GCSE English Language AQA - Paper 2 Question 3

This was one of the first lessons that I taught once we started to teach from home at the beginning of 2021. The topic of food poverty was everywhere and as we started to cover our theme of 'Be Kind' across FS, it seems liked the perfect opportunity to cover this in GCSE.

Connect

As a connect activity, I showed the class a tweet from Marcus Rashford's twitter account. The tweet was 'I don't even know what to say. Just look at what we can do when we come together. THIS is England in 2020'. I asked the group 2 questions - why is this tweet effective? And what does it imply/tell us? Without a lot of background knowledge (although some of the groups knew what Marcus was doing), they were able to discuss a sense of community through the use of 'we' and the impact of 'THIS' and why this was capitalised. Even looking at 'I don't even know what to say' was worth discussing as it represented how stunned and speechless he was - something had made him emotional. 

Share - the objectives of the session were:

1. To know what DAAFORREST stands for (we use this acronym and feel it works best for resit students)

2. To read a letter and identify DAAFORREST examples and their effects

3. To write 3 analytical paragraphs for Paper 2 Question 3  - how does the writer use language to interest readers?

Present

The present part of the session included an introduction to the acronym DAAFORREST and its link to non-fiction writing. Checking prior knowledge, students were asked to work together to see if they could figure out what the techniques were - using the acronym as clues with explanation of the definition for each one.

I then showed a clip from BBC News https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vyHZ8rbJQUQ explaining what Marcus was doing and the reasons behind it. I then posed questions based on what they have just watched. For example, what do you think of this situation? I then shared a comment from the clip 'the pandemic of food poverty' easing them into language analysis. What technique/s can you spot in the quote? What does it suggest about Food Poverty if it has been referred to as a pandemic? What effect does it have? The quote was fitting as obviously the pandemic is everywhere at the moment. I really wanted them to draw on what it meant whilst also linking this to the food poverty crisis in the UK.

Apply

We then read Marcus Rashford's Open Letter to Parliament. I did cut some of it out as it was too long but the source was rich nonetheless. After reading we spoke about the writer's opinion and discussed if anything stood out in particular. In small groups, the students then worked together to find 3 examples of DAAFORREST techniques from the text before sharing to the class. Typically, I write them down on the board and explore each one with them in depth. I did explain here that although paper 2 includes DAAFORREST techniques generally, this does not mean that the writer won't use metaphors, similes, word classes etc.

After planning and class discussion through the previous tasks, they tackled the question 'how does the writer use language to interest the reader?' We regularly use PEEEE as a scaffold but with an emphasis on the 'e' part. Basically, I tell my students that they need to explore each quote in depth and that each quote is worthy to be pulled apart in analysis. 

We look at what it suggests (explain), zooming in on key words and their connotations (expand) and effects on reader (evaluate).

Recall/Review

This could be reviewed in various ways. Students reading their work out (or offering to read it for them), check-list for one of your 3 paragraphs etc. and general questions linked to the overall theme and how relevant it is to them in society.

For the PowerPoint, click here: PowerPoint - Open Letter (all photos used from google images which I take not credit for - only to use for educational purposes)

For the letter, click here: Open Letter