Overview
At our school, the English curriculum is unapologetically ambitious: academic in rigour, canonical in scope and chronological in design. From the very beginning, pupils are immersed in the great traditions of English literature, building powerful cultural capital and deep subject knowledge.
Key Stage 3 moves purposefully through literary history, beginning with Ancient Greek myth and progressing through Elizabethan and Jacobean drama, Romantic poetry, Gothic fiction, and seminal Victorian texts such as The Picture of Dorian Gray, A Tale of Two Cities and Jane Eyre. Pupils then encounter Victorian poetry, First World War verse, modern drama (An Inspector Calls), twentieth-century poetry, post-colonial literature (Things Fall Apart) and the art of rhetoric. This carefully sequenced journey ensures that students gain a secure grasp of the most important genres, movements and styles, equipping them with the intellectual framework needed to read, write and think with sophistication.
Our curriculum is knowledge-rich and deliberately demanding: pupils plan and write essays every week, and frequent low-stakes quizzing ensures that key ideas, quotations and concepts are embedded in long-term memory. This strong foundation feeds directly into our ambitious GCSE programme.
In Year 10, pupils study Julius Caesar, Power and Conflict poetry, Lord of the Flies, Great Expectations, English Language Paper 1 and Unseen Poetry in a carefully structured sequence that builds analytical precision and exam confidence.
In Year 11, this knowledge is built on with English Language Paper 2 and then refined through a rigorous programme of revision across Literature and Language, ensuring that every pupil enters the examinations with mastery of content and confidence in craft.
The result is a curriculum that does not simply prepare pupils for assessments, but shapes articulate, knowledgeable and intellectually resilient young scholars.
Year 7
Term 1 – Ancient Greek literature
Ancient Greek mythology
Term 2 – Ancient Greek literature
Epic poetry: The Iliad
Term 3 – Renaissance literature
Tragedy: Titus Andronicus and Doctor Faustus
Term 4 – Renaissance literature
Comedy: Much Ado About Nothing
Term 5 – Romanticism literature
Romantic poetry
Term 6 – Romanticism literature
The convergence of Romanticism and the Gothic: Frankenstein
Year 8
Term 1 – Renaissance literature
The predecessor to the Gothic: The Tragedy of MacBeth
Term 2 – Gothic literature
Gender and gothic anthology: A history of the gothic
Term 3 – Gothic and Victorian literature
A Picture of Dorian Gray
Term 4 – Victorian literature
Historical fiction: A Tale of Two Citites
Term 5 – Victorian literature
Victorian poetry
Term 6 – Victorian literature
The evolution of gothic: Jane Eyre
Year 9
Term 1 – Renaissance literature
The Tempest
Term 2 – World War literature
The lost voices of the 20th century: the poetry of WWI
Term 3 – Modern morality play
An Inspector Calls
Term 4 – 20th century literature
World voices poetry
Term 5 – 20th century literature
Post-colonial literature: Things Fall Apart
Term 6 – The art of rhetoric
Fictional and non-fictional rhetoric
Year 10
Term 1
Julius Caesar
Term 2
Power and conflict poetry
Term 3
Lord of the Flies
Term 4
Great Expectations
Term 5
English Language paper 1
Term 6
Unseen poetry
Year 11
Term 1
Language paper 2
Term 2
Revise English Literature paper 1 (Julius Caesar and Great Expectations) and revise English Language paper 2.
Term 3
Revise Literature paper 2 (Lord of the Flies, Power and Conflict Poetry, and Unseen Poetry) and revise English Language paper 1.
Terms 4 – 6
Revise all units
Exam board
AQA
English Literature specification
English Language specification
Years 12-13
We offer this subject for scholars at sixth form. Click here to find out more.