ENRICHMENT

Super-curricular creative tasks

These tasks are part are our new Enrichment Level system for Year 9 and 10 only. They have been designed to give you a chance to express yourself creatively while also practising English skills and, in some cases, finding out something about some literature along the way. Come to your Enrichment Day to receive the rewards for completing these tasks.

Website exclusive creative tasks

We will be adding new tasks to this section of the site over the course of the academic year.

General creative tasks — for students in Year 9 and above

Write a short story

Create an original piece of short fiction – something you have written entirely yourself. You can write about any topic in any genre or style, but it must be a complete story with a proper ending. Make the story something you are proud of. Show it to an English teacher and talk to them about the plot and the characters to earn the reward.

REWARD: 1 Enrichment Level

Learn a poem of your choice by heart and recite it

Choose a poem and learn it by heart. Then perform a recitation of the poem (no notes) on Enrichment Day. The poem must be at least 14 lines long.

REWARD: 2 Enrichment Levels + 2 Oracy Levels

Write a poem

Write an original poem on any topic and in any style. It must be a proper poem, though, something that uses the conventions of the poetic form. Take some time to craft your writing and express your ideas using the best words in the best order. You’ll need to show it to a teacher and talk about how you composed it to earn the reward.

REWARD: 1 Enrichment Level + 1 Oracy Level (if you perform it)

Create a piece of visual art inspired by a poem

Choose a poem (it could be one you’ve studied or one you just happen to like or find interesting) and create a piece of visual art based on it (painting, drawing, collage, photography, video, etc.). Try to capture the poem completely, including the meaning, the mood and the imagery. Outstanding artworks will be displayed in the English classrooms and will also earn a Headteacher’s Award.

REWARD: 1-5 Enrichment Levels (depending on the form)

Create a piece of writing inspired by a painting

Choose a painting that you like, and which includes one or more human beings, and then write a story or poem based on the individual(s) in the painting. Try to capture as much of their life, inner and outer, as you can in your piece of writing. Draw on as much of the rest of the painting as you can.

REWARD: 2 Enrichment Levels

Write and perform a monologue by a literary character

Choose a character from a literary text of your choice (any novel, play or poem) and write an original monologue for that character, in which they express their deepest thoughts. Deliver the monologue on Enrichment Day and explain your rationale behind it to earn the reward.

REWARD: 2 Enrichment Levels + 2 Oracy Levels

GCSE creative tasks — for students in Year 10 and above

Write some literary fan fiction

Research one of the classic characters from English Literature who are listed below and produce a short story in which the character either features or is the protagonist. Your short story can be in any genre – it doesn’t have to match the genre of the story in which the character originally featured.

  • Mr Darcy from ‘Pride and Prejudice’

  • Jane Eyre from ‘Jane Eyre’

  • Sibyl from ‘The Picture of Dorian Gray’

  • Heathcliff from ‘Wuthering Heights’

  • Estella Havisham from ‘Great Expectations’

  • Mr Rochester from ‘Jane Eyre’

  • Hamlet from ‘Hamlet’

  • Elizabeth Bennett from ‘Pride and Prejudice’

  • Nancy from ‘Oliver’

  • John Watson from ‘Sherlock Holmes’

  • Magwitch from ‘Great Expectations’

  • The Creature from ‘Frankenstein’

  • Dracula from ‘Dracula’

  • Any of the narrators from ‘The Canterbury Tales’

  • Samwise Gamgee from ‘Lord of the Rings’

REWARD: 3 Enrichment Levels

Create a pastiche

Choose a writer or story that you really like and create your own imitation, writing a new story in the same style. You can use characters from the sources text, or create completely new ones. The key thing is that you consciously imitate the style of the writer/text that you are pastiching.

REWARD: 2 Enrichment Levels

Invent your own language

English is not just about literature – it’s also the study of language, and all languages work in roughly the same way. In books and TV shows, writers invent fictional languages (Klingon, Parseltongue, Elvish, Dothraki, etc.) and they do so by applying the principles of linguistics and the rules of universal grammar. Invent your own language, using these rules, and present it to a teacher to earn this reward. If you like the sound of this but are not sure how to get started, speak to your English teacher, and they’ll point you in the right direction.

REWARD: 3-8 Enrichment Levels (depending on the complexity of the invented language)

Write the start of a sequel

Write the opening chapter of an unwritten sequel to a novel that you’ve read. Bring the opening chapter to Enrichment Day and explain your ideas for how the sequel would pan out.

REWARD: 2 Enrichment Levels

The Reduced Shakespeare Company

Take any Shakespeare play that you have not studied at school and create a reduced version of it, which you perform on Enrichment Day. You should try to reduce the whole play to about 1 minute, while maintaining the core plot and characters. Try to make your reduced version as entertaining as possible. To help you prepare you should look up ‘The Reduced Shakespeare Company’ on YouTube for some ideas. Or ask your English teacher.

REWARD: 3 Enrichment Levels for the writer/director AND 1 Enrichment Level + 2 Oracy Levels for the performers