Hello there, and welcome to today's lesson.

My name's Mr. Barnsley.

So great to see you today.

In today's lesson, you are gonna need your copy of the AQA World and Lives Poetry anthology 'cause we are gonna be exploring some of the major themes that appear in these poems. Okay, I think it's time for us to get started.

Right, okay, let's have a look at the outcome of today's lesson then, shall we? So by the end of the lesson, you are gonna be able to explore the big ideas and connections between the poems in the World and Lives anthology.

So there are four keywords in today's lesson.

They are anthology, theme, representation and connections, two of which you will have seen in our outcome.

So let's start by thinking about anthology, a really important word, because I said, look, you're gonna be using your poetry anthology today, but what on earth is an anthology? Well, it's a collection of artistic works that have a very similar either form or subject.

So it's collecting pieces of art or artistic work, bits of writing, putting them together that are linked by either form, maybe with a collection of poetry, or subject.

So a theme is a universal idea, lesson or messages explored throughout a work of literature.

So we'll obviously be thinking about the themes in the poems in this anthology.

Representation is something, such as a picture or a symbol that stands for something else.

And connection's a really important word today.

You could see it in our outcome.

It's something that joins or connects two or more things.

So in today's lesson, as we introduce and take our first look at the anthology, there are gonna be two learning cycles.

Firstly, we are gonna be exploring connections and then we're gonna move on to giving a personal response.

Let's start by exploring some of the connections in this anthology, shall we? Today we are gonna be exploring the AQA World and Lives anthology, and you are gonna need to make sure you've got your copy in front of you for today's lesson.

Remember, it's that copy that I showed you right at the beginning of the video.

If you haven't got it, now's the time to pause your video, go and find it, and then press play when you're ready to continue.

Right, now, no excuses.

Everyone should have their own copy of their anthology in front of them.

So a poetry anthology then is chosen with overall themes and big ideas in mind.

The poems within the anthology then are gonna relate to those overall themes.

This means that these overall themes and big ideas are gonna form connections between the poems. And we are gonna be looking at that connectivity, those connections between the poems in our analysis.

It doesn't mean all the poems in the anthology are gonna be about the exact same thing, but we should be looking for links and connections between the poems. So should we have a look at the titles of the poems then? The first poem is called "Lines written in early spring." There's a poem called "England In 1819." "Shall earth no more inspire thee." "In a London Drawingroom," "On an Afternoon Train from Purley to Victorian, 1955," Name journeys," "Pot," "A wider view," "Homing," "A century later," "The jewellery maker," "With birds you're never lonely," "A portable paradise, "Like an heiress," and "Thirteen." What I'd like you to do now is discuss, can you see any connections between these titles? So if you've got a partner, now's the time to discuss with them.

But do not worry if you're working by yourself.

You can think through this independently.

So look at all the titles of the poems in the anthology and see if you can spot any connections.

All right, pause the video, over to you and press play when you are ready to continue.

Welcome back, some fantastic discussions there.

Now let's have a look at some of the things that you might have said.

I really want to shine a spotlight on some of the connections that you might have made, and I'm gonna do this by looking at some of the answers our Oak pupils have said.

So Izzy said she'd spotted loads of references to the concept of place and location.

So for example, England, earth, London, Purley, journeys, homing, paradise.

So very much this idea of location and place.

Sofia noticed references to nature.

She saw spring and earth, birds and paradise.

You might have spotted some of those as well.

Now, what I want you to do now is think about if you could pick one title that seemingly was out of place, didn't seem to fit in with the others, which one would you pick and why? Pause the video, have a think and press play when you are ready to continue.

Some really interesting ideas there.

And it was great to see that not everyone could agree.

Let's have a look at what some of the Oak peoples said.

So Lucas said he picked "Like and heiress" because he's not really sure how that title links to ideas of place or nature.

However, Andeep said, well, "I think "Like an heiress" could link to one's place in the world," So I would pick "Thirteen" as seemingly out of place.

But even then, maybe it could be about how you feel out of place when you are 13 years old." So you can see, we can start to get some clues from the titles of these poems, but it's very difficult for us to know for sure how these connect to the themes and the big ideas of the anthology World and Lives.

So let's check how we're getting on there.

Do we think nature is a potential connection between several of the poems? Is this true or false? Pause the video, have a think and press play when you're ready to continue.

Yes, well done if you said true.

Let's justify that now, shall we? Is it A several titles reference natural things, such as birds, spring and earth? Or is it several titles reference natural things, such as ocean, beasts and soil? What do you think? Pause the video, have a think and press play when you are ready to continue.

Well done if you said A< birds, spring and earth are all words we can see in the titles of some of the poems. So I want you to think about if you can form a connection between the titles of the poem and the title of the anthology, which is World and Lives.

Why don't you pause the video and have a think? Great if you can discuss this with the partner, but don't worry if you're just thinking through this to yourself.

Pause the video, have a think and press play when you are ready to continue.

Some really interesting discussions going on there and I was really impressed by those of you who were zooming in on individual words and trying to make connections, seeing those individual words in the title and the words World and Lives.

Let's have a look at what some of the Oak pupils said, shall we? So Lucas said, "Perhaps references to place link to how people live in different times and locations.

Maybe about the connection between your location and your identity." So thinking about where we live or maybe where we were brought up or where our family is from helps form our identity.

There's some nice ideas from Lucas.

Andeep says, "Perhaps the references to nature are all about connecting kind of our relationship with the natural world." Okay, thinking about humans' relationship with the natural world.

Really nice ideas from the Oak pupils and well done if you said something similar in your discussions.

On the screen now, you can see one word from each poem.

So I'm not gonna tell you which poems these are from.

You will find out if you continue studying the whole anthology, but these are one word from each of the poems. I want you to think, if you were to group these quotations together, which words would you put together and why? There are no right answers here.

This is all about exploration.

This is all about creative thinking.

But if you could group some of these words together, what would you put together and why? Okay, time for you to pause the video.

You can do this activity in pairs if you've got a partner or you can work through this independently, but it's over to you now.

So pause the video and press play when you are ready to continue.

Okay, I heard some really great discussions there and people going back and forth.

Some people really felt sure two words belong together, where others were like, "N, no, no, this word is much better in this group over here." But it's great to see us having these explorations of the themes and the ideas in the poem.

Let's have a look at Sam's groupings then.

So Sam grouped these words into three groups.

Group one, which was grey trees, prison houses, banana field, workshop, and grandmother.

Group two, which is powerless, firing-line, leach-like, lost, idolatry, the worship of idols.

Or group three, generations, accent, soul, tourist, name.

What are your initial thoughts about Sam's groupings? Can you understand why she's grouped these words the way that she has? Why don't you pause video, have a think.

What do you think Sam was thinking as she grouped these words together? Press play when you're ready to continue.

Right, I could see some of you felt, yeah, no, I can see why Sam's put those words together.

But others were like, oh, a bit of confusion here.

Let's clear this up then, shall we? Shall we see what Sam's reasoning was for the groupings that she made? Well, for group one, she said she thinks these words are something physical, something or someone you could reach out and touch.

Okay, nice.

Her second group, she put these five quotations into a group two because I think of these words as concepts.

They're things that exist in your perception or your mind.

Whereas group three because they think of them being associated with identity and belonging.

All right, I'm starting to understand why Sam has grouped them the way that she has.

Let's see what another Oak pupil was thinking.

So Jacob grouped the quotations differently.

He had group one, which you can see on the left, group two, very small group in the middle and group three on the right.

Okay, let's pause for a minute and think about why Jacob has grouped the words in the way that he has.

All right, think about can you understand why Jacob has? What do you think Jacob's reasoning might have been? And do you agree or do you disagree with Jacob's groupings? Okay, pause the video, time for some reflection.

Have a think, have a discuss if you've got someone to talk to.

And press play when you're ready to continue.

Okay, some great discussions as ever and well done to those of you who were listening just as well as you were contributing.

Should we have a look then at Jacob's reasoning then? Let's see how he justified his groupings.

So for group one, he said he grouped these words because they could represent things humans can create or things that they can cause.

For group two, he said these words represent a sense of dislocation, a sense of feeling out of place, being lost, or being a tourist in a country that you don't know.

And for group three, Jacob said, well, he thinks these word could represent a sense of heritage and identity.

It's all about where you come from and what influences us.

I really like Jacob's reasoning.

I felt these were potentially a little bit more interesting than some of the groupings that Sam put together.

I wonder how you felt about those groupings and I wonder how they compared to the groupings that you made yourself.

All right, let's stop for a minute and check we're understanding everything we've done so far.

Which one of the following statements is true? Is it A, some poems refer to fundamentals of human identity, such as soul and name? Is it some poems refer to political terms, such as democracy and votes? Or is it several poems refer to religious terms, such as church and worship? Pause the video, have a think and press play when you're ready to continue.

That was A> okay, we know that lots of the poems or several of the poems refer to human identity and ideas around identity.

All right, now, all of our poems will draw on context.

When we're studying literature, we always think about context, the historical context, social context, biographical context of the writer.

And here are some events that are covered or discussed in the poems. They are the industrial revolution, which is where there was technological revolutions and rise in factory work.

The Peterloo Massacre, which is an 1819 protest that was violently broke up by cavalry.

And Malala, a young schoolgirl who was shot by the Taliban.

Can you see any links between these contextual events? Can you spot any commonality between these three contextual events? Pause the video, have a think and press play when you're ready to continue.

That was a really tricky question, so well done for giving it a go.

Let's have a look at things that you might have said.

Well, Sam said these are all things that inspired in some way social change and she would be right to say something like that.

I wonder if you said something similar.

All right, another check then now.

Which one of the following is a contextual event for one of the anthology poems? Is it the Russian Revolution, the Industrial Revolution, or the Glorious Revolution? Pause the video, have a think and press play when you're ready to continue.

Yes, well done if you said that was B, the Industrial Revolution.

Okay, over to you now for our first task.

On the screen, you can see a picture of an image.

Now, this is an image that might have been used or could have been used on the front of the World and Lives anthology.

What I want you to discuss is do you think this is a good representation of the themes in the anthology? Why or why not? Pause the video, have a discussion and if you're working by yourself, you could just make a few notes on what you would say if you were discussing with someone.

But think about does this image make a good representation? Pause the video, over to you and press play when you're ready to continue.

Welcome back.

Really well done with that discussion there.

Let's have a look at Izzy's response and think about whether you agree or why or why not.

So Izzy said, "I think it's a good representation of the anthology because, to me, the anthology seems to be about the way that we, as humans, impact not only the world around us, but each other.

So to have a world in your hands is appropriate because not only do we hold the natural world in our hands, but we also hold each other's conceptual worlds in our hands as well." What do you think about that? Do you agree with Izzy or do you disagree? All right, pause the video, have a think, reflect how Izzy's response compared to your discussions and then press play when you are ready to continue.

Okay, it's time for us to move on to our second learning cycle and now we're gonna be thinking about personal responses.

So a key part of understanding and analysing a poem is having a personal response to it.

Reading poetry is, at its very core, an emotional reaction to something and our emotions are very personal to us.

It's why poetry can have so many different interpretations and meanings to different people.

So when you're considering your own personal response to a poem, here are some of the questions that you might ask yourself.

Do I think this poem is important? Why does this poem speak to me? Or why does this poem not speak to me? What emotions do I get from this poem? So we're gonna look at what initial emotional reaction you have to each of the poems, okay? We're not gonna look at all of the poems, we don't have time to look at all the poems today, but you are all gonna be looking at them independently.

And if you're working with other people, it's gonna be really important that you maybe look at different things, okay? So you can think about, and we can cover as many poems in the anthology during this activity.

So Izzy has looked and done an initial read of the poem, "Thirteen." And this was her initial response.

Before I share it with you, I think now would be a good time just to pause the video and turn to the poem "Thirteen" and just read through it once to yourself so you know what it's about.

All right, pause the video, read the poem "Thirteen," and just start thinking, how does this feel to you? What's your personal response? And then we'll compare that to Izzy's.

All right, pause the video, over to you.

Press play when you're ready to continue.

Okay, let's have a look at what Izzy said then, shall we? So Izzy said, "My initial emotional reaction to "Thirteen" is fear because it's a reality that so many young people face and it's quite chilling to think about." Okay, really nice ideas there from Izzy.

Let's check then, true or false? Izzy responded with fear to "Thirteen." Is that true or false? Pause video, have a think and press play when you're ready to continue.

Yes, that is true.

Let's think about why.

Is it because she thought it represented a chilling reality or is it because she thought it represented a chilling fantasy? Was it very similar to real life or was it almost a make believe but still really kind of scary and chilling? Pause the video, have a think and press play when you're ready to continue.

Yes, well done.

Izzy felt this was a real chilling reality that actually young people up and down the country might experience.

So that made it actually a poem that kind of created quite a significant emotional reaction, one of fear in Izzy.

Okay, it's now over to you.

I want you to pick a poem whose title appeals to you.

And what you're gonna do is you're gonna read that poem once through and write down what are your initial emotional reactions to it? And like I said before, it'd be great if you could select a different poem to your partner if you are working with someone else.

Remember that your emotional reaction to a poem will be based on many things, from the world around you to your own personal past experiences.

And that's okay.

This is a personal response.

Okay, time for you to pause the video, pick your poem, read through it, and think about what your initial reaction is.

Remember to press play when you're ready to continue.

Okay, welcome back.

I hope you enjoyed reading that first poem and I hope you're looking forward to analysing that poem in more detail in a future lesson.

What I would like you to do now is working with a partner, share your emotional reactions with them and reflect on your experience of the two poems together.

You might want to consider, as you're doing this, did you have similar or different emotional reactions and why do you think that might be? What were the similarities or differences between the poems you looked at? If you're working by yourself, now might be a fantastic opportunity to find someone else in your household to talk through the poem that you have read and explain what your initial emotional reaction was.

All right, time to pause the video and do a little bit of reflecting on our initial emotional reactions to the poems. Right, really well done today.

It's been really nice to explore the World and Lives anthology with you all today.

On the screen, you can see a summary of what we've learned.

We've learned about what an anthology is and how anthologies are selected, or the poems for an anthology selected with overall themes and big ideas in mind.

And we really started exploring the titles of the poems and some quotations and really starting to look for some of those early connections.

And right at the end there, we were thinking about our own personal response.

Thank you so much for joining me today.

I hope to see you in one of our lessons in the future on the AQA World and Lives poetry.

Have a wonderful rest of the day, however you're choosing to spend it.

And I hope to see you all soon.

Thank you so much for joining me.

Goodbye.