Joe Nutt

So much of the teaching in schools of how the English works does not prepare students for the real world. So little has changed in exams, the curriculum, or the way people think about English teaching, in several decades. This book is Joe Nutt’s attempt to help schools redress that dramatic imbalance. It’s not in any sense a practical teaching guide only for English teachers, nor is it full of hints and tips, lesson plans and schemes of work. Teaching English for the Real World is a far wider consideration of what schools and English teachers should be doing if they wish to prepare secondary school children to be successful and effective users of English, in the real world of work, higher education and adult life they will all too soon enter. If you are an English teacher, by the time you finish reading Teaching English for the Real World, you should be better prepared to deliver lessons that those you teach will forever be grateful for. The book consists of four main sections: English in context, towards the GCSE, choosing texts and technology matters. It starts by putting English clearly into context through a range of current examples. It urges teachers to consider the complex role English usage plays on everything from the side of a bus, through tissue-thin social media, garish slideshows and perky TED talks, to the hundreds of pages of research or official reports so often used as the basis for serious political policy and commercial decision making. It will then examine the classroom status quo and instead of the unrealistic and damaging focus on experiment and creativity, instead of requiring them to write newspaper articles, stories or speeches, the main deliverables in any English GCSE exam, the book will argue that teachers should think carefully about how to connect what children write, with who they are and where they really want to publish. The next section deals with choices of texts. There is a place for children to be taught to write well by example, but there are challenging questions to ask about much of the material routinely chosen. How often are texts and authors selected for study, for reasons that have absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with knowledge or linguistic skill, and everything to do with politics? Even exam boards are guilty of this. The final section examines the relationship between English and the technology real people use to produce it. It reflects on how technology has impacted on the quality of the reading experience itself and argue that there is a crisis in reading in secondary schools, with many children sailing through exams yet leaving school as disinterested and even poor readers. And it suggests how teachers might approach introducing these different risks to children and equip them best to make sound judgements about the way they write and communicate, for personal and employment purposes in adult life.

What’s the point of poetry? It’s a question asked in classrooms all over the world, but it rarely receives a satisfactory answer. Which is why so many people, who read all kinds of books, never read poetry after leaving school.Exploring twenty-two works from poets as varied as William Blake, Seamus Heaney, Rita Dove and Hollie McNish, this book makes the case for what poetry has to offer us, what it can tell us about the things that matter in life. Each poem is discussed with humour and refreshing clarity, using a mixture of anecdote and literary criticism that has been honed over a lifetime of teaching.Poetry can enrich our lives, if we’ll let it. The Point of Poetry is the perfect companion for anyone looking to discover how.

Paradise Lost has excited and provoked poets and critics for over 300 years. This introduction provides an accessible route into Milton's influential epic poem, guiding students through each of the twelve books by a combination of close textual analysis and summary of key themes and techniques.Without assuming prior knowledge, Nutt helps navigate the book's biblical and classical background and its relationship to seventeenth-century history. Focusing on developing the reading skills needed to approach this important and complex poem independently, A Guide to Paradise Lost is essential reading for all students of Milton.

Paradise Lost has excited and provoked poets and critics for over 300 years. This introduction provides an accessible route into Milton's influential epic poem, guiding students through each of the twelve books by a combination of close textual analysis and summary of key themes and techniques.Without assuming prior knowledge, Nutt helps navigate the book's biblical and classical background and its relationship to seventeenth-century history. Focusing on developing the reading skills needed to approach this important and complex poem independently, A Guide to Paradise Lost is essential reading for all students of Milton.

John Donne's poems are some of the most challenging and stimulating in the English literary heritage. This book looks at the entire range of his poetic output, from the erotic to the divine, from satires to sonnets. Through detailed analysis of a large number of individual poems, Donne's intellectual vitality and unique poetic voice is entertainingly explored. The practical techniques are explained clearly, and when applied to the work of other poets, will enable the reader to feel confident in understanding and discussing even the most demanding verse.