Hello, welcome to your lesson today on writing an open letter.

I'm Miss Sutherland and I'll be teaching you today.

Our learning outcome for today's lesson is to write an open letter using emotive language, antithesis and satire.

We have four keywords for today's lesson.

They are antithesis, satire, blunt, and parody.

Let's go through them together.

Antithesis means the direct opposite.

Satire is a humorous way of criticising ideas or people, especially to make a political point.

Blunt, blunt means saying what you think without trying to be polite, and parody.

So parody is to copy the style of something or someone else in a humorous way.

I'll give you a moment now to reread the definitions and jot down any of the key words that you may want to.

Off you go.

Excellent.

We have two learning cycles in today's lesson.

In our first learning cycle, we'll be analysing Siegfried Sassoon's open letter and using his open letter to inspire our own.

And then in the second learning cycle, we'll be writing our own open letter using satire.

So let's begin with analysing and planning an open letter.

An open letter is a letter with an intended recipient that made publicly available for anyone to read.

Open letters can be written by anyone to anyone.

For example, an open letter to your local bus company, an open letter to Olympic athletes and open letter to people with no manners.

Sometimes open letters are published to be enjoyed by the public rather than actually read by the person or perhaps thing they are addressed to.

For example, an open letter to the guy at the gym who hogs the equipment.

An open letter is my younger self and an open letter to coffee.

In those three open letters, the person they're written to or thing they're written to will not be able to necessarily read the open letter so they're merely for written to entertain the reader.

An open letter balances the private with the public.

Letters are often associated with private feelings and messages, and the personal private content of a letter is written knowing that the public will read it.

So that's something to bear in mind as we analyse and plan our very own open letter.

What message is personal to you but something you also think the public needs to hear about? Today, you're going to plan to write an open letter.

Oak pupils here discuss who they would like to write their open letter to.

Jun wants to write his open letter to education leaders about how unfair exams are.

Laura wants to write to her open letter to influencers because she wants to spread the message of young people having positive role models.

And Izzy wants to write an open letter to Shakespeare.

She wants to tell him how she feels about his work.

Discuss now who do you want your open letter to be to and why? Pause the video and discuss.

We are going to now study Siegfried Sassoon's open letter, "A Soldier's Declaration." You can find this letter in your additional materials.

Siegfried Sassoon was a soldier and poet during World War I.

I want you to read the open letter "A Soldier's Declaration" by Siegfried Sassoon.

And I want you to discuss two of the questions on the screen.

I want you to discuss what did you notice about this open letter? And I want you to discuss, did you notice any patterns in his use of language or structure? Pause the video, get reading and discuss those two questions.

Off you go.

Let's go through what you may have noticed in Sassoon's open letter.

First of all, Sassoon uses repeated first person singular pronouns.

I believe, I have seen, I make this protest.

This clearly shows that the message of his letter is personal to him.

Sassoon also uses a lot of emotive language in his letter.

Suffering, evil, unjust, callous and agonies.

So this is clearly a topic that Sassoon feels strongly about.

And Sassoon also uses complex sentences and antithesis throughout his letter.

For example, this war upon which I entered as a war of defence and liberation has now become a war of aggression and conquest.

I'm not protesting against the military conduct of war, but against the political errors and insincerities.

So Sassoon uses complex sentences which shows the seriousness of the topic and the complexity of the topic.

He also uses antithesis, and by antithesis we mean a sentence with antithesis.

So antithesis means the direct opposite, but when we use an antithesis in a sentence, it usually means that the sentence has two contrasting or opposing parts to it.

So for example, this war upon which I entered as a war of defence and liberation has now become a war of aggression and conquest.

So that sentence uses antithesis 'cause on the one hand, war was supposed to be about defence and liberation, but it's now turned into aggression and conquest.

So we can see how that sentence has two contrasting parts to it.

And the second sentence also uses antithesis.

Sassoon is not protesting against military conduct but against political errors.

So we see that sentence also has two opposing parts.

Now Sassoon uses antithesis to clarify his point and make it really clear what he is and is not arguing about.

So antithesis could be a really useful technique when you go to write your open letter to.

Now, let's check your understanding of what we've talked about so far.

I am not protesting against the military conduct of the war, but against the political errors and insincerities.

This sentence uses emotive language, figurative language, or antithesis.

Pause the video and complete that answer.

Off you go.

Well done if you said that sentence uses antithesis.

It's a sentence in which there are two contrasting or opposing elements to it.

Now, an open letter is a letter written to a particular personal group, but which is published so the public can read it.

Thus, the writers of open letters may be inclined to make the letter relevant to different groups of people.

They might refer to how the issue affects themselves as an individual, how the issue affects other groups like friends, family or wider communities, and how the issue is relevant to all citizens.

In Sassoon's open letter, he references himself a group of people and all citizens to show the wide impact of war and surrounding issues, which sentences reveal Sassoon's awareness of how war is relevant on a large scale.

Pause the video and find evidence that Sassoon references himself, groups, and or citizens.

Pause the video and discuss.

So how the issue affects Sassoon himself, how the issue affects other groups and how the issue is relevant to all citizens.

Sassoon writes, "This war upon which I entered as a war of defence has now become a war of aggression." We see the first person, singular pronoun, I, reflect that this topic is relevant to Sassoon himself.

How the issue affects other groups.

Sassoon mentions for his fellow soldiers and the suffering of troops.

He's clearly showing how this topic is relevant to all soldiers as a group and how the issue is relevant to all citizens.

Sassoon writes the complacence with which the majority of those at home regard the agonies.

So Sassoon mentions the people at home.

In other words, all the citizens of England, which show how this topic is relevant to not only him, not only his fellow soldiers, but also those at home, all citizens in general.

So when you are writing your open letter, consider how your topic is relevant on a large scale too.

Now I want you to plan your open letter using the grid below.

You can use some of Sassoon's craft such as emotive language, antithesis, complex sentences and personal singular pronouns to help you plan.

I want you to plan who your open letter is addressed to, what you are writing about, the groups affected by your topic.

And then I want you to plan a couple of sentences and crafting to help you make your open letter even more effective.

Pause the video and get planning now.

Off you go.

Here are some ideas from Laura's planning of her open letter.

Laura is going to write to social media influencers.

She's going to write about being a good role model for the younger generation.

Laura says that her topic affects herself, her peers, her future children, and the future of the planet.

And here are some of the sentences that she'll use.

She's going to use antithesis.

She's going to write, I'm not against the existence of influencers, but rather the shallow content that overshadows real world issues.

And she's also going to use emotive language.

This content serves to alienate humankind, tearing us away from our true purpose.

That is a very thoughtful and detailed plan from Laura, which is really going to help her in writing her own open letter.

Reread your plan.

Did you attempt to use emotive language, antithesis and personal pronouns to state a clear personal purpose? Pause the video and reflect upon the sentences and crafting of your own letter.

Off you go.

Very well done on that plan.

I can't wait for the next landing cycle where you'll write your open letter and add in satire next.

So we're now going to move on to writing your open letter using satire.

Sometimes open letters are published to criticise something or someone, and in doing so, amuse the public rather than actually be read by the person or perhaps thing they are addressed to.

Satire can be a useful tool in an open letter because it can simultaneously criticise and amuse and satire is used by Sassoon in his poem, "The General." If you haven't read that poem, go and read it because it can really highlight the difference between a poem and a letter and how those forms could serve different purposes.

It's a really great poem and it's great to read alongside his open letter.

Let's move back to satire then.

Let's explore how satire could be used in Laura's open letter.

Here's what Laura's come up with.

'You are a major inspiration' is a comment I recently read under one influencer's post.

I waited for the page to load to uncover her latest act of heroism.

Was she providing medical aid for those affected by conflict, volunteering at a homeless shelter, running for charity? No, dear reader, she had gallantly posted her superfood matcha latte recipe.

So here Laura is humorously criticising and mocking social media influencers and how they are praised and seen as heroes for perhaps doing quite superficial things and for acting in ways that are not actually heroic or helpful to society.

We're now going to explore how exactly Laura has managed to craft her satire.

Let's look at how to craft satire to ensure you can successfully use it in your own open letter.

Satire can involve a clear target, so you must make it clear who or what you're criticising.

Satire can also involve humour.

Can you amuse the reader by highlighting how absurd something is? Satire can involve exaggeration.

Can you exaggerate the behaviours or actions or qualities of someone or something to amplify its absurdity? Satire can also involve irony.

Can you point to the flaws of something using language opposite to what you truly mean? For example, stating that superficial content is heroic.

And finally, satire can involve parody.

Can you mock the speech patterns or actions of the person you are criticising? So there are five different aspects of satire that can help you make your use of satire effective.

So here again is Laura's use of satire in her open letter to social media influencers.

I want you to discuss which satirical techniques does this paragraph use out of the ones we've talked about.

Pause the video and discuss.

So in Laura's paragraph, she uses a clear target and her target is an influencer.

She uses humour and she's done this by using rhetorical questions to allow the reader to reflect upon the absurdity of the comment.

She's also used exaggeration via the words heroism and gallantly to mock how brave the influencer is made out to be.

And she's used irony.

She's exposed that the post of the influencer is the complete opposite of inspiring.

I hope you'll be able to use some of these techniques when crafting your own satire in your open letter.

Discuss now, how could we rewrite this idea from Izzy's open letter to Shakespeare so that it includes satire.

She's written, "In my opinion, Shakespeare is overly complex," but Izzy wants to use satire.

So what could she do to make that comment more criticising and humorous? Pause the video and discuss.

Here are some of the things that Izzy could have written.

Good is bad and bad is good.

If I wrote this in my creative writing, I'd be met with an angry red question mark for my teacher.

Rather than be honoured as a literary hero.

Of course, in dire moments of agony and terror, your characters still find a way to churn out iambic pentameter because nothing reflects all-consuming agonising gut wrenching grief upon finding your lover dead like an ornate poem performed right on cue.

So in the first example, we have parody to create satire because in Macbeth, Shakespeare wrote, fair is foul and foul is fair.

And in the first sentence there, and in the first example there, Izzy is shown to be mocking that quote from Macbeth.

And in the second example, Izzy is humorously mocking Shakespeare's complex and dramatic language that she finds quite tedious and inauthentic.

Now, which of the below sentences uses satire? Pause the video and answer that question to check your understanding now.

Well done if you said sentence C, why let pupils develop their teamwork when you could just develop their anxiety? That sentence uses satire to criticise the use of exams in the education system.

It's using a rhetorical question to show that this people thinks exams are absurd and pointless.

Now, I want you to write the first draught of your short open letter.

You could include the following techniques and that we've looked at in in this lesson.

So you could include antithesis, emotive language, satire, personal singular pronouns, and a reference to the wider groups of people affected by your topic.

I can't wait to see what you come up with now.

Remember to lean on Izzy's examples, Laura's examples, and Sassoon's open letter to help you in this task.

Pause the video and get writing.

I hope you enjoy.

Amazing effort in your writing there.

I now want you to reread over the satire you have used.

Which of the following have you used to ensure its effectiveness? Have you made sure your satire has a clear target? Have you used humour, exaggeration, irony, or parody in your example of satire? Pause the video and reread over your satire now.

Off you go.

I am really impressed by how you've had a go at using satire in your own writing.

It's a really complex skill and quite hard to master, but each time you try and use it, you will get better at crafting satire.

Very well done on writing your open letter today.

Here's what we've learned in today's lesson.

Open letters are letters written to a particular personal group, but which are made publicly available for all to read.

Siegfried Sassoon uses antithesis emotive language and repeated personal pronouns to make his open letter a powerful protest.

The method used in an open letter will differ depending on the purpose of writing.

Satire can also be used in open letters to criticise a personal idea in an amusing way.

And successful satire usually involves any of the following, a clear target, humour, exaggeration, irony, and parody.

Thank you so much for joining me in today's lesson, I hope you've enjoyed writing your own open letter today.