Homeschooling For English In A Pandemic - Some Suggestions

Scrolling through Facebook, I see the same types of posts and memes time and time again about the difficulties faced by parents and carers in engaging their children with their schoolwork - so I thought I`d offer my many years of experience to help show you how to engage your child with their English work and make homeschooling successful! At the end of each `tip`, I have cross-referenced to where these skills will fit within the UK English curriculum - a lot of this will still be relevant for IB/International curricula.

1. Focus on things they enjoy and use this as a `hook` into their learning. For example if they are a huge fan of something like Roblox or Fortnite, ask them about what happens in the game, the gaming world, the characters, etc. Then you could do English language activities around such things as:

a) Create a new Fortnite character. Draw the character, and use words to describe the character. Then write their `back story` - where they came from, who their friends are, who their enemies are, what powers or weapons they have to hand, their strengths and weaknesses. Then use this as the basis of a short story featuring that character in the Roblox world, going on an adventure. (KS1/2/3 - descri ptive writing, creative writing GCSE English Language Paper 1, Section B - creative writing)

b) Get them to draw up a list of the pros and cons of spending a lot of time on computer games. Use this list as the basis of a speech to present to their friends/classmates about the value of/problems with computer games. They could either take a strong side one way or the other, or offer a balanced argument. Focus on using some key language techniques, like alliteration, facts, opinions, rhetorical questions and rule of three (they might have learnt a mnemonic at school such as PERSUADER or AFOREST for this purpose - use it). (KS1/2/3 - writing to argue/persuade GCSE English Language Paper 2, Section B - writing to give a viewpoint)

c) Find and print out an article online about the computer game/topic they like - then use this as the basis for language analysis. Using a highlighter to pick out the topic sentences (this will have been taught at KS2 - but basically a topic sentence is a sentence that summarises the whole paragraph and usually comes first in the paragraph). They could also then pick out the five most important language techniques, such as simile, metaphor, repetition, alliteration, etc. and explain how these make the reader feel about the topic and why (an easy way of focusing on the effect of language). Talk is very good here - rather than get them to write down their answers in full, maybe question them: Why do you think that this would make the reader sad? What else might it make them feel? Why? Building a spoken response can easily be developed into a written response and I will talk about how to flesh out that written response later. (KS2/3 Analysing language GCSE English Language Paper 1, question 2, 4 English Language Paper 2, question 3, 4)

On top of this, you could also focus on the beginning, middle and end of the article - what is their opening idea? How do they develop this idea or change it in the article? What sort of thing do they conclude the article with? What topic does each paragraph deal with (again, focusing back on the topic sentences). (KS3 - Analysing structure GCSE English Language Paper 1, question 3, 4 English Language Paper 2, question 4)

2. Reading, reading, reading! If there`s one thing I dearly wished my English students would do more often, that thing would be reading! It doesn`t have to be sitting at a desk reading Dickens or Shakespeare though - broadsheet or tabloid newspapers can provide plenty of rich pickings for reading activities and development of their skills of analysis and evaluation. For more able/older students, I would focus on using broadsheet newspapers as these have a much broader vocabulary than tabloids - yet tabloids are much better for focusing on how arguments/comments are developed and use language in a much punchier way, which would be easier to identify for younger students or those who are struggling with the subject.

Reading short stories, or chapters of longer novels, can also be a good way into reading. Coming up with a list of questions to check their understanding can also help to ensure that they are reading and digesting the information:

Who is the main character? What do they look like? What is their personality like? Are they likeable or a villain? Why do you think this? What happens at the start of the story? What do you think will happen next? Why?

If Shakespeare is the order of the day - watch a film version - these plays were designed to be seen in performance! For younger viewers, be mindful of age ratings - some film versions of Shakespeare`s plays are 12A or 15, so a more approachable version would be the Animated Tales - available on DVD or Youtube if you look carefully! Watch and make notes on what happens in the story. Then pick out the ten most important events and create a poster or comic strip to consolidate understanding. Then write down the ten key events, cut out and use as an ongoing resource to check understanding of the order of the events.

Another thing you can do is a `chatterbox` - these are lovely to make and can help to consolidate understanding. Students create the `chatterbox` (if you don`t know how these are made, google it) and on the outside, maybe have four themes from the story, characters on the middle layer and key quotes or events on the third layer and then play the chatterbox - each turn should generate a theme/idea, character and key quote or event. The aim of the game is to join up all three in a sentence. You can also do this on a grid of 6 by 6 boxes, numbered 1-6 on the x and y axis. This version of the game needs a dice. You can join up two, or three or more ideas, depending on how much challenge you want to attempt! It`s a great way of making conceptual links between ideas, characters, etc. in Literary texts and can be used for other topics (Science, History, etc.). It can also be brought out to break up learning or if there is a gap in activities. (KS2/3 English Literature GCSE English Literature paper 1 and 2, A Level English Literature)

3. Finally, are they struggling to get their words down on paper? Use a whiteboard! These can be bought from the bigger supermarkets/homeware stores for a couple of pounds and I find them invaluable in my teaching/tutoring. They`re ideal for struggling writers to generate ideas on or to practice writing out their paragraphs before committing to paper, as they`re easier to check and correct errors than when writing. Some students, particularly those with MLDs/dyslexia, often having anxiety around writing on paper because they don`t want to make a lot of mistakes and for it to look scruffy - this alleviates some of that anxiety.

Anyway, I hope that these few ideas have given you some food for thought in these challenging times - or in the future, when your child is just flat-out refusing to engage with their English homework!