English

In the First Year, our exploration and eco-writing prizes allow pupils to write descriptive and polemic pieces about subjects that matter to them, and to their local environments too. All our pupils have a private reading text and we are in constant dialogue with pupils about the books they are reading and should move on to next. Our termly alumni talks show pupils how English and communication matter in fields as varied as law, marketing, charity work and environmental science. At A-Level, all our pupils have a bi-weekly one-to-one with a teacher that allows us to discuss essays, personal responses to literary texts and coursework plans. 

Bede's English department offers an unrivalled co-curricular offer: we have more than a dozen invited speakers a year, ranging from poets and novelists to academics and English graduate alumni telling pupils about their careers; we have three writing competitions across the trust a year, including poetry, travel writing and eco-writing, and we publish creative writing in Small Island, our creative journal; we offer trips to the Charleston Literary Festival, the Globe Theatre, Stratford-Upon-Avon and we take an annual writers' trip to London; we put on plays within the department and offer English enrichment and poetry writing activities.  Our bi-weekly lit academy offers lower school pupils the chance to be taught by A-Level English pupils, and gives our older pupils opportunities to share their own favourite texts. 

Our sixth form pupils take the Eduqas A-Level course, an exciting option that enables pupils to study a range of canonical and contemporary texts and hone their essay writing skills over two years. In 2026, our cohort are studying: Shakespeare's Henry IV, Part I (which we will stage at Bede's in summer 2026), Marlowe's Dr Faustus, Enron by Lucy Prebble, the poetry of Christina Rossetti, Phillip Larkin and Carol Anne Duffy, and a wide range of poetry and prose texts in preparation for the unseen texts examination. For coursework, our students will each select a novel of their choice to compare with Ian McEwan's postmodern masterpiece, Atonement. 

Our EAL students learn English in small classes of around 8 taught by experts. The EAL hub offers a 'home within home' for pupils, and many pupils gravitate to their English rooms to talk, play games, and even cook. Nightly, EAL teachers offer prep sessions to support pupils with homework they have across all their subjects. See more on our EAL page.

English results at GCSE and A-level are strong in comparison to national figures.  Whilst GCSE English Language (which all pupils must study) has a pass rate of 57% nationally, Bede's achieves 90%. Nationally, 29% of pupils achieve a 6 or better, and at Bede's this level is 53%.   In GCSE Literature, over half of students achieved a 7 or better in 2025 (52% 7-9).     In A-Level English Literature, our three year average is 67% A*-B.  Our 40% average of A*-A grades compares with the national average of 25% A*-A.