The Curriculum and Assessment Review (CAR), long-anticipated and finally released in November 2025, made some fairly positive nods towards a better focus on language at Key Stages 3 and 4; but to be brutally honest, that is not particularly difficult, given the evident failings of the current programme for English Language and how it has translated into a stale and uninspiring GCSE and a precipitous decline in A level English student numbers.
So, with curriculum drafting underway, we thought we would take a look at what kind of positive changes could be made to the English Language curriculum – within the confines of the CAR and the government’s response to it. In doing this, we’re suggesting ways to work within what we see as the spirit of the review itself but also building on what we know is a long tradition of language work that has been carried out in English classrooms, sometimes as part of the National Curriculum, sometimes beyond it.
I will outline a few key ideas here in this first piece and then go into detail about specific areas in further posts. First of all, what did the CAR actually say about English Language?
The report stated that ‘a clear dissonance exists between highly specified curriculum content at Key Stages 1 and 2 and under-specified content at Key Stages 3 and 4’ which it saw as leading to ‘a challenge at transition’. That’s a fair observation, particularly when you think about the highly prescribed approaches to phonics and grammar, punctuation and spelling in those early stages. Rather than over-specifying content at Key Stages 3 and 4 to match this though (something that we think the CAR would also like to avoid), we would like to see better balancing: some key areas of language study could be specified, but there must be freedom to teach concepts, varied texts and relevant terminology at the appropriate times.
The CAR also asked that ‘throughout the English curriculum, requirements for speaking and listening are given greater clarity and the curricular aims and outcomes are better specified’.
Here, it would be good to see joined-up thinking around the study of language at Key Stage 3 and the new oracy framework. Knowing about speech is a vital part of being able to use it (and indeed the role of listening – especially the idea that communication is a mutual process that requires listeners to exert some effort to understand and learn from speakers). It would therefore make sense to foreground the study of spoken language, how and why it can differ from written and online forms, and how it can be shaped for different audiences - now and in the past, in face-to-face and online situations – early in Key Stage 3 to embed key principles. Examples here could be rhetorical speech from the past and present, advertising pitches, appeals for support, how conversations work in face-to-face and online environments, etc.
One positive aspect of the CAR was its welcome call for a distinct purpose for each of the GCSEs, another was the recommendation to expand the range of text types for English Language. The study of English should be wide-ranging, exploratory and analytical, but also creative and engaging, so it would be good to see not just detailed analysis of these forms, but also the chance for students to create them for themselves and reflect on the writing/text creation process and the choices made. There is always a risk that ‘ephemeral’ texts are less-valued than traditional written texts, but with a clear analytical approach to all texts based on writers’ choices and a linguistically-informed understanding of modes and meanings, students can learn to appreciate and critically respond to language in the world around them.
Another way to make English Language more distinct – and to ensure that its study recognises how it is actually used in the real world – would be to focus more on the links between language and identity. Language is absolutely central to who we are as individuals – whether it’s our accents, our sign language, ‘heritage’ languages our families might switch in and out of, the vocabulary we use to show our expertise in a field or the vernacular we use to communicate casually. Modern linguistics does not treat language users as products of their environments, pigeon-holing them into identity categories, but as shapers and creators of our own identities through language. GCSE English Language has to recognise that.
While spoken language study (briefly!) appeared in the GCSE in the early 2010s, it was soon dismissed as ‘listening to tapes of Eddie Izzard and the Hairy Bikers’ by the then Education Secretary; now is the time for it to return in a much more beefed-up form. Students need to be introduced early on in Key Stage 3 to the basics of linguistic variation – in the form of accent, dialect, sociolect and idiolect – but questions about language use in the GCSE itself would be a good way to show the importance of genuine knowledge about language in the new GCSE qualification. We would therefore propose that more discursive questions are used to assess some aspects of the course, whether in the form of essay writing, or perhaps more interestingly through some kind of oral assessment based on student research and investigation.
All of what is outlined here might appear quite removed from where we are now, but it is not a million miles away from where we have been before and where we can get to in the future. If we really want to have a distinct GCSE in English Language and a Key Stage 3 and 4 curriculum that is rich in knowledge about language, English teachers will need to be given the guidance and knowledge about language that has been missing from the secondary classroom for much of the last 15 years, but also given the freedom to explore language use in creative and analytical ways.
Other EMC Curriculum Think Pieces
EMC Thinking About Curriculum - An Introduction
Standard(ised) English – an EMC think piece
Talk in the New National Curriculum
