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Summer19Welcome to our redesigned NATENEWS - brimming with important updates, features, opportunities, resources and news items to support the English teaching community.

NATENEWS

Jonathan MorganDirector of NATE

It’s been an incredibly hectic, productive and immensely rewarding few months at NATE as a result our magnificent conference and our developments regionally and nationally. We are also looking forward to our Primary Matters conference in November and soon hope to have details of the future CPD we can offer. Please complete our annual survey as we hope to provide you with a voice to shape the future of English teaching. We are pleased to be working collaboratively with our collegaues within the English teaching community in responding to the OFSTED changes and concerns over take up of English post 16. Have a well-deserved break and good luck to all your exam students during August. We will keep you updated via our website and social media platforms.

Contents

• Annual Survey

• Conference

• Harold Rosen

• Employability

• TeachMeets

• Opportunities

• Publications

• Research

• Primary

• ITE

• Our team

We hope that you take this opportunity to:

• inform the national debate on the future of English teaching in the current climate;

• evaluate how NATE can more effectively meet the needs of our members and the wider English community;

• provide your valued opinion on a range of key issues, including CPD, curriculum, assessment and teacher training;

• identify your own professional CPD needs.

Deadline: End of October 2019 half-term.

Connect with us via twitter @natefeed, our website and facebook.

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Conference 2019Our annual conference last month in Chester was an outstanding success, due to the wonderful line-up of speakers, including Professor of Shakespeare Studies, Emma Smith, best selling author, Frank Cottrell-Boyce and performance poet, Luke Wright. They all provided insight, inspiration and entertainment in equal measure. We have already had some exceptional feedback from delegates too. If you were not able to make it this year, don’t worry, as we will be providing a whole range of materials from the conference over the summer, including workshop materials.

You can watch our Conference video here

Feedback from delegates:

I have taken lots of resources and potential teaching methods which will influence my future classroom practice.

It’s such a great platform for networking with others who are equally passionate about English in education.

All four of the sessions I attended were brilliant.

Very valuable- given me many different approaches to narrative writing that I did not have before.

I have walked away full of ideas for my department to make great adaptations to our teaching of writing. Highly valuable.

I have been enthused by the general atmosphere and by networking with teachers and academic with a range of experiences.

The conference has given me a strengthened sense of purpose.

Have already started pulling ideas together to use this term and beyond.

It was a moment of calm and an opportunity for reflection - thank you.

It was my first time and I found the conference to be hugely beneficial and inspiring.

Conference 2020

We are currently exploring options for our next conference - please keep informed via our website and social media platforms.

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Conference 2019

NATE Awards

We would like to congratulate our award winners who have been deservedly recognised for their contributions to NATE and the wider English teaching community.

Trevor MillumOutstanding

contribution to NATE

Barbara BleimanOutstanding

contribution to the Teaching of English

Marcello GiovanelliThe Terry Furlong Research Award

Rachel RobertsThe NATE

Research Award

The Harold Rosen lecture - Barbara Bleiman (EMC)

If we want our subject to thrive and grow, if we want students to choose to study it at A Level and at university, and if we want students to do well at GCSE, this is what it has to be – a subject with genuine intellectual interest, that brings students on board, that takes them and their own contributions seriously and allows them to take a full part in the conversation. It’s what made the subject one we all chose to do ourselves and they have an entitlement to that. We shouldn’t expect them to settle for anything less.

Barbara Bleiman NATE Conference 2019

One of the many highlights from our conference was the outstanding lecture delivered by Barbara Bleiman who provided many insights and a range of practical and inspiring ideas that can be used with students of all abilities. This is a must-see for all new and experienced teachers of English. You can watch the lecture here and read the transcript and powerpoint on the EMC website.

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NATE collaborates with The Common English Forum in defending the employability of English graduates. You can read our collective response below and continue the debate via @natefeed

We’d like to assure teachers, students and Laura McInerney The misguided obsession with STEM subjects is to blame for the decline in English A-levels that the organisations that support the discipline of English have been addressing this issue head-on since 2017. For example, we have collaborated to produce material to counter myths and misinformation about the subject (available at the English and Media Centre website); we have held discussions with the Department for Education; and we have canvassed across the sector (the most recent annual survey is on the National Association for the Teaching of English website).

Employers really rate English and the skills it teaches: English graduates are successful in a very broad range of graduate careers. Our Action on Employability in English event on 16 September at Northumbria University will challenge the misrepresentations of the subject that McInerney highlights. The huge English: Shared Futures celebration and conference in Manchester, in June 2020, will be addressing this topic constructively too. Responding to wide-ranging evidence that student dissatisfaction with the new GCSE has discouraged many from continuing to A-level, we are also lobbying for a richer experience of the subject at GCSE: the curriculum in English should mean much more than exam preparation.

Barbara Bleiman Editor, English and Media Centre, Martin Halliwell President, English Association, Rob Penman Chair, English Association, Jennifer Richards English Association HE committee, Sean McEvoy, Robert Eaglestone English Association, Katy Shaw, Gail Marshall University English, Clare Lees Director, Institute of English Studies, Jonathan Morgan Director, National Association for the Teaching of English, Seraphima Kennedy The Director, National Association of Writers in Education, David Duff Chair, Common English Forum and four others (see gu.com/letters)

https://www.theguardian.com/education/2019/jul/17/the-value-of-an-english-degree-in-the-graduate-job-market

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NATE Teachmeets

NATE can support you to provide networking and CPD for English teachers (KS1-5) within your region.

How to organise a NATE Teachmeet: • use a local school as a venue for a meeting space and refreshments

• ask for contributions from attendees—providing excellent CPD

• invite a keynote speaker—NATE may be able to provide one too

• set up the meeting, using Eventbrite (NATE can support this)

• provide a carousel of activities

• include practical resources

• make it a joint ventures with others

You can help by: • becoming a Regional Coordinator

• offering your school as a venue

• delivering a session at one of the meetings

We look forward to hearing about how we can promote, share and support the fantastic work within English & Literacy at all key stages.

Contact our Regional Activities Officer, Christine Thomas at regions@nate.org.uk for further information and advice.

Providing opportunities for English teachers to network, share resources and support each other to develop teaching & learning within English & Literacy. (KS1-5)

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Opportunities for English teachers and students

Arvon runs an annual programme of creative writing courses and retreats for schools, groups and individuals. Our courses, tutored by leading authors, are held at three rural centres and include a powerful mix of workshops and individual tutorials, with time and space to write, free from distractions of everyday life. Arvon courses are in a range of genres and we have different styles of courses. Grants are available to help with course fees. Find out more here.

LATELONDON ASSOCATION FORTHE TEACHING OF ENGLISHOn 21st September LATE meets to plan the conferences for the next year and decide on any campaigning issues to address. LATE welcome anyone who would like to attend though make sure you let them them know so they can prepare enough to eat! The next conference is at the BFI in Waterloo on 7th December.

Podcasts have become a revolutionary force for entertainment and information - and are growing in popularity every year. Audiopi brings this powerful medium to education to support teachers, reduce workloads and help students throughout their GCSE and A-Level studies. We cover a wide range of texts for GCSE English Literature. Our series, written by experienced teachers and examiners, are built to the specification and have high production values. We include music and soundscapes, creating an inspiring and highly relevant resource for students, also designed to support the great work of teachers, both in and out of the classroom. Join some of the over 200 schools now using Audiopi. School subscriptions are available on a topic by topic basis making access to Audiopi highly affordable.

‘Students and teachers LOVE Audiopi’ - Sam Aston, Head of English, Scalby School Visit Audiopi.co.uk for more information and samples!

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Opportunities for English teachers and students

There are two wonderful new free resources which have recently been published on the British Library’s Discovering Literature website. The resources have been designed to encourage teachers to use their digital resource in more practical and dynamic ways with students. These have been produced in collobaration with Lucy Webster at the EMC.There’s one general Teacher’s Toolkit with all sorts of ideas that can be applied to any text; the other one focuses specifically on Macbeth, its critics and contexts.

The English Language List is an email-based discussion and support community for teachers of English; academics interested in making links between English A-Level and degree level courses and professionals working in related areas such as examining and educational publishing. Individual memebership is £18.00 per year.

Premium subscription has all of the benefits outlined above, but additionally allows an organisation to promote paid educational services via the list, with an unlimited number of members or employees of that organisation enrolled for one subscription price. £80.00 per year.

The English Language List owner Mark Boardman is currently undertaking a PHD on The ironic persona in the poems and letters of Emily Dickinson - a corpus based approach. Mark is the author of the Language of Websites (Routledge) and has vast experience of leading and advising on A Level English & Media.

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Some highlights from this term’s Teaching English magazine:

• James Durran demonstrates how to inject challenge at Key Stages 3 and 4, using Key Stage 2 knowledge about grammar

• Trevor Millum and Chris Warren remind us how to use ICT effectively in English lessons, and also continue their series on how to get kids responding creatively to poetry

• Barbara Bleiman of the English and Media Centre discusses how to teach a novel in ways that encourage students to respond, discuss and explore with enthusiasm

• Andy Goodwyn gives a beginner’s guide to classroom research, and there’s a series of articles focusing on what teachers found out when they did research in their own classrooms

• Beth Andrews Dawson reflects on what happened to her class’s reading scores when she encouraged group reading of whole novels

• … and much more!

Remember that IllumiNATE emails come to your inbox twice a month featuring strategies, activities and inspiration for your classroom. We are currently featuring NATE Chair Peter Thomas’s superb series ’ 12 Ways To ….’.

The last instalments were:

• 12 Ways to Teach 19th Century Novels• 12 Ways of Making Speaking and Listening Matter

Other recent IllumiNATEs have included:

• Teaching Wilfred Owen using the BL Discovering Literature site by the BL learning team• How to develop academic writing at KS3 by letting go of the PEE formula by Louise Enstone• Develop reading and inference skills through drama by Mick Connell

Publications updateGary Snapper Teaching English editor

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English in Education is NATE’s journal for sharing good practice with English educators worldwide. The journal has recently been redesigned and is now published by Routledge, who produce our series of professional books on English teaching. Particular attention has been paid to the design of the journal, which now has larger pages and a more attractive visual layout.

Global downloads of articles from the website http://bit.ly/EIE-current have increased by 75% over the last year. To keep pace, from next year (2020) we shall publish the journal four times a year, with more special issues on current and emerging topics. To mark the centenary of the first UK government report on the teaching of English, the autumn 2019 issue will focus on Newbolt and the Construction of Subject English. 2020 will bring two special issues, on Multilingualism and English Education and on Expertise in English Education. 2021 will include special issues on Literacy in a Post-Industrial City Region and on Social Media and English.

The Editors always welcome your ideas for topics, articles and creative pieces (particularly poems) on English teaching. Please see http://bit.ly/EiEaims-scope for author guidelines. We are currently running a survey to discover what you think are the key topics for research over the next decade. Please let us know your views at http://bit.ly/EIE-research-agenda. The password is set-agenda. If you’re not currently a member of NATE, joining will give you access to English in Education in print and online. In the meantime, you might like to sample the following articles that are available open-access: • How do librarians in school support struggling readers? by Margaret Merga. http://bit.ly/Merga-

librarians • Reading as enactment: transforming Beowulf through drama, film and computer game by Jane Coles

& Theo Bryer. http://bit.ly/Coles-Beowulf• The Politics of Testing by Bethan Marshall. http://bit.ly/Marshall-Testing• What does a good one look like? Marking A level scripts in relation to others by Victoria Elliott.

http://bit.ly/Elliott-goodone

Members of NATE will have received an email from the publishers with an access code. If you have any queries, go to the members’ area on the website or email the Editor at john.hodgson@uwe.ac.uk.

Research updates John Hodgson English in Education editor

The photographs below come from the spring 2019 special issue on Writing.

Remember that IllumiNATE emails come to your inbox twice a month featuring strategies, activities and inspiration for your classroom. We are currently featuring NATE Chair Peter Thomas’s superb series ’ 12 Ways To ….’.

The last instalments were:

• 12 Ways to Teach 19th Century Novels• 12 Ways of Making Speaking and Listening Matter

Other recent IllumiNATEs have included:

• Teaching Wilfred Owen using the BL Discovering Literature site by the BL learning team• How to develop academic writing at KS3 by letting go of the PEE formula by Louise Enstone• Develop reading and inference skills through drama by Mick Connell

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Many primary schools are taking an approach which puts quality texts at the heart of the curriculum, with an increased emphasis on reading for pleasure. Schools are in the process of overhauling their curricula in preparation for the Education Inspection Framework which comes into force in September 2019. This framework includes a much more robust approach to judging the quality of education and will always include, in all primary schools, a ‘deep-dive’ into the teaching of reading.

The deep dive includes the following elements:

• evaluation of senior leaders’ intent for the curriculum in this subject or area, and their understanding of its implementation and impact

• evaluation of curriculum leaders’ long- and medium-term thinking and planning, including the rationale for content choices and curriculum sequencing

• visits to a deliberately and explicitly connected sample of lessons

• work scrutiny of books or other kinds of work produced by pupils who are part of classes that have also been (or will also be) observed by inspectors

• discussion with teachers to understand how the curriculum informs their choices about content and sequencing to support effective learning

• discussions with a group of pupils from the lessons observed.

Vocabulary continues to be a high priority in many primary schools. Following on from the evidence-based Education Endowment Fund’s Improving Literacy reports of October 2018, the recommendations for developing pupils’ language capability to support reading and writing has been reiterated and strengthened in their latest report Improving Literacy in Secondary Schools (July 2018).

Schools are addressing this by focusing on reading for pleasure, exposing pupils to high quality texts and through the explicit teaching of vocabulary. Sound advice based on empirical evidence such as the EEF publications, rather than reactive comments which are prolific on social media, are essential reading in primary schools.

9:00 Registration, refreshments and exhibition

9:25 Welcome address: Jonathan Morgan, Director of NATE

9:30 Keynote: Reading into Writing and Back Again JAMES CLEMENTS (Author and educational consultant – Teaching English by the Book, Shakespeare & more)

10:20 Keynote: CREATIVITY - The Essential Science Hilary will talk about how children’s books can help us develop creative skills to help us navigate dilemmas and find solutions. HILARY ROBINSON (Author – Where the Poppies now Grow, Peace Lily, Jasper)

11:00 Refreshments, exhibition and networking

11:15 Workshops Bob Cox

Opening Doors to Poetry: A Maze of Meaning

Maddy Barnes What happens when children read?

Michelle Nicholson Spelling SOS

12:10 Keynote: PIE CORBETT (Author and educational consultant)

13:00 Lunch, exhibition and networking

13:55 Workshops Suzanne Horton

Reading at Greater Depth Ruth Baker-Leask Leading English (advice on how to lead English in light of the new framework)

Rachel Clarke ...and they all went home for tea. Looking at narrative structure in children's stories

14:50 Keynote: JOHN DOUGHERTY (Author, poet, songwriter – Stinkbomb and Ketchup-Face)

15:45 Closing speech and prize draw: Peter Thomas, NATE Chair

16:00 Event close

NATE Primary Matters

conference Proposed Schedule

http://bit.ly/nateprimaryconference

Primary updates Janet Gough Primary Matters editor

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English Shared Futures 2020 is an exciting international conference planned for 26th-28th June 2020 in Manchester. Spanning the different strands of ‘English’ (including literature, language, linguistics and creative writing), the 2020 conference looks like an amazing event for teachers and lecturers of the English discipline. This will include a day focused on the school teaching of English and NATE will be involved in this aspect of the conference. More details can be found here: https://www.englishsharedfutures.uk/

The NATE ITE committee will be holding its annual one-day conference on 21st November at the EMC buildings in London. Aimed at those supporting the training of secondary English teachers, the day will focus on the pedagogy of writing. More details will be released soon.

Look out for the special Teacher Education edition of Teaching English in the members’ area as it has a range of helpful advice for PGCE students and tutors.

NATE welcomes new teachers to the profession Our Director, Jonathan Morgan had the pleasure of speaking at the recent Now Teach conference and welcoming the new cohort of English teachers into the profession - congratulations to the 2018 graduates. Jonathan was delighted to meet the new Teach First students at Manchester University last month as they embark on the first stage of their teaching career. If you are involved in teacher training and would like to hear more about NATE, please contact Jonathan director@nate.org.uk and he will be pleased to come and talk to your students and introduce what NATE has to offer.

English Shared Futures & ITE updatesRachel Roberts ITE Committee Chair

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NATE MembershipIf you are a NATE member, remember that you receive all the benefits below. If you would like to join, please visit NATE’s membership page or ring our membership team on 0330 333 5050. We have a range of membership options - details and prices are on the following page.

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Free until 31st Aug 2020, then upgraded

to INDIVIDUAL membership.

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Following our AGM, we are delighted that we have retained the high level of expertise within our managment team and we look forward to developing our committees over the coming months. Our updated Officer list is below:

NATE’s Managment Team

Director Jonathan MorganChair Peter Thomas Vice Chair Raina ParkerPast Chair Alison SmithTreasurer (and Trustee) Barbara Conridge Secretary (and Trustee) Mick ConnellResearch Officer Andy Goodwyn Regional Activities Officer Christine Thomas

NATE Committee members

ITE • Rachel Roberts (Chair) • Lorna Smith • Francis Gilbert• Fiona Darby• John Perry• Bethan Marshall• Mari Cruice.

Post 16/HE • John Hodgson (Chair) • Gary Snapper • Ann Harris• Carol Atherton • Marcello Giovanelli • Ian Cushing• Yvonne Williams• Susan Cockcroft

Primary • David Gibbons (Chair) • Joanne Robinson

Multi-cultural • Stuart Scott (Chair)• Valerie Coultas

NATE’s Managment Team & Committee members

Publications:

Primary Matters: Janet Gough

Teaching English & illumiNATE : Gary Snapper

English in Education: John Hodgson

NATENEWS: Jonathan Morgan

NATENET: Raina Parker