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In the past few English lessons this May we have been split into two groups to complete an 'Apprentice' style task: to completely make up a new product for break time at school and advertise it with a leaflet, poster, magazine article and radio interview. One group did a blackberry tart called the Black Lady which was based on the playing card the Queen of Spades. My group did a really tasty sounding chocolate bar called Chooum with toffee and caramel in it.
The pressure was on when we found out that Mr Abbott from the kitchen would be coming to listen to our presentation and judge our promotion. This meant that we would have to do a good job! Overall, the task was fun, exciting and, most importantly, it was good practice of all of the skills that I have learned this year.
Alex Wainwright (3S) and Fergus Skinner (3P)
From 2011 the College will be working in departments to promote literacy and its support in promoting good learning and therefore higher achievement. Good reading, writing and speaking skills are at the heart of the education system and are assessed formally in the majority of examinations a pupil will sit. Not only this, it is an essential life skill which will be tested throughout life from university applications to job interviews and beyond.
Therefore we have introduced a whole-school marking policy designed to stress the importance of spelling, punctuation and written expression which will be used by all teachers on every written piece of work. In addition to this departments will develop subject-specific vocabulary lists and have started looking at ways of incorporating the teaching of reading and writing in all subjects. For example the Third Form Chemists have been doing some creative writing to help them understand chemical reactions and the junior biologists have been doing "pop-corn" reading around the class, a fun and mildly competitive way to engage readers when they have to read complex material.
The English department has opened up a Blog for readers to offer comments about their reading and the Library continues with the Reading Challenge. Next term there will be a whole school writing day and a new school newspaper has been developed to promote writing outside of class and we hope that initiatives like these will spread throughout the college and promote reading, writing and learning at a higher level.
RC Sherriff's well known play was written and first performed in the late nineteen twenties, giving an insight into the lives of a group of World War 1 officers on the front line over the period of four days. Unlike other works of literature on the Great War, this play focuses not on the horror of battle, but on the anguish of suspense, of waiting for something, anything, to happen - young and inexperienced officer Raleigh's first observation on the front line is 'how frightfully quiet it is'.
The Fourth Form and a select band of the sixth form will be studying this play and a unit on World War One literature so this was an opportunity not to be missed to see the play in the flesh. It was a very good evening!
The whole drama takes place in the officer's dugout, showing their daily relations rather than the actual fighting. The set at the Theatre Royal in Glasgow was low-ceilinged and intricately detailed, which, coupled with the soft and murky candlelight effect, provided the audience with the same feeling of claustrophobia as the characters. Through much of the play there was complete and eerie silence behind the conversation of the officers, while at other times the rumble of the guns could be heard in the distance. This grew louder and louder throughout the last scene so that the curtain goes down to the deafening booms of the bombardment, leaving the audience fearful and slightly shell-shocked.
The story includes very little 'action', focusing on the interaction between officers at mealtimes or after duties. The static conversations on schools, 'rugger' and the importance of pepper can be hard to follow, but poignantly convey the way the soldiers distracted themselves from what faced them. One of the play's key themes is the way in which different people coped - pretending to be ill so as to get sent home, drinking excessive amounts of alcohol, colouring in circles on a bit of paper - quietly questioning whether any one way is better than another, whether we have the right to judge those who could not cope, for as Stanhope despairingly remarks in justifying his alcoholism, 'is there no limit to what a man can bear?'.
Developing subtly through the first half, the characters built towards the disastrous attack in the final scene with deliberate evasion of the topic. Osborne's reassuring schoolmaster's attitude provided a comforting medium between Raleigh's painful naivety and Stanhope's hopeless exhaustion, while Trotter and Mason, less complex characters, provided some comic relief - though not much.
At the very end of the play the curtain rose on the cast standing in two rows, hands behind their backs, the backdrop showing a vast list of soldiers killed in the First World War resembling the Menin Gate. This poignant ending serves to remind the audience of the immense number of men who reached their own journey's end defending our country.
Iona Gaskell (U6th Home)
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All the world's a stage... The annual Shakespeare pilgrimage for the Lower Sixth English pupils was underway early, stopping for Starbucks a good hour and a half into the trip at about 7.30am; we are keen if nothing else. Arriving at the youth hostel at 2.30pm we thought we had made good time and were soon off to tour the town and begin our sojourn into the world of old Bill Rattle Stick. Starting at the end we went to the grave in Trinity Church on the meandering banks of the Avon and then headed up to Henley street where the group could sustain themselves in preparation for The Merchant of Venice that night. The new RST is a delight with some of the old stage now used for flooring in the foyer and bars and the auditorium now with a thrusting stage that echoes the Globe. The performance was stunning as it was set in Las Vegas. Shylock, played by Patrick Stewart, was a casino owner and his employee Lorenzo was an Elvis impersonator. Portia's casket game set up by her late father was done in the form of a game show and the accents ranged from New York eye-talian to ditzy southern belle. Visually it was arresting and daring and the whole stuck together brilliantly. A great way to start. The next day we packed in a visit to Mary Arden's farm, The Birthplace and museum as well as the Hall's Croft and Nash House - now there's commitment! The final show on the tour, Macbeth, was more Jacobean in its delivery the major change being the exchange of witches for the ghosts of murdered children. It was chilling. The icing on the cake was a last minute tour around Anne Hathaway's cottage and as always a key highlight was the interaction with the actors post show in The Duck. We look forward to next year. |
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"Don't have daughters; they do your head in and then you die." A fitting if somewhat glancing review of King Lear, a dark but oddly funny (ha ha, not peculiar) play, famous amongst old people for reminding them of their eventual downfall. The real draw for our Upper Sixth was that it offered a live Shakespeare performance to complement the study of the set texts for the June examination (yikes). The other draw was of course the starring role taken by great thespian Sir Derek Jacobi - "He's in The King's Speech!" Yes he is and Gladiator, Cadfael (what?), Frasier, Evolution: Endgame (no idea either), The Rats of Nimh (as opposed to the knights that say ni) and lots more. The performance was also dotted with recognisable faces such as Gina McKee from Notting Hill, Atonement, Scenes of a Sexual Nature (ooh!) and lots more. Before I start sounding like an edition of Hello! I should tell ye about the show. It was the best King Lear I've ever seen, amusing, dark, impeccably acted and thoroughly engaging. The theatre was packed and suitably awed at the great performances on the stage. The set was simple and allowed one to focus on the stunning language and to be suitably appalled by the famous eye-plucking scene. All in all it was a great night out of Coll and a useful reminder of the nature of tragedy.
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