The use of worked examples for novice learners in the English classroom

Nicole Still, Curriculum Leader for English, Thinking Schools Academy Trust, UK When undertaking the research-based enquiry project in the final phase of my journey to secure Chartered Teacher Status, I identified Year 10 students at the beginning of their English literature GCSE as suitable novice learners on whom to explore the possible impacts of models. The class was only just beginning their GCSE literature course, and would spend the first two terms working on texts for a literature exam. The students had previously been taught together and thus their shared knowledge and understanding of analysis was similar. This also ensured that they were not going to be subject to the expertise reversal effect, as they were ‘low-knowledge’ learners (Kalyuga, 2020) in the domain of analysis. Why do we need models in the English classroom? One efficient way to support the building of schemas and avoid cognitive overload, thus supporting students in their move from novice to expert learn