Just after the First World War the English Association published The Teaching of English in Schools. It argues that developing children's 'creative spirit' is fundamental to maintaining peace in Europe. Seventy years later, the first National Curriculum promotes a creative, unitary English appropriate for 'a European context'. In contrast, today's…

Creativity is integral to the inquiry process. Inquiry-based work highlights students' understanding of the ways that literature and language mediate lived experiences and social relationships. Within the secondary English classroom, students and teachers can engage in collaborative and imaginative activities to read texts, ask questions, and…

The centenary of the publication of "The Teaching of English in England" provides an opportunity to consider the current National Curriculum for English in England from a historical perspective. This paper reports on a hermeneutic study that explores the humanist values underpinning Newbolt's Report and how they shape the creative…

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to discuss the important work of Peter Medway in seeking to define English as a school subject in the period from the 1980s to the early years of this century. Design/methodology/approach: The author reviews the work of Peter Medway. Findings: The paper addresses the issue of how his work reflected -- or not…

English education has played a vital role in facilitating Singapore's global city ambitions since the country's independence. While the state has prioritized English education's cognitive objective emphasizing information processing and effective communication skills, it has given insufficient attention to the role of English in equipping students…

We are at a particularly difficult historical juncture marked by uncertainty, contingency and change. Zygmunt Bauman characterises the present time as "liquid modernity" (2000, 2008, 2011b) because of the fluidity and instability that we live with. Our identities and our relations to the world are changing radically. There is an urgent need for…

A senior secondary English curricular commitment to biblical relationality and narrative through Ricoeur's hermeneutics provides students a learning community where they are invited to awaken to the biblical story, to love each other and creation within their Christ given identity in that story, to think about their own narratives within the…

Argues that English instruction is irrelevant and devoid of content. (RD)

Politics has always made strange bedfellows, but now the public and the traditional academy are collaborating in an attack on the site of their uneasiness--what they label "political correctness as neo-fascism" and what one composition teacher calls "political correctness as challenge to ideological assumptions." In their…

Author presents a high school English curriculum resulting from a definition of English as the study of language...from perception through thinking and feeling; 20 courses are described. (Author/SP)

Describes the way one teacher utilizes a variety of activities by which the power of language is analyzed and fostered among students of English. Describes methods for engaging students in language play, specifically through the use of puns. (HB)

Examines the role in the English curriculum being given to both written and oral language. Asserts that oral language currently has little or no role in that curriculum. Claims that this misguided situation must change. Suggests ways by which orality can be given its rightful place in the English curriculum. (HB)

Describes the way one teacher utilizes a variety of language games by which the power of language is analyzed and fostered among students of English. Describes methods for engaging students in language games. Argues that games, to be effective, must give students a chance at success. (HB)

The transactional, expressive and poetic functions of language are discussed; examples from elementary school student conversation and writing are included. (Author/SP)

Details the various questions regarding the teaching of language and parts of language to high school students. Contends that teachers should aim at providing students with a view of the wholeness of language. Gives suggested criteria for classroom language activities. (HB)