Writing a letter from the British home front: tone, audience and purpose
I can write a letter detailing an imagined experience of the British home front during World War One, showing a deep understanding of tone, audience and purpose.
Writing a letter from the British home front: tone, audience and purpose
I can write a letter detailing an imagined experience of the British home front during World War One, showing a deep understanding of tone, audience and purpose.
These resources will be removed by end of Summer Term 2025.
Lesson details
Key learning points
- To write convincingly, you must have a secure understanding of tone, audience and purpose.
- Tone is created through carefully crafted methods.
Keywords
Establish - begin, create, set up
Tone - the attitude and emotion of your voice - written or verbal
Purpose - the reason something is done; the motivation behind doing it
Memoir - a nonfiction account of something written from a person's memories
Methods - the tools a writer uses to create their work- structure and language choices are the most obvious examples
Common misconception
Working out the tone, audience and purpose is an unnecessary step in planning. These things are always really obvious.
The foundations of convincing writing comes in the planning stage. This includes thinking carefully about tone, audience and purpose. Having a deep, rather than superficial, understanding of each will allow for a compelling piece of writing.
To help you plan your year 9 english lesson on: Writing a letter from the British home front: tone, audience and purpose, download all teaching resources for free and adapt to suit your pupils' needs...
To help you plan your year 9 english lesson on: Writing a letter from the British home front: tone, audience and purpose, download all teaching resources for free and adapt to suit your pupils' needs.
The starter quiz will activate and check your pupils' prior knowledge, with versions available both with and without answers in PDF format.
We use learning cycles to break down learning into key concepts or ideas linked to the learning outcome. Each learning cycle features explanations with checks for understanding and practice tasks with feedback. All of this is found in our slide decks, ready for you to download and edit. The practice tasks are also available as printable worksheets and some lessons have additional materials with extra material you might need for teaching the lesson.
The assessment exit quiz will test your pupils' understanding of the key learning points.
Our video is a tool for planning, showing how other teachers might teach the lesson, offering helpful tips, modelled explanations and inspiration for your own delivery in the classroom. Plus, you can set it as homework or revision for pupils and keep their learning on track by sharing an online pupil version of this lesson.
Explore more key stage 3 english lessons from the Literary perspectives from the First World War unit, dive into the full secondary english curriculum, or learn more about lesson planning.
Content guidance
- Depiction or discussion of violence or suffering
Supervision
Adult supervision recommended
Licence
Lesson video
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Starter quiz
6 Questions
the attitude and emotion of your voice - written or verbal
the person or people you intend your text to be read or seen by
the reason something is done; the motivation behind doing it
angry, anxious, despairing, formal, reflective
the wider public
to present the experiences of those on the home front
fear their loved ones would never return to them
feeing powerless to help the war effort
there were food shortages and rationing was introduced in 1917
many women were employed in industries traditionally worked by men
of bombs and invasion
Exit quiz
6 Questions
I had little patience [...] for my mother's middle-aged acquaintances
life would seem so utterly empty and purposeless without him
fear that the War would come between us
I began to look carefully through his letters