Diverse Shorts – Literature to Promote Critical Thinking (Hard copy)

Part of our EMC Mixed Basket Offer

This publication fills a much-needed gap in the educational experience of today’s secondary pupils, with its focus on a richly diverse range of texts to promote critical thinking. From Andrea Levy to David Almond, from Angie Thomas to George Orwell, and from Alex Wheatle to ZZ Packer, pupils are offered challenging material by renowned authors writing about issues important to the world today. Accompanying material, both within the book and available online, encourages pupils to explore the texts from a range of critical standpoints. Perfect for English lessons, Citizenship, PSHE and tutor time.

Key Aspects

• Literature to challenge, entertain and inspire
• Develops vital critical reading skills
• Engages young people with real world values
• Activities to use with each short story or extract
• Read singly or in thematically linked clusters
• Includes nine specifically developed critical literacy cards:‘identity’, ‘freedom’, ‘tolerance, rights & respect’, ‘justice’, ‘diversity & community’, ‘democracy’, ‘equality & responsibility’, ‘change & action’, ‘power & control’.

Stories and novel extracts for 11-16-year-olds:

• David Almond
• Sita Brahmachari
• Anne Cassidy
• Ted Chiang
• Helen Dunmore
• Hans Fallada
• Elizabeth Laird
• Patrice Lawrence
• Andrea Levy
• George Orwell
• ZZ Packer
• Bali Rai
• Gillian Slovo
• Angie Thomas
• Alex Wheatle
• Benjamin Zephaniah

Additional resources

Diverse Shorts – Literature to Promote Critical Thinking includes a downloadable version of EMC's Critical Literacy Cards. These can be downloaded directly from this web page.

Click the link (right) to download: Resource 1 – A PDF of the Critical Literacy Cards.