff'; they are the broad skills or competencies that students
need to function in English, to communicate clearly and accurately, and they
are the competencies they need across the curriculum.It is not implied that the foundation focuses need to be mastered before the others are given attention, but that they should probably be attended to first and should never be neglected or taken for granted: learners need to keep developing their skills in these areas throughout their years in education.
A. Foundation focuses:
1. Spelling and
vocabulary
2. Handwriting
3. Sentences
4. Read fluently
and accurately
5. Meaning and
understanding
6. Information
handling
B. Building focuses:
7. Viewpoint and
influence
8. Engaging appropriately
9. Structure
10. Context
Organisation and rationale
The 'notional curriculum' is not
divided into reading, writing and speaking. The focuses have been designed
to take advantage of the inter-relatedness of these discrete modes. However,
teachers will often quite naturally concentrate on only one of these modes
during a lesson or lessons.
The purpose of
the notional curriculum is to simplify the curriculum for English, taking
close account of the draft National Curriculum
(2013), and to make it more understandable, particularly for students, their
parents, and non-English teachers. By emphasising the holistic nature of
language and language development, the notional curriculum will enable students
to develop a better appreciation of their progress in the subject as a whole.
In recent times English has become atomised. Students increasingly see
the subject content as random and unpredictable. They don't feel they have
enough control and choice. Meanwhile, teachers keep shifting the focus for
termly attainment measures: one term’s report is derived from four assessment focuses (AFs), but the
following terms’ reports are based on quite different focuses. As a result,
students, their parents and teachers are frustrated and infuriated by a wildly
fluctuating pattern of performance that perversely ignores the underlying
coherence of the subject. The learning
focuses of the notional curriculum
are meant to provide a joint, continuous and permanent focus, so that
students can keep getting better at English,
rather than at a series of disconnected assessment focuses (AFs).
This learning focus approach also describes – in some senses – a more
limited curriculum – a curriculum that is small enough to be stretched and
moulded in its particulars to suit the needs and interests of students. In
interviews with many students over the last year I have been struck by how ‘over-taught’
students in English feel. It is clear to me that a great many students feel
that tasks and processes are over-prescribed and over-scaffolded. Students want
much more choice over what to do and how to do it. They want to try stuff out,
make mistakes and get help. They want more open-ended tasks. They want the time
and opportunity to practise and master the skills they consider to be important: they do not want to race from AF to
AF at the tyrannical behest of their teacher or the English department’s scheme
of learning. They want some real control, and they want the chance to be proud
of what they do and how well they do it. They might be happy to write a
publicity leaflet for a theme park, but they might want to write a horror story
instead to develop the same skills. These are just different, equally-valid contexts
for the use of English. Students need an English curriculum that supports continuity and
development in transferable skills, not a curriculum that encourages a
proliferation of contexts.
Of course, setting students free to do what they want would not be a
good thing. Chaos and very haphazard progress would be the result. Roughly
speaking, we have been there before. However, if we can be informed by a
curriculum that helps us to work with
students rather than against them, then they cannot be a bad thing. It is this happy
situation that the notional curriculum set out below hopes to facilitate.
The Notional
Curriculum for English 2013
Overall aim
Students should experience, study and enjoy a wide range of texts and
speech, drawn from varied eras, places, cultures and genres, so that students can appreciate the dyamic, creative and transformational potential of language.
Students should learn and become proficient in the conventions of
English so that they can communicate powerfully, appropriately and efficiently.
Learning focus detail:
Students should learn
l To spell an
increasingly complex range of words correctly
l To improve their
own spelling through helpful strategies
Students should learn
l To write legibly
and quickly
l To type with
reasonable speed and with few errors
3. Sentences
Students should learn
l To write
accurate and well-controlled sentences
l To design
sentences for deliberate effect
l To punctuate
correctly and effectively
4. Read fluently
and accurately
Students should learn
l To convert print
and handwriting into the corresponding sounds, syllables and words
l To decode print
fluently and accurately
l To choose and
use appropriate reading methods, including skimming and scanning
5. Meaning and understanding
Students should learn
l To recognise
intended meanings
l To appreciate
subtleties of tone and meaning
l To infer and
interpret
l To make
themselves clear
l To imply and
make provisional suggestions
l To offer and
develop complex and subtle ideas
6. Information handling
Students should learn
l To design
research
l To find
information efficiently
l To evaluate
sources
l To summarise and
collate
l To present
Students should learn
l To recognise
overt and implied points of view
l To recognise how
writers and speakers influence readers and listeners
l To influence
readers and listeners
l To justify views
through reasoning and evidence
8. Engaging
appropriately
Students should learn
l To speak and
write in ways that suit purpose, audience and context
l To speak and
write in formal, standard English (when appropriate)
l To choose
effective, appropriate vocabulary and style
l To appreciate
how and why writers and speakers choose language and style
l To engage and
sustain the interest of readers and listeners
9. Structure
Students should learn
l To organise
material effectively into sections and paragraphs
l To sequence
material helpfully and effectively
l To appreciate
how form and structure support meaning and effect
10. Context
Students should learn
l How language
changes through time
l How language
varies according to place, class, occupation, etc
l How the meaning
of texts and utterances differs according to culture, era, etc.
l How to match
speech and writing to context
l How preferred
language forms are determined by social, political and economic power
l How technology
affects language use and language change
