World Cup Literacy Club: Session One as I see it.

It’s fair-and accurate- to say that many of the ideas I post on here aren’t necessarily suitable for your average English class of 33 students of whom some are male and some are female. Sorry but it’s the truth.

So, I’ve decided I’m going to run a World Cup Literacy Club during the 6 weeks prior, during and after the World Cup in Brazil this June. (15 days to go.) This club, I decided, was to be by invite only and will be aimed at improving the reading attitudes of a number of that most obstreperous of creatures: Boys. In fact, I thought, why not really let yourself in for something? Year 9 boys.

And so, with nothing but a rabid desire to impress, I ventured onto the Year 9 playground last week and found the boys I was looking for. I’m not going to go into too much detail about the boys and the type of students they are, or are perceived to be, for obvious reasons but let’s just say that each of the boys I spoke to wanted to come to my club so they can, and I quote, “show everyone what they can do when they have a go.” As if that wasn’t enough to put a mile-wide grin on my face, the boys asked that the club be held on a Monday, “so they have something to look forward to.” 

So, here’s what’s going to happen, as I see it, on Monday 9th June, 3 days before the World Cup kicks off.

1.10pm

Welcome the boys in, ask them to sign the team sheet and get them to fill out a quick survey on attitudes towards reading. I’ll use this later to see if I’ve had any positive impact on the boys’ approach to reading; 6 weeks is, in my opinion, to short a time frame to measure a change in attainment but an improvement in attitudes towards reading would have huge implications: all research suggests improved attitudes to reading result in improved attainment in reading and writing over time. 

1.20pm

Paper Talk. I’m going to give each of the boys (there’s ten of them by the way) a present: a copy of The Sun newspaper minus the third page.

(Just a thought – could I say at this point: “Any of you boys Liverpool supporters?” as I hold the copies of The Sun hesitantly in my hands. “No? Okay just thought I’d check because of the whole Hillsborough thing…” This could then lead onto a discussion of the tragedy and an exploration of the poem, The Ballad of Hillsborough at a later date…Just a thought.)

Anyways, I’m going to give each of the boys a copy of the paper and ask them to read any article(s) they so wish from the Sports section so long as it is football related. What I will also ask them to do is to highlight anything that is a ‘Nailed It’ or a ‘Head’s Gone.’

Nailed It: an opinion from a journalist or the actions of an individual player/manager/agent that the student thinks is absolutely brilliant. For example, a journalist writes that Mauricio Pocchetino needs to work on improving Roberto Soldado’s goal tally – Nailed It!

 

Head’s Gone: an opinion from a journalist or the actions of an individual player/manager/agent that the student thinks is absolutely barmy. For example, the student reads that Yaya Toure is threatening to leave Manchester City because the club officials didn’t buy him a birthday cake – Head’s Gone!

 

1.35pm

After a discussion of the Paper Talk I’m then going to show students a number of phrases: 

It’s lashing with rain and thunderstorms are rumbling in the distance.

 

Hacked down

 

Dangerous Position

 

  Stirring counterattack

 

Charged upfield

 

Ferocious counterattack

 

Slicing them open

 

Tearing them apart with every attack

 

…trudge forward in the rain…

 

I’ll ask the boys what they make of the phrases and hopefully we’ll get onto the fact that the phrases use imagery you’d commonly associate with war. I’ll then explain to the boys that phrases come from Sean Ingle’s report of the Spain vs Russia World Cup Qualifier from the Guardian website. I’ll ask the boys why they think football journalists would choose to use such imagery and maybe we’ll do a bit on metaphors and similes.

And that’s it.

World Cup Wall Display – Love Football: Love Reading.

This photo shows a World Cup Wall Display that I knocked up in just 40 minutes at school today:

 

Eight different English Teachers, upon seeing my finished display, declared it to resemble: a sheep-cow, a pyramid head (don’t know either) or ‘perspectively flawed.’ Charming.

Needless to say I was very pleased to see, upon my return to my classroom at the end of a busy Friday, that two of my colleagues had taken it upon themselves to do me a goal that doesn’t look like a grazing animal. With real netting! Here it is:

My decision to create a World Cup wall display was fully inspired by the amazing World Cup Toolkit released this week by the National Literacy Trust. The link to this wonderful-and free- resource, aimed at encouraging children to read using football, or more specifically, the world cup as a ‘way in’ (sound familiar?), can be found by clicking on the link below. My only regret is that I didn’t think of any of the amazing ideas within it, myself! 

http://www.literacytrust.org.uk/schools_teaching/world_cup_2014

Right, so here’s how my World Cup display is going to work:

The Goal Posts: Pupils will be encouraged to give me mini reviews, which they will write onto paper footballs, about a book (doesn’t have to be football related) that they have read. If it’s a good book their ‘review football’ goes in the goal; if it’s a book which inspires neither love nor hate then their ‘review football’ is whacked on the cross bar; finally, if the book is the literary equivalent to Jordan’s love life then that ‘review football’ is flyin’ wide. Well wide. 

World Cup Reading Selfies: In the middle of my display, i’ll be encouraging pupils to read newspaper articles, web articles, comics, books or magazines relating to this year’s World Cup and taking a photo of themselves doing so. They do this, their selfie goes on the wall.

Football Metaphors, Cliches and Similes: On the far right of my board I will be encouraging students (this is where KS4 comes in) to find footballing Metaphors, Cliches or Similes in magazine or newspaper match reports. Students that find the best, get their name and the (offending) metaphor, cliche or simile on the wall. Also, students will also be encouraged to listen out for interesting metaphors or similes during match commentary. Again, the ones I like will go on the wall.

Hope you’re inspired. If you’re not, here’s the link again. Try it

http://www.literacytrust.org.uk/schools_teaching/world_cup_2014

 

Premier League Reading Stars

Premier League Reading Stars is a reading intervention scheme jointly developed by The National Literacy Trust and the Premier League, aimed at improving reading attainment in ensuring that pupils in Years 5 and 6 meet expected KS2 targets. The scheme can also be used with pupils in Years 7 and 8 that haven’t yet met KS2 targets.

Like LastMinutePen, Premier League Reading Stars aims to foster and develop a love of reading in pupils via the world of football. A teacher pack is available which provides resources for a 10 week course for 32 pupils. The project claims that the following improvements have been found in just 10 weeks of students’ undergoing the project:

• 3 out of 4 children made at least 6 months’ progress in just 10 weeks. 1 child in 3 made a year’s progress, or more
• The number of children who enjoy reading ‘very much’ tripled as a result of taking part
• The number of children who read every day doubled
• 7 out of 10 say that they are now proud to be readers
• Nearly half joined their public library
• 2 out of 3 say that as a result of taking part they now have a favourite author
• Nearly 9 out of 10 participants said that seeing Premier League footballers read has made them want to read more
• Those who took part were 10 times more likely to progress in reading than similar children who didn’t  take part 

(http://www.literacytrust.org.uk/premier_league_reading_stars/practitioners/information_for_senior_leaders)

The teacher’s pack comes at a cost of £150 and I have not yet had the opportunity to test it out. Certainly, the information on the scheme’s website seems as though it is more geared towards a KS2 audience which means I don’t anticipate that I’d be able to use it in my own practice. We’ll see. 

Teacher’s pack aside, the project’s site also contains an ‘Online Challenges’ section in which anybody can access a number of reading challenges, each set by a different Premier League Footballer (meaning student’s can ‘collect’ the challenges as they would football stickers) which aim to improve students’ comprehension skills. These challenges cost nothing. Furthermore, they are also differentiated according to difficulty (you can choose from Professional, Word Class, or Legendary just like you can on the Fifa football games) which means students can opt for the challenge that suits them best and then work their way up to the highest level. 

So what about the challenges? Excellent. Upon reaching the challenge homepage (http://www.literacytrust.org.uk/plrs_2014_home) students are met with the smiling faces of 20 different players (one from each different premier league club) each of whom has 3 challenges for students to take part in. By clicking on a player you are asked to choose one of the challenges. I clicked on Jan Vertonghen’s  challenge page (because he’s Mighty Spurs of course) and selected the easiest challenge: Professional Level. Upon clicking the challenge I was then shown a video in which a slightly wooden (okay, positively mahogany) Jan read aloud an extract from Andros Townsend’s (another Spurs star) player profile page from the team website. Once I’d listened to Jan’s reading I then had to answer three questions based on the extract. So far, so good. But I haven’t read anything yet right? Correct. However, question 3 can only be answered once you’ve read the extract that Jan was reading, yourself. So, scrolling down to the bottom of the page I found the extract, read it, and answered question 3. Goal! (That means I got it right.)

As you click on through the harder challenges the extracts become increasingly more difficult. And the extracts are not always football based. Jan Vertonghen’s ‘Legendary’ challenge asked me to listen/read an extract from Dareen Shan’s Zom-B. Whoever came up with the texts, know what students want. This is good stuff.

I’m going to email National Literacy Trust and see if they can send me a £150 resource pack for free and I can let you know what it’s like. In the meantime however, do check out the Online Challenge section of the website with some of your struggling pupils. You never know, it may well do exactly what it claims to do on the tin!

Here’s the link again:

http://www.literacytrust.org.uk/plrs_2014_home

 

 

The Vital 3 Points: A summary of the weekend’s football news in 3 bullet points

Right, here goes:

 

• Spectacularly, Chelsea (2nd in the league) lost to Sunderland (bottom of the league) meaning that Chelsea look increasingly less likely to snatch the title out of Liverpool’s grasp. Do say: “What a season it’s been. Chelsea losing to Sunderland! You just never know do you?”
• This loss led Chelsea’s manager, Jose Mourinho to provide a typically churlish post match interview in which he sarcastically congratulated Mike Riley (Premier League Referee Boss) on being ‘Absolutely Fantastic’ in making the premier league exciting this year. Do say: “Although Sunderland did win an unfair penalty, Chelsea have won a few too! West Brom anyone?” 

Watch the full interview here: 

 

 

• Tottenham Manager Tim Sherwood reacted angrily to questions from the BBC about leaving Brazillian Midfielder, Sandro, out of his squad. Sherwood has previously stated that Sandro was injured. However, prior to the game against Fulham (which Spurs won 3-1), Sandro tweeted the world to announce that the manager was lying; he wasn’t injured. Sherwood, upon hearing this news, explained in no unclear terms that Sandro wasn’t good enough to get into the squad. Sandro later tweeted, ‘LOL!!!’ Do say: “Players need to stay away from Twitter. Joey Barton is proof enough of that fact!”

Watch the Sherwood interview here:

 

 

 

 

 

The Ballad of Hillsborough

Many students will have heard of the Hillsborough disaster but few will have had any real emotional awareness of the event. i used the poem, ‘ The Ballad of Hillsborough’ in a lesson with some Year 9 students who were studying the Ballad form of poetry.

You have to watch how you play this one; at times I had to prevent myself from being florid in my description of the disaster. Sometimes, when you see the kids in front of you are genuinely interested in what you’re saying, it can be hard not to get carried away.  But, there’s nothing worse than people who exploit death for any sort of gain so just watch it. 

Anyway, here’s the poem. Use it in what way you will:

 

THE BALLAD OF HILLSBOROUGH

The Liverpool supporters
Were given the smaller end;
Crammed behnd the goalmouth,
The fans were tightly penned – 

Penned, penned in their thousands,
Penned in under the sky
No one there had reckoned
That ninety-five would die.

The barriers all buckled,
They couldn’t take the strain
The cheers of jubilation
Turned into cries of pain.

And when at last they noticed,
The police unlocked a gate,
But the exit was too narrow,
And they’d opened it too late
The nation watched in horror,
Stunned with disbelief
As the shadows from the goalmouth
Stained a football pitch with grief.

An inquiry has been opened
To find out who’s to blame,
But for those who lost their dear ones
Nothing will be the same.

For nothing brings the dead back,
Post mortems, flowers or prayers,
It’s like reaching the top of the stairwell
And finding there are no stairs.

That drop into the darkness
Goes down and down and down;
And grief’s black water well there,
Inviting you to drown.

Never to see your loved ones,
Or hear them on the phone – 
It’s hard to believe when it happens
That you’ll never walk alone.
But down at the Kop at Anfield,
The goalmouth shows it’s true:
The scarves around the crossbar
Are knotted red and blue.

Despite divided loyalties
Liverpool loved its own,
And every tribute there proclaims:
You’ll never walk alone – 
Not by the banks of the Mersey
Nor down the terraced streets;
Beneath the great cathedrals
A city’s warm heart beats.

And now in the cold spring sunset,
The Liver Bird’s aflame
The Phoenix rose from the ashes;
A city can do the same.
Simon Rae

 

I focused largely on the the rhyme scheme when I studied the poem. It was interesting to see student opinion on why a poem which describes such a tragic disaster would have such a ‘sing song’ feel to it, as created by the rhyme in the ballad. If this is an avenue that you’d like to pursue then do consider:

• The Ballad form as an oral form of poetry and the fact that rhyme would make an oratory performance easier to remember. 
• The frequent references to You’ll Never Walk Alone, another song which Liverpool fans have adapted as their own. Can singing provide a sense of catharsis? Show students this clip of Liverpool fans singing the song on the 25th anniversary match of the tragedy and you’ll probably agree that it certainly does: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x3UPeulnY
• If a poem rhymes does it not reach a wider audience that includes young people whom otherwise might find textual insights to the tragedy inaccessible? After all, we’re not studying newspaper articles on the tragedy are we? No, we’re studying the poem.
• What’s the effect of the Juxtaposition between the ‘sing song’ tone of the poem and the tragic content? Does it make the tragedy seem all the more shocking? Perhaps, perhaps not. 

Of course, there’s a plethora of other things you could use this poem for. What’s important is that if you use this poem, you use it sensitively. Good luck and let me know what you come up with.

Punctuation Pie: The Semi Colon (;)

If punctuation marks were footballers then the semi colon is Lionel Messi. For me, students that know how to use semi colons tend to be those students who write better than the rest. What does this mean? It means that even if your writing is crap, there’s always a chance you can fool me into thinking it isn’t. How? By using a semi colon. So listen up.

As with the colon, there are a number of ways the semi colon can be used:

• In complicated lists
• Joining closely related sentences
• Used in place of a connective

Here’s how it works.

In Complicated Lists

Semi colons can be used to separate things in complicated lists. Firstly, let me show you a list:

Contenders for the worst footballing haircut of the year award are Marouane Fellaini, Manchester United, Bacary Sagna, Arsenal, Marouane Chamakh, Crystal Palace and Gervinho, Roma.

Bit of a mess don’t you agree? If you knew nothing about football then you wouldn’t know what names were the names of players and what names were the names of clubs. Semi colons can be used to smarten things up:

Contenders for the worst footballing haircut of the year award are Marouane Fellaini, Manchester United; Bacary Sagna, Arsenal; Marouane Chamakh, Crystal Palace and Gervinho, Roma.

Joining closely related sentences

This is the easiest and most effective way to use semi colons I think.

Here we have two sentences that make perfect sense on their own:

Vincent Tan is foolish. He gave the ‘Bluebirds’ a red kit.

This example is fine. However, if we have two sentences (as in the example) that make perfect sense on their own which are closely related, then we can join them with a semi colon like so:

Vincent Tan is foolish; he gave the ‘Bluebirds’ a red kit.

Here’s another example:

Jose Mourinho is infuriating. He whines constantly.

Jose Mourinho is infuriating; he whines constantly.

See how the version with the semi-colon just looks…posher? Note that unless the word that follows the semi colon is a name of a place or person then you get rid of the capital letter.

Used in place of a connective

Finally, we can also use semi colons in place of connective words such as ‘and’, ‘because’, ‘so’, ‘as’ etc.

For example:

Jose Mourinho is infuriating because he whines constantly.

Jose Mourinho is infuriating; he whines constantly.

Right, that’s me done on semi colons.

Hope it helps.

Reference: http://www.bristol.ac.uk/arts/exercises/grammar/grammar_tutorial/page_05.htm

SEATING PLANS – Home and Away

An old classic this, which I can take no credit for, but it is tenuously linked to the beautiful game somehow so I thought I’d whack it on. 

Teachers, draw up two seating plans for your classes: one plan based on name/gender/ability as per usual and another in which students are free to sit with whoever they so choose.

Your seating plan is the HOME seating plan and theirs is the AWAY seating plan. Reward your pupils for good behaviour/work with an AWAY day every now and again. 

Hope the Easter hols are treating you well. 

 

 

Punctuation Pie: The Colon

The Colon ( : )

The colon is a very popular piece of punctuation but often used incorrectly. A bit like Wayne Rooney I guess. Colons can be used in 3 different ways:

• To introduce an idea
• To introduce a list
• To introduce quoted material

How about an explanation for each?

Colons to Introduce an Idea

Colons can be used to introduce an idea or thought.

Example 1: There’s only one thing you need to know about Arsene Wenger: He’s having a nightmare.

Example 2: Spurs are left with only one option: Keep winning games.

 

You must be aware that the clause (the phrase) before the colon must make sense on its own. If it doesn’t then you can’t use a colon.

People spend far more time than they should about whether to use a capital letter after a colon. I don’t think you know all the ins and outs; just ensure you stick to one rule consistently. I like to use capital letters after all my colons.

Colons to Introduce a List

The other main use of a colon is to introduce a list. Like before, the clause before the colon must make sense on its own.

Example 1:Some truly delightful human beings work at Chelsea Football Club: John Terry, Ashley Cole and Jose Mourinho.

 

See how ‘Some truly delightful human beings work at Chelsea Football Club’ makes sense on its own?

 

Example 2: Chelsea Football Club employ John Terry, Ashley Cole and Jose Mourinho.

 

A colon doesn’t work here because ‘Chelsea Football Club employ’ doesn’t make sense on its own.

 

Colons to Introduce Quoted Material

‘Quoted Material’ just means stuff that people say. Like when Joey Barton says, ‘Somewhere in those high echelons of NUFC, they have decided, I am persona non grata.’ (If you don’t know what that means then don’t worry; Joey probably doesn’t either.)

Lets look at an example:

Example 1: My favourite Jose Mourinho quotation is: “Omelettes, eggs. No eggs, no omelettes. And it depends on the quality of the eggs in the supermarket.”

Make sure that if you are using a colon to introduce speech, you begin the speech with a capital letter always.

 

Enjoy using Colons.

 

Starter: Word Squads

Get brains working by asking students to work out an 11 man football team where the names of each player must all begin with the same letter. Take my ‘S’ team for example:

Goalkeeper: Szczesny, Wojciech (ARSENAL)

Defender: Shaw, Luke (SOUTHAMPTON)

Defender:Smalling, Chris (MAN UTD)

Defender: Stones, John (EVERTON)

Defender: Sagna, Bacary (ARSENAL)

Mid:Schurrle, Andre (CHELSEA)

Mid:Snodgrass, Rob (NORWICH)

Mid:Sidwell, Steve (FULHAM)

Mid:Silva, David (MAN CITY)

Striker: Suarez, Luis (LIVERPOOL)

Striker: Sturridge, Daniel (LIVERPOOL)

 

Loads of variations you can use on this: A team full of players with animals in their names (LIONel Messi, Van WOLFSwinkel..) for example? You could test the spelling of words by making  pupils name a player whose name begins with each sequential letter. For example, ONOMATOPOEIA:

Oscar

Neuer

O

Mata

Adebayor

Terry

O ?

Podolski

O ?

Evra

Ibrahimovic

Anita

 

It’s difficult yes. But there’s a lot to be said for making things difficult. Read this if you don’t believe me:

http://www.learningspy.co.uk/featured/deliberately-difficult-focussing-on-learning-rather-than-progress/

P.S. Let me know if you get those O’s.

 

 

Reading Football Commentary

A great activity which asks students to read (yes, listening to footballing commentary still counts as reading; they are digesting the ‘text’ for information) and, if they are able, to recognise a number of figurative language devices.

Show students the clip and ask them to note down any metaphors or similes they recognise. More able students may be able to recognise a bit of personification. Ask lower ability students to listen out for alliteration.

I found the following:

“Wembley welcomes…” (Alliteration, Personification.)

“Roaldhino has had fun and games with penalties over the years” (Metaphor.)

“…poorer penalty…” (Alliteration.)

“..a springboard for England…” (Metaphor.)

“…suicidal moment for England…” (Metaphor.)

“…a disease that spread for England…” (Metaphor.)

 

Afterwards, see if students recognise any other metaphors or similes from the world of Football and/or sport. Are there recurring cliches? What’s the effect (if any) of these?

Happy teaching.