features: teaching language – literacy, linguistics and

NATE | Teaching English | Issue 26 | 21

“All students have to acquire the language they need to investigate, think, learn and express themselves in different subject disciplines. Every subject is identifiable by the specific language patterns and vocabulary that makes up its identifiable ‘tune’.”

Fifty years ago, James Britton and Douglas Barnes explored the notion that children learn through exploratory talk, noting that the language of subject areas was a potential barrier to learning. Their work became part of the findings of the influential Bullock Report which began the search for education’s holy grail. For years, articles have been written and conferences run, yet what ‘Language across the Curriculum’ looks like in effective practice in secondary schools has remained evasive, so much so that some dismiss it as unachievable.

Learning in any subject is inextricably linked with language; language is the key to cognition. Students with small vocabularies will inevitably fail. To succeed, all students have to acquire the language that they need to investigate, think, learn and express themselves in different subject disciplines – hence the term disciplinary literacy. Every subject is identifiable by the specific language patterns and vocabulary that makes up its identifiable ‘tune’. As soon as you read extracts from exam questions, you know what subject you are entering:

• Explain how speciation and macro-evolutionary changes result from …

• … Hence, or otherwise, solve the equation P(z) = 0, giving solutions in the form …

• Write an account of how the remilitarisation of the Rhineland increased …

To respond to such questions, you have to have the tune of that subject in your head (as well as the relevant content) so you understand the terminology of the question and can respond in the language of the subject.

Years of working with schools on how to achieve language across the curriculum, combined with the fact that Talk for Writing (TfW) focuses on language acquisition, has led to the point where we can clearly identify key strategies rooted in the TfW process that can be adapted by all schools to make language across the curriculum a meaningful reality. It raises student confidence, engagement and attainment.

From imitation to applicationMoving from imitation to innovation to independent application underpins all learning and is the foundation on which Talk for Writing is based. Students first warm up the key language required in a unit so they have the basic ingredient to promote understanding of its content. They then imitate the pattern of language alongside any processes within the unit, before innovating on that pattern so that, by the end of the unit, they can talk the text and independently apply what they have learnt. This works for all subjects and all ages. In the words of Ben Rhodes, Deputy Headteacher and PE specialist at the John of Gaunt School, Trowbridge: ‘

If you think Talk for Writing is just a classroom-based approach to developing language and literacy, then think again! The broad range of TfW strategies complement and enhance learning within the practical context, fitting in with the rhythms and tunes of the subject. The cyclical learning process TfW brings allows the cross-pollination of learning between theoretical study with practical performance and investigation. It provides the scaffold to create descriptive and analytical text, drawing from the student’s primary physical evidence and experiences. Gesture can be a powerful, but awkward, tool for the self-conscious young adult. Using valid movements from specific sporting techniques provides learners with a justified reason to use gesture and text-mapping to recall key theories, rules and their explanations. ‘Cold tasks’ of hypothesising outcomes of tests and visualising performances lead to independent physical discovery, providing purposeful application of findings in scaffolded written work that can lead to higher-order analytical and evaluative text.

Talk for Writing holds the key to making language across the curriculum a powerful reality, argues Julia Strong. Here, she identifies the key strategies that can be used by schools to support learning across subjects.

Talk for WritingStrategies to develop language across the curriculum

Features: Teaching Language – Literacy, Linguistics and Literature

22 | NATE | Teaching English | Issue 26

Talk for Writing – Strategies to develop language across the curriculum

How the underpinning TfW strategies support learning in all subjectsThe key strategies of the approach (internalising text, text mapping, boxing up, and analysing text by identifying its generic language and sentence signposts) enable students to co-construct understanding of how a subject is expressed.

1. Internalising model textInternalising model text is at the heart of the process so that students become increasingly familiar with the underpinning tune of whatever subject they are studying. Initially, this means being able to recite a short model text with the aid of a simple text map and related actions before you have actually seen it in written form. As the tune of subjects becomes more embedded, internalising and analysing text becomes more sophisticated.

2. Text mappingText mapping has proved not only to support students in internalising text but to help them understand the meaning of complex terminology and to recall content. Encouraging students to visualise the meaning of technical words and phrases aids cognition. When key vocabulary is first introduced, students are encouraged to come up with an image that helps them both understand and recall what it means. For example, A-level sociology terms like The Hawthorne Effect or industrialisation encompass complex concepts which need to be processed if the students are to understand what they are reading and discussing. Text mapping the meaning, as illustrated at the bottom of the page, helps build understanding.

Such understanding is often boosted by using actions to help internalise the meaning of the words. The image below shows a Year 10 student using a text map to help him explain to his class the meaning of cashflow, a short word that sums up a whole financial process.

Text mapping also enables students to independently map the content they want to use and the order in which they want to use it. The image below shows how a Y8 student from John of Gaunt has used text mapping to help him plan the content of what he is going to write about the power of Henry VIII. The arrows help him remember cause and effect (what led to what) and he has noted down examples of the key causal linking phrases (because, this caused, etc.,) he will need to express himself coherently.

The power this has in helping students both understand and recall content is illustrated by the three images at the top of the next page of students text mapping the same text. As the science teacher at Slough and Eton Business College spoke the following text aloud slowly, the Year 9 students text mapped it.

“Moving from imitation to innovation to independent application underpins all learning and is the foundation on which Talk for Writing is based.”


“Text mapping not only supports students in internalising text but also helps them understand the meaning of complex terminology and to recall content. Encouraging students to visualise the meaning of technical words and phrases aids cognition. When key vocabulary is introduced, students are encouraged to come up with an image that helps them both understand and recall what it means.”

To prevent some illnesses, we create vaccine. We inject dead or weakened pathogens. The white blood cells recognise a foreign body. This helps the body make specific antibodies. The body memorises these antibodies so when we get the disease again, it can create them faster.

Every student in the class quickly and with total concentration was able to turn the challenging text into a series of images. The images they chose reflected the fact that they understood the terminology used. When interviewed, they explained that text mapping helped them recall key content and personalised learning for them making it much more engaging.

3. Boxing upThe simple strategy of boxing up (creating a grid to represent the underpinning structure of text in any subject) has proved to be another invaluable tool that enables students first to analyse the structure of any text they will be required to write and then use that understanding to plan their own text. Boxing up enables you to identify what the focus of each paragraph or section of a text is – by giving it a heading. In the same way, the structure of individual paragraphs can also be planned, as illustrated by the example at the top of the next column provided by Alex Shaw, a science teacher at Hungerhill School, Doncaster. Because the student planned his one paragraph answer by boxing up the key points: spacing, movement, forces and then jotting down the information to include against each of these headings, he was able to write a very coherent answer that won full marks. The understanding that this method brings is a great boost to confidence, as the student’s comment suggests: ‘I just got how to write today’.

4. Analysing key generic features of textOnce the students have analysed the structure of the sort of text they will need to write, they then need to know how to express the text. To enable them to do this the teacher co-constructs with the class how to analyse the key features of the text so they recognise and internalise the subject-specific recyclable text alongside the generic sentence signposts that provide coherence. They will then be able to recycle this when they write themselves.

A good way to establish understanding of this in all subjects is to get the students to highlight the key recyclable features of text in different colours (for example: green for the subject-specific recyclable text; magenta for the connecting phrases.) If you look at what is left of the science investigation text when you delete everything that isn’t generic or linking text, you have a frame that can be applied to any investigation. Students can then easily adapt this to suit whichever investigation they are now considering. In this way, students can quickly internalise the language of whatever subject they are studying, adapt it to suit varying situations, and talk and write about it independently.


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Significantly, such an approach not only helps the students to express themselves coherently using the language patterns of the subject they are studying but it also deepens their understanding of how to do whatever is being described. This enables them to think and respond at a deeper level.

For example, if you look at the model text below for art annotation (thanks to Mandy Christmas, an art teacher at Ormiston Endeavour Academy, Ipswich) students could initially see the text all in black and then highlight any subject-specific recyclable text alongside identifying the sentence signposts that hold the text together. The underlined words in black here are the technical art vocabulary used. In discussing how the artwork has been evaluated, they will increase their understanding of the techniques needed to make a drawing look realistic as well as how to express the process in written form. It provides the voice in the head that guides understanding of what to do as well as what to say.

Strategies across subjects and stagesThe more these approaches are used consistently across a school, the more quickly students start to recognise how to plan, write and perform effectively, and the more they can transfer this understanding from one subject to another.

Using quality model text across the curriculum and analysing it consistently is central to building student confidence. As soon as students start to experience success in the sort of practical, non-fiction writing that is generally required in secondary schools, the more confident they will feel about their ability and the more pleased they will be with their progress which, in turn, leads to greater progress. It helps open the door to understanding within every subject.

The TfW process can be adapted to suit all subjects for all ages and all levels of attainment. It is well known for supporting primary school children develop the language of storytelling but the same processes can be adapted to support learning at much more advanced levels in any area. The picture at the top of the next column shows Janine, who teaches A Level psychology at Beechwood School, Slough, explaining how the approach has supported her students to both understand and enjoy learning about the complexities of psychology.

Transforming learning across the curriculumIf you are interested in understanding more about this, it is all explained in Transforming Learning Across the Curriculum written by myself and Pie Corbett, including chapters by secondary teachers covering most subjects in the curriculum. Enthusiasm for the approach shines throughout these teachers’ chapters. Reading through them, it becomes clear that the patterns of language in the different disciplines reflect the patterns of learning. Every subject has its tune.

In answer to the question ‘has Talk for Writing made a difference?’, Emma Cooper, a science teacher at The John of Gaunt School, replied:

It’s literally filled my heart with joy … With some activities, students you might have felt were the weakest kids have scored the highest marks – it’s really making a difference. The great thing is that TfW helps them get there and it’s fun. It works especially well for the lower and middle attaining students because it makes me think more clearly about chunking up information into manageable chunks and it makes you think about the format of what needs to be said and how to express it as well as the content. Step-by-step, boxed-up text mapping transforms their ability to express content clearly. And the text mapping is great – the dual coding just helps them remember.

“The TfW process can be adapted to suit all subjects for all ages and all levels of attainment. It is well known for supporting primary school children develop the language of storytelling but the same processes can be adapted to support learning at much more advanced levels in any area.”

Talk for Writing – Strategies to develop language across the curriculum



Her chapter illustrates the approach when teaching atoms and isotopes in Year 10. To help her students grasp the distinction between irradiation and contamination she came up with the novel solution of providing Velcro hats and balls, as illustrated above. The ball represents the radiation/radioactive atom. If the ball is thrown and it sticks to the Velcro, the students in the class shout, ‘Contamination’. However, if the ball passes near the volunteer but does not stick, the students shout, ‘Irradiation’. In such engaging ways, the students talk their way to understanding.

Ben Rhodes ends his chapter on PE with this overview of the independent application stage:

Gradually taking away the support of TfW is like helping someone learn how to ride a bike. The teacher pushes the students with the TfW stabilisers on, they then take away some of the scaffolding, like removing one stabiliser and then both, whilst still giving a little balance but not over pushing the student and, before they know it, the student is off writing independently, moving forward finding their own way … For me, Talk for Writing hasn’t been about re-inventing the wheel. It has been about refining a number of my approaches with clarity about how and why the strategies of support work. To this end, I have been able to predict more effectively the outcomes of the students’ work and therefore plan further TfW strategies to help students overcome their personal barriers and realise they can rise to the challenges I set them.

Skills learnt in one area can be applied in another. The fact that similar processes are used across the curriculum means that Talk for Writing facilitates a spiral of progress which not only helps students build their skills and understanding from unit to unit within subject areas but also enables them to transfer these skills across the curriculum. This is how it makes language across the curriculum a powerful reality.

And finally…Hopefully, secondary teachers will find the book as inspiring as these endorsements suggest:

Who’d have thought Talk for Writing could make such a difference to maths, PE and science? Packed with riches, the powerful TfW approach is applied in this book to the entire curriculum by the experts Pie and Julia, with outstanding results. You will find everything you need to be transformative in developing students’ language acquisition and confidence in writing, no matter what the subject. Detailed rationale, links with cognitive science, endless practical examples across the upper primary and secondary curriculum and exemplary chapters written by teachers: get started! – Shirley Clarke, Formative Assessment Expert

In Transforming Learning Across the Curriculum, Pie Corbett and Julia Strong offer a compelling and eminently practical approach to mobilising effective writing in the classroom. This book is packed full of useable strategies, whether it is for English or maths, or in primary or secondary school classrooms. A wealth of interesting school case studies bring alive the thorough, step-by-step ‘Talk for Writing’ approach for the teacher-reader. Highly recommended! – Alex Quigley, National Content Manager, Education Endowment Foundation (EEF)

We believe that Transforming learning across the curriculum can help every school to develop a practical and meaningful approach to language across the curriculum. This, in turn, should raise standards across the curriculum for all our students and help wipe out the inequalities of the postcode lottery that the 2020 exams fiasco sadly exacerbated. In Pie Corbett’s words:

If we are to transform the life opportunities of every child, then teaching subjects through this approach is vital. After about half a century, we now know what language across the curriculum looks like and how to use it to raise standards. The aim of this work is about whole school transformation and, therefore, the transformation of students’ lives.

Julia Strongis Deputy Director of the National Literacy Trust

Transforming Learning Across the Curriculum is available from www.talkforwritingshop.com/

“The fact that similar processes are used across the curriculum means that Talk for Writing helps students to build their skills and understanding within subject areas and also to transfer these skills across the curriculum.”

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