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Depiction or discussion of serious crime

Depiction or discussion of mental health issues

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Hello and welcome to today's lesson.

My name is Miss Halliday and I will be teaching you today.

I really hope you've brought your resilience with you to today's lesson as you are definitely going to need it because we are going to be writing a first draught of a response, and then looking at how we can improve it to write the second draught.

And that will require you to be really resilient because you're going to be given lots of feedback about what you've done well, but also how you can improve.

So you'll need to be really open and receptive to that feedback and make sure that you're acting on it.

So make sure that you've brought your resilience with you and let's get started.

So today's lesson is called a Written analysis of "The Tell-Tale Heart." And by the end of today's lesson, you'll be able to confidently draught and redraft your work.

Here are some key words that you'll need to unlock today's learning, starting with the word redraft.

Now a redraft means rewriting your work to improve it.

In today's lesson, we're going to be talking about Poe's use of methods.

And a method is any conscious choice that the writer makes.

Now this could be as large as using a simile, or it could be as small as choosing a specific word, but what I really want to emphasise here is that the writer's method is any deliberate decision that the writer makes.

When you are writing a critical essay, it's really important to be concise.

Now what that means is using as few words as possible to express as much meaning as possible.

It's also really important in your essay to be tentative with your interpretations and your analysis.

Now, tentative means not absolutely certain or agreed, and it's important to be tentative because at the end of the day, we are not the writer of the text and we were not there when they wrote the text.

Therefore, all we are doing is making educated guessers about what we think they were trying to achieve.

So it's really important to be tentative to reflect that.

If you'd like to take a moment to jot any of those keywords down, then please feel free to do so at your leisure.

Here's our outline for today's lesson.

The first part of the lesson is going to focus on you writing your first draught of your response.

And the second half of the lesson is where we're going to be looking at redrafting your work to create a new and improved second draught.

But let's start, first of all, by writing your first draught.

So here's the question that you are gonna be writing a response to.

Using this extract as an inspiration, how does Poe present the theme of madness in "The Tell-Tale Heart"? Now, before we look at the extract, I think it's really important for us to think of some synonyms for the word madness so that we don't repeat that word 50 million times throughout our critical response.

We need to switch it up a little bit and consider equally within madness what different kinds of madness there are.

So what I'd like you to do now is pause the video while you try to think of alternative words that we can use instead of the word madness.

You can do this either by discussing it with the people around you, or if you are working independently, you can just bullet point some words on your own.

So pause the video and off you go to do that now.

Fantastic discussions and some really great synonyms being shared there, a massive well done.

Here are some of the synonyms that I heard that I liked the best.

So first of all, we've got this word delusional, which is where you believe things that may not perhaps be true or actually there.

Okay, so you might see things, you might hear things that are imagined.

The second word I liked was insane.

Now this means again that you are not of sound mind, you are not mentally sound, and therefore you are mad.

I also really liked this use of the word deranged, which again means that you are out of control because of your madness or because of your kind of emotional and mental state.

And finally, we can use this phrase, not of sound mind, to reflect this idea that somebody is mad or perhaps mentally unstable in some way.

Now, a lot of these words have quite subtle differences between their meanings and equally, some of them can be used quite harshly if used insensitively.

So what I'd like you to discuss now is, well, which of these words is the most extreme? So which one has possibly the most negative connotations? And equally, which of the narrator's actions could we attribute to each of these words? So can you think of an example of the narrator seeing or believing things that are imagined and not real? Can you give me an example of the narrator where he's deranged and outta control because of his mental state or his mental torment? So what I'm going to do now is invite you to pause the video where you consider which of these words is the most extreme, and also which actions from the text we can attribute to each of these different words or phrases.

So pause the video and either discuss that with the people around you or consider it independently.

Whatever works best for you today.

Off you go.

Fantastic discussions, and great to see many of you identifying this word, deranged, as probably the most extreme of those words 'cause it has quite negative connotations.

So when we're writing this word deranged in our response, we're going to have to think very carefully about which part of the text we are attributing it to.

So at the beginning of the text, we recognise that the narrator is somebody who suffers with mental illness.

However, mental illness does not necessarily make a person dangerous.

And in fact, in many cases, it really doesn't make a person dangerous.

The mental illness that we see in this text does make the narrator dangerous because he then goes on to commit murder, dismemberment, and he hides the old man's body under the floorboards.

That is an action that we can comfortably describe as deranged because it's also very wicked and legally and morally very, very wrong.

So there, we feel comfortable using the word deranged to describe those actions, even though it's a very extreme and harsh word.

Because actually, what the narrator has done to the old man is despicable, and therefore we can use that word deranged or insane to describe the despicable actions of the narrator because those words best reflect the gravity of what the narrator has done.

So it's really important for you to consider carefully the word choices that you're making, and make sure that you are talking more sensitively about this topic because mental illness is an extremely controversial but also sensitive topic that we need to approach with some level of empathy and sensitivity.

So basically, what I'm saying is think carefully about which of these words you are choosing to describe which of the narrator's actions.

So let's have a look at what we're actually being asked to do in this question.

So here's our question again, and first of all, this phrase, using this extract as inspiration is really important.

And what that phrase means is that some of our evidence should come from the extract, but also, some should come from the rest of the text, because we're being asked to demonstrate here a holistic knowledge and understanding of the whole text.

Therefore, we can start by discussing the extract, but then we need to start bringing in some evidence and ideas from the rest of the text as well to show that holistic understanding of the text.

Now, whenever that word how is used in a question, what we're being asked to analyse is the narrator's use of methods, because actually, the writer's method is how they do something.

So if we're looking at how Poe presents the theme of madness, we need to be focusing on what methods Poe uses to characterise the narrator as mad or mentally unstable.

And finally, the key question word here is madness.

That is what we're being asked about.

And therefore when we are looking for evidence, we need to really be looking closely for evidence of how the narrator is presented as delusional or not of sound mind.

So that's what we need to keep focusing on if we're wanting to create a cohesive argument.

Okay, if we're wanting to create one large argument in which we explore different ideas, all of those ideas need to link back to this one larger argument that the narrator is characterised as mad.

So here is the extract that we will be using for inspiration.

So some of our quotes need to be taken from this extract and some need to be taken from the rest of the text.

I'm going to read this extract to you now, and you need to make sure that you are following along really closely, as you will need to have a really solid understanding of this extract in order to do well in your writing.

"I paced the floor to and fro with heavy strides, as if excited to fury by the observations of the men, but the noise steadily increased.

Oh God! What could I do? I phoned, I raved, I swore! I swung the chair upon which I'd been sitting and grated it upon the boards, but the noise arose overall and continually increased.

It grew louder, louder, louder! And still the men chatted pleasantly and smiled.

Was it possible they heard not? Almighty God! No, no! They heard! They suspected! They knew! They were making a mockery of my horror! This I thought, and this I think.

But anything was better than this agony! Anything was more tolerable than this derision! I could bear those hypocritical smiles no longer! I felt the time must scream or die! And now, again! Hark! Louder! Louder! Louder! Louder! 'Villains!' I shrieked, 'dissemble no more! I admit the deed! Tear up the planks! Here, here! It's the beating of his hideous heart!'" So a very, very dynamic and jam-packed extract there where I'm really hoping that you recognise some of kind of the narrator's mind unravelling and his kind of delusions escalating to the point of utter insanity.

So let's check for understanding of what we've just read.

Which of the following summaries best describes the extract that you have just read? I'm going to invite you now to pause the video while you read both answers and decide which one you think is the more accurate description of what we have just read together.

So pause the video and off you go.

And fantastic work if you correctly selected B, you are absolutely right.

This extract is taken from the end of the story when the narrator imagines the old man's heart beating still beneath the floorboards.

This imagined sound drives the narrator to insanity.

He imagines the police laughing at him amongst themselves whilst they sit and converse with him.

Eventually, the sound drives the narrator to lose control and hysterically confess his crime.

So there's a really kind of succinct and concise summary of exactly what we've just read in that extract, and well done if you identified that B was the much more accurate summary.

So before we write, you've got to make sure that you have read the extracts and highlighted evidence that you want to use in your response.

And you need to make sure that you have planned your response really carefully using paragraph outlines.

What I'd like you to do now is discuss, well, what is it that makes a clear and concise response? So how am I going to make my response really concise and really, really crystal clear for my reader? What can I do to achieve that? So I'm going to invite you now to pause the video while you, again, either discuss it with the people around you or think about that question independently if you're working from home on your own.

So pause the video and off you go to discuss that now.

Fantastic discussions, and some really great and usable suggestions there as to how we can be making our essays as concise and as clear as possible.

So here's what you could have said.

You could have said that a clear response follows the same line of argument.

So in this case, is that the narrator is delusional.

A good essay also focuses on the writer's use of methods.

Basically, how they do what they do.

A clear essay uses key vocabulary really accurately.

And a concise response uses embedded quotations.

Finally, a convincing response always links back to the writer's intentions.

So why they did what they did, what were they trying to teach us when they wrote this text.

So there are some really kind of usable suggestions as to things that you need to make sure that you are doing in your essay to make it really clear and really concise.

So onto our first task of the lesson where you are going to basically write up your response.

So I'm looking for you here to write your response to the essay question using your notes to help you.

And here's our question reminder, using the extract as inspiration, how does Poe present the theme of madness in "The Tell-Tale Heart"? I cannot emphasise enough how important is that you are using your notes, okay? You should have planned paragraph outlines before you've reached this point.

So make sure that you use them, okay? Make sure that you take your ideas that you've already considered and just write them up, okay? So this really is kind of the almost the easy part because you've done the hard part in planning it, now you're just taking those very same ideas and writing them up formally in an extended response.

While you are doing that, you need to make sure that you are including an introduction that explains your argument.

So what is it that you are hoping to prove throughout your essay? At least three analytical paragraphs which have really clear topic sentences.

Check that you are embedding your quotations from the extract.

And also remember that you should be taking some of those quotations from the rest of the text as well.

Make sure you're including analysis of exactly why post chose really specific words or methods, what is it that they show us, and what effect do they have on our impressions of the characters.

You also need to keep a really clear focus on Poe's intentions.

So basically, why he wrote the story, what was he trying to teach us? And finally, you need to be using key vocabulary really accurately.

It is no use using a fancy word if you use it incorrectly 'cause it really doesn't make you look clever.

What does make you look clever is using fantastic and really specific vocabulary accurately, okay? That's the difference.

We've got to be using vocabulary accurately in our responses.

I am so excited to see what you come up with and I'm really hoping that you are going to demonstrate effort, enthusiasm, but most importantly, resilience when you're approaching this task, okay? Yes, it will be hard.

Yes, your hand might hurt.

You've just got to power through the pain, okay? That's just the way it is.

So I'm really looking to see a really high level of resilience demonstrated in this task.

You absolutely can do this and I'm so excited to see what you come up with.

So what I want you to do now is pause the video while you write up your response to that essay question.

As I say, I can't wait to see what you come up with.

So off you go.

Fantastic work.

And then thank you so much for your effort there.

I was so impressed by your resilience and how hard you were all working, and I think most people were able to comfortably write over a page and a half, which was fantastic to see.

So really well done.

What we're going to do now is a quick assessment of our work, to check that we have done the following.

So I'd like you to identify where have you included an introduction that explains your argument.

So what it is that you are hoping to prove.

Where you used really clear topic sentences? Where have you used embedded quotations? Where have you analysed why Poe used specific words or methods and thought about what it was he was trying to achieve? Where have you mentioned Poe's warnings about guilt and its long-lasting effects on human beings? And finally, I'd like you to highlight any key vocabulary that you've used and double check to make sure you've used it accurately.

So I'm going to invite you now to pause the video while you undertake that self-assessment.

Pause the video and off you go.

Fantastic work.

And a massive well done because you have completed the first draught of your response.

Really, really well done.

So onto the second learning cycle now, where we're going to look at how we can really improve and build on that first draught by redrafting our work.

So our earlier writing was actually not our completed essay, it was just our first draught.

And I think a lot of students think that when they've written something, that's it finished, but that's actually never true, okay? The finished piece of work is normally something that has gone through several processes of redrafting.

So your finished piece of work should really be kind of your fourth or fifth draught of the same piece of writing, because each time you redraft it, you are improving it, you are making it better.

So we're going to work together now on writing a second draught.

I told this to Laura and she had a little bit of a misconception, and she said, "Well, I thought that redrafting was only for creative writing.

I thought the point of redrafting was to make better vocabulary choices.

We don't make vocabulary choices in critical writing." Now, as I said, this is a misconception.

So it means it's something that Laura has got wrong.

And what I would like you to discuss is, well, why is Laura mistaken? Why is she not quite right in what she's saying there? And then I'd like you to think off the back of that, well, why is it important to redraft critical writing as well as creative writing? So pause the video while you either discuss that with the people around you or think about it independently if you're working on your own.

Off you go.

Fantastic discussions.

And many of you really able to clearly identify that actually, we do still make vocabulary choices in critical writing, and that is where Laura is incorrect.

These choices are so important in making our writing clear and concise.

We need to make sure that we are picking the most specific piece of vocabulary to express the meaning that we're trying to express.

And secondly, actually, writing a second draught of your work ensures that it's the best it can possibly be.

As I said, the finished, finished piece of work would ideally be the fourth or fifth draught.

So well done if you've got those ideas, let's move on.

So let's show Laura how to redraft her work successfully then.

So here's the first part of Laura's first draught.

"In Poe's 'The Tell-Tale Heart', Edgar Allen Poe uses an unreliable narrator to show us the theme of madness.

This can be seen when the narrator writes that he 'gasped for breath, and yet the officers heard it not.

' The word not here shows the narrator is delusional, thus the narrator is delusional and deranged." So there's a part of Laura's first draught.

What I'd like you to do now is think, well, what do we think that Laura's done really well? And I'd like you to give her a what went well, a WWW.

And then I'd like you to think, "Well, there's quite a bit here that could be improved." So what is it that Laura could improve moving forward into her second draught? So I'd like you to give her an EBI, which is an even better if.

So, that's something that she could do better in her second draught to improve her work.

So thinking really carefully back to that first learning cycle about things that we identified would make a concise and successful essay, and using those to assess Laura work and think about what she's done well, but also what she needs to improve.

So again, you can do this in pairs or groups, or you can do it independently, whatever you would prefer.

But I'd like you now to pause the video while you have a go at giving Laura a what went well and an even better if.

Off you go.

Fantastic work.

And it was great to see so many of you identifying things that Laura's done really successfully, but also able to recognise where she can improve her response.

So Izzy and Sophia also gave some feedback to Laura, and this is what they had to say.

Sophia said, "In terms of a what went well, well, well done for using an embedded quotation from the extract, Laura.

I think that you chose a great quotation that shows the narrators delusion." So Sophia here really happy with not only the quotation that Laura chose, but the way that she included it in her writing.

And I have to agree, I think that it was really great that Laura used that embedded quotation, and I thought she'd picked a really, really effective quotation.

Now in terms of an even better, if Izzy says, "Well, you need to make sure that you remember that Poe wrote this story, not the narrator.

So you need to make this clearer in your essay." Izzy also says, "Also, your explanations need more depth.

I think the word gasped might have given you more to say about the narrator's delusion than the word not.

Think carefully about which of Poe's methods that you want to discuss." And again, I have to agree with Izzy.

I think that Laura doesn't make it clear enough here who the writer of the text is.

And I also think that perhaps the word not isn't the most appropriate word that Laura could have picked out of that quotation to explore in a bit more detail.

So I think that's really useful advice from Sophia and Izzy there.

So well done if you've got anything similar in your discussions.

So we gave this feedback to Laura, and Laura was really receptive to the feedback, which is fantastic.

And she said, "Thank you so much for your feedback.

Let me have another go." So Laura is going to go and redraft her work.

Now, when Laura came to do this, she actually struggled a little bit, and she said, "Well, I'm not sure which word better shows the narrator's delusion in my quotation, 'I gasped for breath, and yet the officers heard it not.

'" So what I'd like you to do is give Laura some advice as to which word she can choose that would better show the narrator's delusion.

Is it A, breath, is it B, hard, C, gasped, or D, I? So pause the video while you make your answer selection.

Fantastic and well done if you selected the verb gasped.

I completely agree, and this was one of the words that Izzy suggested that Laura could focus on instead.

So Laura redrafted this section of her work using the EBI from Izzy, but also our advice as to which words she could better choose.

And she wrote this, "In Poe's 'The Tell-Tale Heart', Edgar Allen Poe uses an unreliable narrator to show us the theme of madness.

This can be seen when Poe writes that the narrator gasped for breath, and yet the officers heard it not.

Poe's use of the verb gasped here shows the narrator sheer panic and loss of control because of the imagined sound of the old man's hideous heart, a symbol of the narrator's guilt.

This shows the narrator's delusion as the imagined sound of the heartbeat causes him to lose all of his self composure and hysterically confessed to his crimes.

Here, we see that guilt has driven the narrator further into delusion and insanity." And what I'd like you to think now is, well, what do you think of Laura's redraft? Do you think that she took Izzy's EBI on board? So I'm going to invite you now to pause the video while you discuss that with the people around you and decide whether or not you think Laura has taken is' advice on board.

And if she has, how successful she's been in including it in her second draught? So pause the video and off you go.

Fantastic discussions, and great to hear so many of you full of praise for Laura and her effort in her second draught, 'cause I completely agree with you that this is a much better version of the same response.

So really well done for identifying that.

Now, as Izzy points out in, this second redraft, there is actually a much clearer focus on Poe's use of methods in Laura's second draught.

Writing phrases like, Poe uses, or, Poe writes, really helps us to keep a really clear focus on Poe's use of methods.

And secondly, Laura's explanations do have a lot more depth because she's used words like because and shows to explain the effects of the writer's methods.

And we've highlighted those in green to show you how you can include them in your response.

So here we see that Laura actually really has taken Izzy's advice on board and she's used those even better ifs to create a much stronger, much more convincing piece of work for her second draught.

So really well done to Laura because actually sometimes, it can be super intimidating to get feedback and be told that something's not good enough.

So really well done to Laura for being so receptive and so open to improving her work.

That is so impressive and I'm really proud of Laura for her resilience during this task.

So onto our last task of the lesson now, and I think you'll really enjoy this because we're going to swap draughts with somebody else.

So you're gonna swap your first draught that you wrote with another person.

You're both going to read one another's responses, and then you're going to use the checklist to give your partner at least one what went well, so something that they've done well.

So you're gonna identify in their response something you think they've been successful at.

But also, I'd like you to give at least two EBIs.

So two even better ifs, which is something that they could improve on in their second draught.

Remember the work that we've just done with Laura because you are going to be doing exactly the same thing that we've just done for Laura for a partner.

And here's the checklist that you will be using to help you assess their work and help you provide this what went well and the two even better ifs.

So when you are looking at your partner's work, you need to be looking for short embedded quotations.

Is their explanation deep enough, okay? Have they used words like because and shows to really explore post use of methods? Have they focused on Poe as the writer and his use of methods? So have they used phrases like, Poe uses, or, Poe's use of, or, Poe's word choice here shows this.

Have they discussed different methods? So have they talks maybe about symbolism, sentence structure, the fact that he uses an unreliable narrator? And finally, have they used sensitive language, so words like may and could, to show that kind of that they are making those educated guesses based on the information that they have.

But obviously, we can never be sure because we're not the writer and we weren't there when per wrote this.

So using that sensitive language is also really important.

So as I said, you are going to use this checklist to assess your partner's work and give them at least one what went well, so something they did really well, and then give them two EBIs.

So something that they could really work on when they write their second draught.

So I'd like you now to pause the video while you assess your partner's work.

Off you go.

Fantastic work there.

And it was great to see so many of you being really sensitive in the way that you were writing these EBIs.

Because as we said, it can be quite daunting to receive feedback from somebody else, so it's important that that feedback is given really kindly and empathetically and in a supportive and productive manner.

So well done for that.

I was really impressed with your sensitivity there.

So what you're going to do now is swap your responses back.

You're going to read the what went wells and the EBIs that you've been given, and then you're going to use them to redraft a section of your work, just like Laura did, but you're going to make sure that you've acted on your partner's feedback.

Remember that you can use Laura's redraft as a model if you are struggling.

So you're not on your own.

You know, Laura's already done this process, so you can absolutely use the work that she's already done to help you improve your own work as well.

So I'm going to invite you now to pause the video while you have a go at redrafting your work, making sure that you produce an improved version of the same piece of writing from earlier in your lesson.

I'm really excited to see your second draught and how much they've come on since the first.

So pause the video and off you go.

Fantastic redrafts.

Aw, it was so great to see so many of you taking your partner's advice on board and being really receptive and open to improving your work.

And actually, just from glancing around, I can see how much better these responses are.

And imagine if you did that another two or three times, think how amazing your responses would be then.

So I'm really impressed with the work you've done today and also the resilience that you've shown me, not only in how much writing you've done, but also the way that you've responded to feedback.

You should be really proud of yourselves.

Great, great work.

So to summarise the learning from today, well, first of all, remember that it's really important to consider the first version of your work as just a first draught and not the finished essay.

Now remember that redrafting critical writing is just as important as redrafting creative writing.

When you're redrafting, remember that a clear and concise essay focuses on the writer's use of methods, and that an interesting and successful essay offers a comprehensive explanation and exploration of the effects of the writer's methods.

Short embedded quotations make your essay more concise and coherent.

So make sure that you're including them.

Thank you so much for coming to today's lesson.

As I say, I've been blown away by your effort, and I'm so impressed with the resilience that you've demonstrated when you received your feedback and the resilience that you carried forward into creating your second draught of your piece of work.

Thank you so much for your effort and engagement today.

I have loved teaching you.

I look forward to seeing you next time, and I hope you have a fantastic rest of your day.

See you later.