Year 8 · English · beta

A monster within: reading and writing Gothic fiction

In this unit, pupils explore the Gothic. They start by learning what the Gothic is, before reading extracts from 'Frankenstein' and 'Jane Eyre', practising descriptive writing and reading 'The Tell-Tale Heart'. They finally learn how to write opinion articles and then write their own.

This is an attributed Oak National Academy lesson sequence, not a completed or academically approved DASKEREL course. Supporting transcripts may depend on video, images, practical equipment or teacher explanation. Follow each lesson’s supervision guidance. For religious education and RSHE, follow the school’s syllabus, policy and safeguarding procedures.

Prior knowledge

  • Pupils can use the four reading skills for decoding challenging texts
  • Pupils can use simple, compound and complex sentences
  • Pupils recognise the features of different forms of functional writing
  • Pupils can use topic sentences
  • Pupils can select evidence from texts to justify their arguments
  • Pupils can make inferences
  • Pupils can recognise a range of language devices in a text
  • Pupils can comment on the language choices of an author

Source curriculum references

  • Read increasingly challenging pre-1914 English Fiction independently
  • Understanding increasingly challenging texts through making inferences
  • Understanding increasingly challenging texts through knowing purpose, audience and context of writing
  • Read critically through knowing how writers methods present meaning
  • Read critically through exploring the effect of setting, plot and characterisation
  • Read critically through making critical comparisons across texts
  • Discussing reading and writing using linguistic terminology

Oak source metadata. DASKEREL has not independently verified school-level coverage.

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