Hello, my name is Miss Grant, I'm so glad you decided to learn with me today, and we're in our World at War Short Stories unit.

Today, we are going to read an extract written by a writer called Vera Brittain.

She was alive during World War I and she recounts her experiences of being a 20-year-old in Britain during those four years of the war.

We're going to consider what it means to read a text and really carefully, along with enjoying Vera Brittain's memoir.

I cannot wait to hear all of your fantastic ideas.

I'm going to be your support and guide as we work through today's lesson together.

Let's get started.

So, by the end of today's lesson, you're going to show a thorough understanding of an extract from Vera Brittain's, "Testament of Youth." We're going to have a quick look at who Vera Brittain is, and then we're going to dive into her memoir, which is about her experiences of World War I on the home front.

We're going to show a thorough understanding by first skimming and scanning the extract, and then, we're going to do a close reading, and we're going to have a look at what these terms means, skimming, and scanning, and close reading, why they are both useful ways to approach reading throughout this lesson.

There are some key words which are going to help unlock our learning today and help us achieve our objective.

The first is testament, which is a truthful account, and Vera Brittain's memoir is entitled, "Testament of Youth." We've got memoir, which is a nonfiction account of something written from a person's memory, and, "Testament of Youth," is an example of a memoir.

Close reading, this is carefully, thoughtfully, and slowly examining a text and considering the writers, the choices the writer made, and we are going to do a close reading of an extract from, "Testament of Youth," today.

Gist, this is the main idea or essence of something, often brief and in a simplified form, and before we do our close reading, we are going to get the gist of the extract from, "Testament of Youth," to inform our close reading, and home front, this is civilians of a country that is at war, who feel its impact in their daily lives.

So, Vera Brittain was on the home front during World War I.

She didn't go to the trenches, but she instead was on the home front, and we're going to look at her experiences today in her memoir.

So, our lesson outlined for today, we're going to start off by skimming and scanning the extract from, "Testament of Youth," and then, we're going to use our second learning cycle to complete a close reading.

Let's start off with skimming and scanning.

So, I'd like you to discuss, before we dive into the memoir, what do you already know about the home front during World War I? Pause the video and discuss this question now.

Welcome back, a really nice discussion.

Some people saying, "Well, I haven't actually really heard "of this phrase before, but I have heard "of this phrase frontline, "so maybe it's connected in some way "to do with the fighting," another saying, "Oh, yes, I have heard "of the home front before, "I learned about it in my history lessons, "or I've seen it in literature that I have read, "the idea that civilians in the country "where it's at war, they feel the impact of war "in their daily lives," and some people even moving into the specifics of what that impact might look like.

Now, here is a discussion that three other pupils had and some of the ideas they had.

So, we had World War I impacted civilians at the home front, telegrams were dreaded, and letters were an important form of communication.

I'd like you to discuss, can you develop these ideas? So, we've got some really nice ideas here, but maybe they could be developed a bit further.

Imagine someone who didn't have any knowledge of the idea of a telegram or the home front, or why letters might be important.

Apply all of your knowledge, your contextual knowledge of World War I, and see if you can develop these students' ideas.

Pause the video and discuss the question now.

Welcome back.

After a really lively discussion, developing some of the ideas that these pupils had.

So, some people talking about the impact that World War I had on civilians at home, mentioning food shortages in particular, and that rationing was brought in near the end of the war about 1917, and that the impact was felt often through emotional strains.

So, the worry of people being away on the front line and worrying what might happen to them, and then lots of people showed their really, really good understanding of two forms of communication during World War I, that are very important, telegrams, that they were dreaded, because they often bought bad news of death, or of casualty, but letters, by contrast, were really celebrated, were really desired, brought moments of comfort and joy.

There was very complicated, but efficient and effective postal service, which made sure that letters got to soldiers and that soldiers could send letters home, as well, because everybody knew that that would be really important for the morale of both people on the front line and people on the home front, that they could stay connected with their loved ones.

So, some really nice development of those ideas.

Now, Vera Brittain, who was born in 1893, she died in 1970, she was a British writer, and you can see from those dates that she lived through World War I and indeed World War II.

Now, Britain was 20 when the war began in 1914.

In 1915, she gave up studying at the University of Oxford to become a nurse, and she lost her fiance, a man called Roland Leighton, brother, and close friends to World War I.

She's perhaps best remembered for her memoir, "Testament of Youth," in which she recounts her personal experiences of war.

It's a memoir, meaning a nonfiction account based on someone's memories, and testament, a truthful account, and it was published in 1933, and it deals with the years 1914 to 1925.

So, you can see why it's called a memoir, because it was published in 1933, many years after the First World War ended.

Now, consider the facts we have learned about Brittain, and I'd like you to discuss what kind of things might we expect to find if in her memoir.

So, pause the video, consider the facts that we've just learned about her, what kind of things might we expect to find in her memoir? Pause the video and discuss this question now.

Welcome back, some really nice hypotheses there, some nice educated guesses.

The idea that she might really explore the ideas of loss and sacrifice, because that seems to have really characterised her time during the war.

So, she sacrificed her university education in order to help with the war effort, to tend to the wounded soldiers, but she also lost some incredibly important people to her, her fiance, her brother, and two close friends.

So, the idea that her present day was really, really impacted, but also her future life was also impacted, because this fiance, this man she was going to marry, she did not end up marrying him, he died, he was killed in the war.

So, really feeling the loss and sacrifice, and those are ideas that are explored very keenly in her memoir.

Now, a check for understanding before we start looking at, "Testament of Youth," of the extract itself.

Vera's, "Testament of Youth," is fictional.

Is this true or false? Pause the video and select your response now.

Well done, if you selected false.

Now, I'd like you to justify your answer.

Is it A, Brittain's memoir deals with her personal lived experiences of the war, or B, Brittain's memoir is nonfiction, but she writes an imaginative recant of her experiences, of the experiences of her brother, fiance, and friends in the trenches.

Pause the video and select your justification now.

Well done, if you selected A.

So, it's about her lived experiences on the home front.

So, there are lots and lots of literature about what it was like on the trenches, on the frontline of World War I, but this is slightly different.

We are getting a different lens.

We're getting it through the experience of someone who experienced the war on the home front.

Now, today, we are going to read an extract from Brittain's, "Testament of Youth," and sometimes being faced with a nonfiction text, written about 100 years ago, can feel overwhelming, and a good approach is to skim and scan it, and this is where you glance through a text and look for clues, for example, keywords to give you an understanding of what the text is about.

Skimming and scanning enables you to get the gist of a tone of a text, its tone, subject matter, and key ideas.

So, it's really, really grounding to get the gist of a text.

Think I've got a rough idea of what this is about, and now I can develop my close reading.

So, starting off with skimming and scanning, and it's not the easy way out.

It is a good thing to do when you're approaching a long, nonfiction text with slightly old or archaic language that might be a little bit challenging.

So, here is the first section of the extract, and I would like you to skim and scan it, and then discuss these questions.

What words catch your eye? What can you infer about the general mood and tone, and how does context support your ideas? So, do not spend a long time reading all through this, just skim and scan.

There are no right or wrong answers here.

What leaps out to you, and what can you infer about the general mood or tone, and how does context support your ideas? So, pause the video, skim and scan, and then the discuss these questions, and I will see you back here shortly.

Pause the video now.

Welcome back.

After giving that opening section of this extract a quick skim and scan, some really nice answers to this discussion.

So, some words that leapt out to people were, "at the time," so the idea that the newspaper might be quite important during World War I, it would have information about what was going on, and that's obviously key to the writer of this memoir of Vera Brittain.

This word, "Roland," jumped out for a lot of people, it jumped out for me, as well, because we know that it's a focus for her.

She's very worried about her fiance, and this word, "never," jumped out to a lot of people, as well.

So, the idea that the war might impact her life forever.

There might have been other words that leapt out to you, and there's no right or wrong answer here, skimming and scanning, it's really just seeing what are the words from the text that really, really jump out to me, and can you give some clues as to what's going on? It was really nice to hear people talking about the tone and mood.

So, the idea that Vera Brittain is out and about, we know that she is out and about, walking up and down the streets, and this phrase, "swung dizzily," and the focus on Roland is showing her state of confusion, her sense of anxiety, so quite an unhappy tone at the beginning of this extract, and then lots of people relied on their contextual knowledge, knowing that Vera Britain is on the home front, and that the home front was characterised by this sort of anxiety, this constant anxiety for those on the frontline, and so that helps us to understand a little bit why that word, "Roland," leaps out to us, and why it's mentioned in this first paragraph of this extract.

That is her focus, that is who she's anxious about.

So, we've done a quick skim and scan, just for that first section of the extract.

Now, I'd like you to skim and scan the rest of the extract from Vera Brittain's, "Testament of Youth." This can be found on the worksheet, just as we did previously just for that first section, and as you're skimming and scanning, I'd like you to select keywords and phrases which stand out, noting what each suggests about the tone of the extract and its main ideas, and then I want you to be prepared to explain the gist of the extract.

So, overall, what is happening in this extract? So, we're not doing close reading here, you're just skimming and scanning, highlighting or noting down a few key phrases that stick out to you, and then think, "What is the overall gist of this extract?" Pause the video and complete this task now.

Welcome back, really nice to see you after skimming and scanning that extract for the first time, getting an overall feel for what Brittain is talking about, what she's writing about, and some keywords and phrases which are leaping out to you.

So, here are three keywords or phrases that stood out to these pupils.

So, we've got, "anxiety waiting for letters," "nerve-wracking suspense," "Every ring at the door suggested a telegram," and, "barrier of indescribable experience "between men and the women whom they loved." So, these are the phrases that leapt out to these pupils.

Now, I'd like you to discuss what might these particular phrases, why might they have stood out to these pupils, and what do they reveal about the gist of the extract? So, focus on what stood out to these particular pupils, why might they have stood out to these pupils, and how does it help us understand the gist of the extract? Pause the video and discuss this question now.

Welcome back, after a really nice discussion, noting that some of these ideas that leapt out to these pupils, they also leapt out to you.

So, there's a bit of commonality there, but the idea that all of these phrases, whilst they express distinct emotions, there's this idea of anxiety, fear, and unhappiness on the home front.

So, anxiety of waiting for letters, a nerve-wracking suspense, of this sense of always waiting, and feel in constant tension, and worry for those people who are are at the front, and then the slightly more focused idea about the telegram, the ring at the door suggested a telegram, we know telegrams were dreaded, because they brought news of death or casualty.

So, Vera Brittain is expressing a feeling that lots of people had on the home front, of the idea that they did not want to receive a telegram, and then the slightly more complicated idea, this barrier of indescribable experiences, metaphorical language here, barrier between men and women, so men who'd been at the front, and women who had been on the home front, the idea that their experiences over these four years were so dramatically different, that there might be this irreversible disconnection or barrier between them, and that is one of her fears, that was one of her fears, that's what she's relating in her memoir.

She's remembering this fear about this barrier between the men and the women whom they loved.

So, we're getting a a gist of the extract, an overall idea that life on the home front was very difficult, and a lot of the difficulty laid in the emotional strain that many people on the home front were under.

Now, Izzy starts to explain the gist of the extract.

She's using bullet points to help her.

She said, "The overall tone is one of worry, "sadness, and anger," and I completely agree, and, "Brittain is angry that young people's lives "might be 'cut' off." So, she's also noting that, that there is some anger within this extract, as well.

I'd like you to discuss what additional ideas might you suggest Izzy includes in her explanation.

She got two bullet points there, but what additional ideas do you think Izzy really must include in these in order to understand the gist of the extract? Pause the video and discuss the question now.

Welcome back, really nice to hear some clear ideas around the room, so that we've got a real, real sense of the gist of this extract.

So, you've really helped Izzy out, she has identified this tone of worry, this tone of sadness and anger, anger at that young people's lives might be cut off, but some additional ideas that had going around is the idea that she talks about what it was like to hear about big battles and gas attacks.

Brittain talks about how time moved incredibly slowly, there's this kind of elongated section in the middle, where she talks about time going incredibly slowly and she talks about how much she feared for her fiance.

So, you can see there that we have got five bullet points, and definitely that captures the sort of gist of this extract.

So, the extract is quite long, about 200 pages, but we have got its essence, its simplified form in those five bullet points.

So, we're in a really, really good position to move on to learning cycle two and look at some close reading.

So, let's move on to that close reading section.

We've done our skimming and scanning, and now, we're going to move on to that close reading.

So, close reading is the opposite of skimming and scanning.

So, skimming and scanning is quickly reading a text, whereas close reading is rereading parts of the text slowly.

We understand the gist when we skim and scan, but with close reading we understand its finer points.

We understand the overall tone when we skim and scan, but close reading, we understand shifts in tone, and we select some words, images, and phrases when we're skimming and scanning, but with close reading, we can analyse words, images, and phrases.

So, close reading and skimming and scanning, they sort of do what they sound like, skimming and scanning is a quick, let's get the gist of this extract, and then close reading, returning and looking at it very, very carefully.

Now, Izzy completes a close reading of this paragraph.

So, this is a paragraph from, "Testament of Youth," and it says, "My thoughts swung dizzily "between the conviction that Roland would return "and the certainty that he could never possibly come back.

"I had little patience to spare for my mother's "middle-aged acquaintances, who patronised me "as they bought my primroses, "and congratulated me on putting aside my 'studies' "to 'do my bit in this terrible War.

' "I took their pennies with scant," which means little ceremony, "and one by one thrust them "with a noisy clatter into my tin." Now, Izzy says she wants to focus on this phrase, "swung dizzily," and she says, "Well, 'swung,' this is an up "and down movement, "'dizzily' is a round and round movement," so it really develops a sense that she feels out of control and confused.

So, could have just used one of those words, swung or dizzily, but putting them together really generates a sense of the intense confusion and feeling of lack of control, and Izzy also looks at this powerful verb, so she's saying that she takes some money from her mother's middle-aged acquaintances.

She thrusts it into the tin, and this powerful verb, Brittain's taking her anger out in any limited way that she can.

So, she's feeling frustrated, she feels powerless, and she can't really do anything, and she's walking up and down, collecting money for the war effort, and so she does the little things she can, and she makes a fast, sharp action with her hand, and this maybe betrays some of her feelings of powerlessness.

Now, I'd like you to discuss, what else would you advise Izzy to annotate to develop her close reading? So, pause the video, re-look at this paragraph, do some close reading just like Izzy has, what else would you encourage her to annotate to develop her close reading? Pause the video and discuss the question now.

Welcome back.

You've got so many ideas to help support Izzy's close reading.

I'm going to select just a few.

So, I like the idea that there's a lot of contrast employed in this paragraph, so she has this conviction that Roland would return, but that is immediately contrasted with the certainty that he could never possibly come back.

So, we actually see, get an insight into her thoughts, and see how they're swinging, veering from one to another, and this phrase, "little patience to spare," so the idea that she really is frustrated with the people who are congratulating her and doing her part for the war effort, she finds absolutely, she doesn't feel good about that at all, and she gets very frustrated with them, which is then augmented and developed with this idea that she's thrust them into the tin with that noisy clatter, and that word there kind of almost automatically we can hear these pennies being thrust into the tin, and the fact that Vera Brittain doesn't feel that there needs to be any ceremony with that, she's not grateful, she just thrusts them in the tin, they clatter, and she moves on.

So, we're getting a real sense kind of picture of what it would be like on the street with Vera Brittain, where she is not happy, not happy about the experience she's having with these middle-aged acquaintances, because her thoughts are so consumed by her fiance, Roland, who is away on the front line.

So, a check for understanding before we embark on our own close reading of the text.

So, what might best describe Brittain's tone in the extract from, "Testament of Youth?" We've got patronising, anxious, optimistic, and angry.

Pause the video and select your responses now.

Welcome back and well done, if you selected anxious and angry, she is not patronising.

Instead, she feels as if others are patronising her, as if they're talking down to her, and she's not optimistic, she is really, really worried, and has some certainty that Roland will never return.

So, our final practise task for today's lesson, we are going to complete a close reading of the extract from Vera Brittain's, "Testament of Youth," and you're going to use Izzy's annotations as a model.

So, she looked at a short section and did some really nice annotations, really nice close reading of this section.

You are now going to apply that to the whole of the text.

So, pause the video, give this task the time that it deserves, spend some time with this extract.

You've got a really nice grounding in it because of your contextual knowledge, and because of that skim and scan that you did before, and we can dwell a little bit more on Brittain's language and how she is expressing herself.

I will see you back here shortly.

Pause the video and complete the task now.

Welcome back, lovely to see these annotations building and building from that first skim and scan, where we just noted down some general ideas, to now some really developed annotations, looking really carefully at the way in which Brittain is expressing herself throughout this extract.

So, some feedback.

Here is a set of annotations from Izzy, a further set of annotations from Izzy.

She is looking at this section where she says, "'Those who are old and think this War so terrible "'do not know what it means to us who are young.

' "I soliloquized angrily.

"'When I think how suddenly, instantly a chance bullet "'may put an end to that brilliant life "'may cut it off in its youth and mighty promise.

'" So, this is a section that Izzy wanted to do some further annotations on, and she focused on this verb, "soliloquized angrily." So, it shows how lonely she feels, because a soliloquy is when a character speaks their thoughts allowed to no one.

So, the fact that she's chosen this verb maybe expresses that she felt there was no one she could express these thoughts to, and finally, there's a contrast between the total end of a life and its potential, so she says maybe this life is going to be cut off in its youth, but it has, by contrast, mighty promise.

So, the kind of contrast here between the the total end and its potential, so a really sad moment within this extract, and, of course, we know that Roland, her fiance, was indeed killed in the trenches of World War I.

So, I'd like you to self-assess your own annotations, ensuring you have a focus on Brittain's methods and their effects.

We've got another example here from Izzy and use that just to sense-check, self-assess your own annotations.

Pause the video and complete the assessment now.

Welcome back, really nice to see holding yourself up to a really high standard, to Izzy's standard of annotations, and I can see some beautifully annotated copies of this extract from, "Testament of Youth," where you're showing a deep understanding of Brittain's methods, to convey her experiences on the home front during World War I.

In summary, Vera Brittain, 1893 to 1970, was a British writer and nurse.

Brittain is best known for her 1933 memoir, "Testament of Youth." "Testament of Youth," recounts Brittain's personal experiences of loneliness and loss during World War I.

Skimming and scanning text involves quickly reading something and gathering its main ideas and overall tone, and close reading involves carefully considering a writer's methods and their effects.

It has been such a pleasure to look at this memoir, this extract from this memoir with you and hear all of your fantastic ideas, particularly seeing those annotations build and build during your close reading.

I look forward to seeing you next time.