About Between the Lines
We write AQA GCSE English resources for teachers, students and families. This page sets out why we exist, what we are doing about it and the rules we hold ourselves to.
Our purpose
A lesson written for every student in the room.
In most GCSE English classes, students start from very different places. Some are working towards a 4 and some towards a 9, and all of them sit the same exam. Our purpose is to give every one of them a way into the same lesson, and a clear next step from wherever they start.
Our mission
One task for the whole class, at three levels of support.
We write complete AQA GCSE English Literature and Language schemes in which the whole class works on one task at three levels of support: Securing, Strengthening and Soaring. Teachers get slides, notes and student packs ready to teach. Students and families get the same pages to revise from, free guides in the Knowledge hub, and essay marking by a teacher.
Our vision
The same question for the whole class.
Every student in an English lesson works on the same question, with the help they need that day, and can see what the next level looks like. Teachers no longer have to write the same lesson three times to make that happen.
What we hold ourselves to
These decide what goes into every resource, and what stays out.
- One task for everyone
- Every student in a lesson answers the same question. The level changes the support around it, and a student can move up as soon as they are ready. We describe the work and the target grade, and we never label the student.
- Honest about the exam
- We write for the AQA specification and use its level descriptors throughout. We don’t predict questions, promise grades or claim AQA’s endorsement. When we state a fact about the exam, we link to where it comes from.
- Readable for the student who finds reading hardest
- What works for that student works for the class. So we use a typeface made for legibility, cream pages on screen and white pages that print cheaply, with tinted paper for anyone who reads more easily on it.
- Written in and for the classroom
- Every lesson is written and checked by an experienced English teacher and changed when it doesn’t work in a real lesson. Model answers are written to the level they claim to show.
- Fair to buy
- Prices are on the page. A school licence covers every teacher in the school, Lesson 3 of every scheme is free to try first, and essay marking tells you the date your feedback will arrive.
Every student in the room
The same ambitious question for everyone. The support changes, never the destination.
- Students with special educational needs and disabilities
- Every lesson’s notes say what to pre-teach, how to chunk the reading and which frames to give, so a student who needs more support still answers the same question as the rest of the class.
- Students learning English
- Each scheme has a key words list with the word class, a plain meaning, an example and space for the word in the student’s home language. The lesson notes point out idioms, old meanings and the sentence patterns that trip students up.
- Pupil premium students
- The notes cover what we can’t assume: a copy of the text at home, the background knowledge a lesson relies on, and who to ask first so a student starts with a success.
- Missed a lesson?
- Every lesson has a one-page catch-up sheet to print and stick in a book: what was missed, the key words and quotation, three short steps and a check question. The student does the work, and a box for the teacher’s check-in makes sure the students least likely to catch up on their own don’t slip through.
See it in a real lesson
Lesson 3 of every scheme is free to read and download, with the same task at all three levels.
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