Hello Y10

Well done for your work today. Those of you that have been focused will be rewarded in the Controlled Assessment next week!

This week we looked at collecting information about the director, Paul Greengrass, other films about 9/11 and some other reviews. You should all have created your own success criteria for review writing.

For your homework, ready for Friday, you need to ensure that you have finished this note-taking and have created a success criteria. You also need to create a word bank of useful words that you could take in as notes. Remember, using very or really needs to be better; you're aiming for unusual/dramatic verbs and adjectives. Finally, you need to take a few notes on paragraph topics. What information might you include in your paragraphs? What do other review writers do to organise their paragraphs?

That might seem like a lot, but really it's just revision of what we've been doing since the beginning of the school year. You have produced some amazing work in your draft books.

Look at the links in the last post if you feel that you need some help with vocabulary or semi-colons.

Big well done again!
Ms Caldwell :)

Hello Y10

This week we have looked at sentence construction and variety. It is essential to consider this as we move towards our controlled assessment; you are marked on your ability to use a range of sentences to control the pace and flow of your writing, organise the text and be interesting/engaging.

We looked particularly at semi-colons, colons, parenthesis and the subordinate clause. We saw how layering clauses was good for adding extra information to show understanding. We also looked at how this made writing interesting and engaging as it made particular aspects of the writing stand out.

I have also found a semi-colon game that you can play online. I know, it's very exciting! Click here to have a quick play; it will help increase your confidence with this very special piece if punctuation.

Your homework is to write two paragraphs reviewing United 93. Ensure that you look at the little success criteria cards to guide your writing; it is also imperative that you look at the target I have given you. Remember that your writing should be engaging, think about vocabulary choices. If in doubt, look at the reviews you have stuck in your books. Your paragraphs should contain a similar amount of information. Practicing writing in this way will improve your ability to write well in the controlled assessment.

Finally, it's very important that you keep your book tidy and organised; please stick in any loose sheets.

Well done for the hard work you've put in this week; you've worked very well indeed.

See you next week,

Ms Caldwell

P.S. Remember, some people think that colons don't matter: colons matter.

Hello Y10

Last week we looked at how reviews are organised, their content and sentence variation. This will continue to be our focus this week as we move towards controlled assessement next week.

With Mrs Dolan on Friday you looked at sentence variety, specifically complex sentences and their effects. Your homework was to write at least one paragraph, taking into account your targets from peer assessment, about United 93. You will need these paragraphs for our next lesson.

I hope you've had a lovely weekend,

Ms Caldwell

HI Y10

Sorry, I keep getting Error 503!

The quickest way for me to do this is to give you a hyper link to the other class's page - the other side! I'll explain tomorrow, but a problem with Blogger it seems...
Click here to find out the terminology for tomorrow's lesson.

BTW: As you can tell, my day has not got any better!

Ms Caldwell

Hello Y10,

We've had an excellent start to Y10 and your GCSE English course. Well done.

Last week, we looked at Simon Armitage's poem Out of the Blue, read by Rufus Sewell. This is a very moving reading and production of the poem; you discussed the performance and issues well in your groups.

This week, we'll look at media techniques and terminology. You've already started to look at film reviews and we'll aim to start to consider the features of good review writing. This will lead us to write our own reviews later this term.

Hope you've had a good weekend.
Ms Caldwell
P.S. I'm having a few problems with the formatting of this post; I apologise for its distinct lack of perfection!

Hello Y10,

It was great to meet you all today. You worked really well as team players and as a class. I was particularly impressed by your group presentations. I do understand that many of you don't like standing up and talking to the class so you were very impressive; we will do a lot of it though so it's good to get used to it from the start.

Your homework is to find an item or think of a word that best describes you for tomorrow's lesson. This will help me get to know you.

You may also be interested in this link to the programme that was shown on Saturday night called 102 minutes that changed America. Click here for the link to 4OD.

See you tomorrow.

Ms Caldwell

Welcome to your Y10 Blog!

Hello Y10/Parents and Guardians

Welcome to the blog for 10LM English. This website is a place where we can post information about how the class is getting on, what we are learning and what work needs to be completed at home. It will be helpful for all of us and will make sure we are all clear about the learning that's going on in Y10. Y10 is a busy year!

We are launching straight into your GCSE coursework. This year, coursework is done in class as controlled assessments; your self-management skills will need to be spot on so this blog will be an accessible tool for your independant learning.

We look forward to working with you.

Ms Caldwell and Mrs Dolan