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With two of Sound of Pen's core team on the verge of gap years and university, I asked them to help me get to the heart of what Sound of Pen is - and why the next generation of A-Level students should get involved! HUGE thanks to Ania and Thea :-)

Hearing Fred again..'s music always fill us with joy. Hopefully, listening to this exploration of 'Marea (we've lost dancing)' will bring you at least a fraction of that happy feeling ;-) The dancing motif repeats again and again throughout the texts we study in class - Fred again... will help you figure out what you want to say about that motif and how your analysis can be inspired by your own actual life!

Have a listen to this podcast if you love Charli XCX or if you're studying Margaret Atwood. Hopefully you'll enjoy finding out how 'I Love It' can act as a doorway to a deeper understanding of 'The Handmaid's Tale'!

In our first session of the 23/24 school year, the Sound of Pen students examined the meaning of the word 'significance'. Your English Literature A-Level questions will often ask you to explore the 'significance' of a character or theme. Think about how YUNGBLUD is significant and then apply the same ideas to your A-Level text. The full lesson outline can be found here: http://soundofpen.com/the-significance-of-yungblud/

Alice, Ellie, Elin & Izzi are all studying English Lit at A-Level. In this, the first in a series of student podcasts, the four of them explore the motif of darkness in the music of Bring Me The Horizon, Linkin Park and Enter Shikari. They will then explain to you how the ideas at the heart of 'Teardrops', 'A Place For My Head' and 'Radiate' are relevant to 'The Handmaid's Tale'. By the end of the podcast, you will have the tools you need to write the best essay ever. And not just about 'Handmaid's' - but about any text that harbours some form of darkness. So, that will be pretty much everything ever written then...

You know how it is. Some days you wake up and you’re the wrong way round. Or you get to school and everyone in your classroom is talking, but nothing anyone’s saying makes sense. At times like these, we turn to one of the world’s most important bands. With YONAKA’s music blaring in our headphones, the world begins to fall into place and EVERYTHING seems possible. Listen to the second episode of 'Wormholes' and listen as Theresa Jarvis sheds light on both life and learning x