Year 8
By the time pupils are in Year 8 they are usually settled and comfortable with their friends and teachers. We have a much better understanding of who we are teaching and how to meet the requirements of individuals and classes. This is an excellent time to really get on and impress as the early jitters and confusion should be gone and the demands of the SATs are a year away.
The work covered in Year 8 looks similar to Year 7 on paper but everything
is taken up a notch. We are looking for much more sophisticated responses to
the classroom tasks. As always, the success of this year is very much down
to the efforts of individuals and a great deal can be achieved with the correct
approach. It is not unusual to see a pupil who struggled when they started
at Southmoor to be thriving in Year 8. Here is a list of likely activities
and areas of study—the level of study should be more appropriate to each
individual pupil by this stage.
• Poetry and figures of speech; similes and metaphors for example.
• Punctuation such as commas, full stops and apostrophes.
• Writing in many forms such as stories, magazine articles or leaflets.
• Parts of speech such as nouns, verbs and adjectives.
• Oral activities in the form of speeches, radio shows or debates.
• Using good grammar. This can be anything from clauses to correct tense usage.
• Using ICT to present work and improve skills such as spelling.
• Analysing media in the form of a film, magazine or web-page.
• Reading in its many, many forms.
• Any other ideas individual teachers may use.
Formal Structure of Year 8:
Year 8 Term 1
Termly Assessment
Writing to inform, explain and describe.
A termly assessment grade will come from this work.
Year 8 Term 2
Termly Assessment
Writing to persuade, argue and advise.
A termly assessment grade will come from this work.
Year 8 Term 3
Examination
“
Optional Tests” in Reading and Writing.
A termly assessment grade will come from this work.
This is all a very general overview of Year 8 and there are a wide variety
of methods used by individual English teachers.
