1. Year 7 Knowledge Organiser: A Christmas Carol
Quotations to Learn:
‘as solitary as an oyster’ ‘as hard and sharp as flint’ ‘squeezing, wrenching, grasping, covetous old sinner’ ‘tight-fisted hand at the grindstone’ ‘no warmth could warm, no wintry weather chill’ ‘Are there no prisons? Are there no workhouses?’ ‘decrease the surplus population’ “I will honour Christmas in my heart, and try to keep it all the year. I will live in the Past, the Present, and the Future” “I am as giddy as a schoolboy” “I wear the chain I forged in life” ‘ The clerk’s fire was so very much smaller that it looked like only one coal’ “he hoped the people saw him in the church, because he was a cripple, and it might be pleasant to them to remember upon Christmas Day, who made lame beggars walk, and blind men see”“Another idol has displaced me” “A golden one” “brought two children; wretched, abject, frightful, hideous, miserable’
Key Literary Vocabulary:
Satire- use of humour or ridicule to criticise.
Simile- comparing using ‘like’ or ‘as’.
Metaphor- saying one thing is another.
Personification- making objects human.
Pathetic fallacy- weather to create mood.
Pathos- language to evoke pity.
Allusion- reference to another literary work.
Hyperbole- an exaggerated statement.
Connotation- an associated meaning of a word.
Characterisation- built up description of character in text.
Semantic field- words related in meaning.
Imagery- visually descriptive language.
Stave 1 Marley’s Ghost
Ebenezer Scrooge is at work in his counting house. Scrooge's turns down his nephew, Fred’s, invitation to his Christmas party & the request of two men who want money for charity. Scrooge is visited by the ghost of his dead partner, Jacob Marley, who tells Scrooge that, due to his own greedy life, he has to wander the Earth wearing heavy chains. Marley tries to stop Scrooge from doing the same. He tells Scrooge that three spirits will visit him during the next three nights. Scrooge falls asleep.
Stave 2 The First of the Three Spirits
He wakes and the Ghost of Christmas Past soon appears to him - they embark on a journey into Scrooge’s past. Invisible to those he watches, Scrooge revisits his childhood school days; his apprenticeship with a jolly merchant named Fezziwig, & his engagement to Belle, who leaves Scrooge as he loves money too much to love another human being. Scrooge sheds tears of regret before returning to his bed.
Stave 3 The Second of The Three Spirits
Scrooge anticipates the second ghost, sitting up in bed waiting. He is surprised when no spirit arrives. Instead, he follows a light & finds himself in a transformed version of his own room. The Ghost of Christmas Present shows Scrooge Christmas as it happens that year. Scrooge sees the Cratchit family eat a tiny meal in their little home ;Bob Cratchit's crippled son, Tiny Tim, whose kindness & humility warm Scrooge's heart and Fred’s Christmas party. Toward the end of the day the ghost shows Scrooge two starved child-like figures; Ignorance & Want. He vanishes as Scrooge notices a dark, hooded figure coming.
Stave 4 The Last of the Spirits
The Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come takes Scrooge through a sequence of scenes linked to an unnamed man's death. Scrooge is keen to learn the lesson. He begs to know the name of the dead man. He finds himself in a churchyard with the spirit pointing to a grave. Scrooge looks at the headstone & is shocked to read his own name. He is desperate to change his fate & promises to change his ways. He suddenly finds himself safely tucked in his bed.
Stave 5 The End of It
Scrooge rushes out onto the street hoping to share his newfound Christmas spirit. He sends a turkey to the Cratchit house & goes to Fred's party. As the years go by, he continues to celebrate Christmas with all his heart. He treats Tiny Tim as if he were his own child, gives gifts for the poor & is kind, generous & warm.
Themes and Symbols:
Poverty, Fate, Charity, Transformation, Capitalism, Greed, Money, Redemption, Family, Friendship, Religion, Morality, Isolation/Loneliness, Choices, Memory and the past, Compassion, Forgiveness, Guilt and blame, Time, Rationality
Fire, bells, chains, weather
Context:
1832 – The Great Reform Bill gave many middle class property owners the right to vote for the first time. Large sections of the middle classes, the working classes and women still didn’t have the right to vote.
1834 – Poor Law Amendment Act – Led to a cut in aid given to paupers to help them stay in their own homes. Workhouses were created which poor people would have to live and work in, if they were unable to pay for their own housing.
September 1843 – Dickens visits a “Ragged School.”
December 1843 – Dickens writes A Christmas Carol focusing on how many of society’s ills can be blamed on greed for money and status.
Charles Dickens:
1824 – Dickens’ father is sent to jail for debt and Dickens has to give up his education until his father inherits some money and he goes to a private school
Dickens was put to work in a warehouse, pasting labels on bottles. He had experience of poverty.
Dickens became a writer of fiction and journalism, reporting on court cases and working for radical newspapers on his disillusionment with politics and the class system.

2. Knowledge Organiser: HT1 Year 8 ‘Twelfth Night’
Plot:
Orsino, the Duke of lllyria, is in love with his neighbour, the Countess Olivia. She has sworn to avoid men’s company for seven years while she mourns the death of her brother, so rejects him. Nearby a group of sailors arrive on shore with a young woman, Viola, who has survived a shipwreck in a storm at sea. Viola mourns the loss of her twin brother but decides to dress as a boy to get work as a page to Duke Orsino.
Despite his rejection Orsino sends his new page Cesario (Viola in disguise) to woo Olivia on his behalf. Viola goes unwillingly as she has already fallen in love at first sight with the duke. Olivia is attracted by the ‘boy’ and she sends her pompous steward, Malvolio, after him with a ring.
Olivia’s uncle, Sir Toby Belch, her servant Maria, and Sir Toby’s friend, Sir Andrew Aguecheek, who is also hoping to woo Olivia, and is being led on by Sir Toby, who is trying to fleece him of his money, all plot to expose the self-love of Malvolio. By means of a false letter they trick him into thinking his mistress Olivia loves him. Malvolio appears in yellow stockings and cross-garters, smiling as they have told him to in the letter. Unaware of the trick the Countess is horrified and has Malvolio shut up in the dark as a madman.
Meanwhile Viola’s twin brother, Sebastian, who has also survived the shipwreck, comes to Illyria. His sea-captain friend, Antonio, is a wanted man for piracy against Orsino. The resemblance between Cesario and Sebastian leads the jealous Sir Andrew to challenge Cesario to a duel. Antonio intervenes to defend Cesario whom he thinks is his friend Sebastian, and is arrested. Olivia has in the meantime met and become betrothed to Sebastian.
Cesario is accused of deserting both Antonio and Olivia when the real Sebastian arrives to apologise for fighting Sir Toby. Seeing both twins together, all is revealed to Olivia. Orsino’s fool, Feste, brings a letter from Malvolio and on his release the conspirators confess to having written the false letter. Malvolio departs promising revenge. Maria and Sir Toby have married in celebration of the success of their device against the steward.
The play ends as Orsino welcomes Olivia and Sebastian and, realising his own attraction to Cesario, he promises that once she is dressed as a woman again they, too, will be married.
Significant Characters:
Orsino The Duke of Illyria and its ruler. At the opening of the comedy, he is desperately in love with Lady Olivia, who spurns his romantic overtures in spite of the fact that he is a perfect and ideal gentleman. He is a vehicle through which the play explores the absurdity of love: He is an egotist and mopes around complaining how lovesick he is over Olivia, when it is clear that he is chiefly in love with the idea of being in love.
Viola/Cesario After being shipwrecked, she disguises herself as a young boy, takes the name of Cesario, and attains a position in Duke Orsino's household because of her wit and charm. As a boy, she is then used as an emissary from the duke to court Lady Olivia. Her twin brother, Sebastian, looks exactly like her. Viola finds that her clever disguise has entrapped her: she cannot tell Orsino that she loves him, and she cannot tell Olivia why she, as Cesario, cannot love her. Her plight is the central conflict in the play.
Lady Olivia She is a rich countess who, at first, plans to mourn her brother's recent death for seven years, but when she meets the emissary from Duke Orsino (Viola disguised as a boy), she immediately falls in love with the youth.
Sebastian The twin brother to Viola who is mistaken for Cesario when he (Sebastian) arrives in town. He meets Olivia and enters immediately into a marriage with her.
Sir Toby Belch Lady Olivia's uncle who lives with her and who is given to constant drinking bouts; he delights in playing tricks on others.
Sir Andrew Aguecheek A skinny knight who is encouraged by Sir Toby to continue courting Lady Olivia because as long as he courts Lady Olivia, Sir Toby can gull him out of enough money to continue the nightly drinking bouts.
Malvolio Lady Olivia's steward who also has fantasies that Lady Olivia might someday marry him and a powerful ambition to rise above his social class. He is opposed to Sir Toby's drinking bouts, and, thus, he becomes the object of one of Sir Toby's elaborate tricks.
Maria Lady Olivia's waiting woman; she is clever and arranges a superlative trick to be played on Malvolio.
Feste A clown, or "jester," in the employ of Lady Olivia; he has a marvelous way with words and with making a sentence "get up and walk away.“ He is Shakespeare’s mouthpiece in the play
Context:
Twelfth Night is the only one of Shakespeare’s plays to have an alternative title: the play is actually called Twelfth Night, or What You Will. Critics are divided over what the two titles mean, but “Twelfth Night” is usually considered to be a reference to Epiphany, or the twelfth night of the Christmas celebration (January 6). In Shakespeare’s day, this holiday was celebrated as a festival in which everything was turned upside down—much like the upside-down, chaotic world of Illyria in the play.
The play was written as a comedy, but like many of his plays it also contained ideas and themes that linked it closely with the society Shakespeare came from. It questions the strict morals of the time and pokes fun at them through Malvolio’s character, as well as generally mocking court life. It portrays women, such as Olivia and Viola, as strong characters, in a world where women were encouraged to be seen as subordinate to men.
Twelfth Night has remained popular throughout the ages for various reasons. It uses puns and witty language. It has a slapstick humour of mistaken identity, something that continues today in popular comedies such as Fawlty Towers, Blackadder and Mrs Doubtfire. Finally, it makes fun of pompous authority figures and it has a happy ending, although for Malvolio it is anything but happy.
Key Quotations:
“If music be the food of love, play on. Give me excess of it, that, surfeiting, The appetite may sicken and so die.” (Orsino, Act 1 Scene 1)
“Better a witty fool than a foolish wit.” (Feste, Act 1 Scene 5)
“Some are born great, some achieve greatness and some have greatness thrust upon 'em.” (Malvolio, Act 2 Scene 5)
“Out of the jaws of death.”.(Act 3, Scene 4)
“One face, one voice, one habit, and two persons, A natural perspective that is and is not!” (Orsino, Act 5 Scene 1)
Themes:
Love as a cause for suffering;
The uncertainty of gender;
The folly of ambition;
Madness;
Disguises;
Mistaken identity;
Appearance and reality

3. Knowledge Organiser: Year 9 ‘Of Mice and Men’
Key Literary Vocabulary:
Cyclical narrative The Great Depression
Foreshadowing Law de Jure vs Law de Facto
Microcosm Motif of lightness and darkness
Segregation The American Dream
Isolation Jim Crow Laws
Misogyny The Dustbowl
Predatory Itinerant Workers
Derogatory Migration
Hierarchy Poverty
Inequality Idealism
Characterisation Racism
Settings
Symbolism
Prejudice
Plot
It is a parable about what it means to be human. Steinbeck's story of George and Lennie's ambition of owning their own ranch, and the obstacles that stand in the way of that ambition, reveal the nature of dreams, dignity, loneliness, and sacrifice.
Protagonist
The protagonist of the story is George. He is the kind-hearted ranch hand who is concerned about his friend Lennie and watches out for him.
Antagonist
The antagonist of the story is George’s trying to care for the handicapped Lennie. Because he has a giant’s body and a child’s mind, Lennie accidentally kills Curley’s wife; at the same time he kills the dream of owning a farm that has kept George and Lennie positive about the future
Quotations to Learn:
C1. George: “Guys like us, that work on ranches, are the loneliest guys in the world. They got no family. They don’t belong no place...“
C2. Slim: “Aint many guys travel around together, he mused. I don’t knowwhy. Maybe ever’body in the whole damn world is scared of each
other.’’
C2 Slim: “Carl’s right, Candy... I wisht somebody’d shoot me if I got old an’ a cripple”...Candy looked helplessly at him, for Slim’s opinions were law.
C3. George: “We wouldn’t ask nobody if we could. Jus’ say, ‘We’ll go to her,’ an’ we would.”
C3. Candy: "I ought to of shot that dog myself, George. I shouldn't of ought to let no stranger shoot my dog“
C4. They looked at one another, amazed. This thing they had never
really believed in was coming true. George said reverently, “Jesus
Christ! I bet we could swing her.” His eyes were full of wonder.
C4 Crooks: “S’pose you couldn’t go into the bunk house and play rummy ‘cause you was black...A guy goes nuts if he ain’t got nobody...I tell ya a guy gets too lonely an’ he gets sick.”
C4 Curley’s wife: ‘She stood still in the doorway, smiling a little ...”They left all the weak ones here...”’
C5. About Curley’s wife: “And the meanness and the plannings and the discontent and the ache for attention were all gone from her face. She was very pretty and simple, and her face was sweet and young.”
C5 George : “-I think I knowed from the very first. I think I knowed we’d never do her.”
C6. “A silent head and beak lanced down and plucked it out by the head, and the beak swallowed the little snake while its tail waved frantically.”
Context:
Steinbeck encourages us to empathise with the plight of migrant workers during the Great Depression.
The novella is an indictment of the way society treats the dispossessed.
Steinbeck reveals the predatory nature of mankind: the powerless are targeted by the powerful.
The prejudices of 1930s America are exposed, including racism, sexism and ageism.
Steinbeck explores the tension between the inevitability of fate and the fragility of human dreams. The novel was inspired by Robert Burn’s poem ‘Ode To a Mouse’. “The best-laid schemes o' mice an' men/ Gang aft agley,/ An' lea'e us nought but grief an' pain, /For promis'd joy!” Theme of fate runs through the novella parallel to the idea of the American Dream (if you work hard you can achieve anything you want to). Instead our lives have a predestined fate. The most prepared plans can still go wrong – what is meant to be is meant to be.
The American Dream is shown to be impossible: reality defeats idealism. The American Dream is written into the Declaration of Independence: "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness." Lennie and George's dream of owning a farm and living off the "fatta the lan" symbolises this dream. For poor migrant workers during the Depression, the American Dream became an illusion and a trap. 
The novella explores the human need for companionship and the tragedy of loneliness.
Themes: Hopes and dreams, loneliness and companionship, brutality and dignity, man v. natural world, freedom and confinement, justice and injustice, power and powerlessness, prejudice: sexism, ageism, racism, migrant workers.
Symbols: setting of Soledad, the brush, the Gabilan mountains, sycamore tree, water, animals, light and dark, contents of the bunkhouse and Crook’s room, the barn.
John Steinbeck:
An American writer ( ) who was born in Salinas, where the novella is set. As a teenager, he spent his summers working as a hired hand on neighbouring ranches, where his experiences of rural California and its people impressed him deeply. He often wrote stories as morals or allegories, that attempted to criticise or consider the social problems presented by the Great Depression or struggles of particular groups that suffered segregation. .

4. Key Literary Vocabulary: Additional Vocabulary
Knowledge Organiser: Macbeth
Context:
Macbeth is loosely based on true events in feudal Scotland in the 11th Century and would have been known to King James. King James inherited the throne through his ancestors Banquo and Fleance who appear in the play.
This violent period in Scotland’s history ended with stronger links with England much like the union of the crowns that took place when King James became King of England as well as Scotland.
King James was fascinated by witchcraft and it is likely that the witches were included to please him as Shakespeare wanted his approval.
King James also believed in The Divine Right of Kings meaning that any attempt to depose a king went directly against God and would be judged harshly. This is reflected in Macbeth’s failure as a king.
Both King James’ parents were killed in politically motivated moves to secure power and an attempt was made on his life through the gunpowder plot. Shakespeare echoes this interest in usurpation in the murders in the play.
Characters:
Macbeth, Thane of Glamis
Lady Macbeth (Macbeth’s wife)
Banquo (Macbeth’s best friend)
Fleance (Banquo’s son)
Duncan, King of Scotland
Malcolm (Duncan’s eldest son)
Donalbain (Duncan’s younger son)
Macduff, Thane of Fife
Lady Macduff (Macduff’s wife)
Ross, Lennox, Angus (Scottish nobles)
The witches – supernatural beings who predict events in the play
Hecate (ruler of the witches)
Key Literary Vocabulary:
Simile- comparing using ‘like’ or ‘as’
Metaphor- saying one thing is another
Personification- make an object human
Pathetic fallacy- weather to create mood
Hyperbole- exaggerated statement
Connotation- associated meaning of word
Characterisation- built up description of character in text
Semantic field- words related in meaning
Imagery- visually descriptive language
Iambic Pentameter- a line of verse with five metrical feet, each consisting of one short (or unstressed) syllable followed by one long (or stressed) syllable
Dramatic Irony – when the audience knows more than the characters
Soliloquy – a character speaks their thoughts to the audience
Monologue – a long speech by a single character
Oxymoron – contradictory terms together
Additional Vocabulary
Meter
Blank verse
Rhymed verse
Prose
Feudal
Trochaic Tetrameter
Heroic couplets
Usurp
Concealment
Gender
Stichomythia
Tragedy
Hamartia
Prophecy
Symbols
Regicide
Plot
Act 1
Macbeth and Banquo meet witches who give them predictions. Cawdor executed. Lady Macbeth reads letter. She taunts Macbeth and Duncan arrives.
Act 2
Macbeth sees a dagger reflecting his doubts about the murder- but kills Duncan with Lady Macbeth’s help. Malcolm flees and Macbeth chosen to be king.
Act 3
Banquo suspects Macbeth – Macbeth murders Banquo but his son Fleance escapes. Macbeth sees Banquo’s ghost.
Act 4
Witches second predictions. Macbeth orders the killing of Macduff’s family. Macduff and Malcolm agree to invade Scotland.
Act 5
Lady Macbeth’s mental state deteriorates eventually committing suicide. Malcolm’s army invades through Burnham wood and eventually Macbeth killed by Macduff. Malcolm is proclaimed king.
Key Quotations:
The witches: Fair is foul, and foul is fair, Hover through the fog an filthy air. (Act I, Scene i) - Captain: For brave Macbeth—well he deserves that name— Disdaining fortune, with his brandished steel, Which smoked with bloody execution, Like valour’s minion carved out his passage (Act I, Scene ii) - Lady Macbeth: Come, you spirits Tat tend on mortal thoughts, un-sex me here
And fill me from the crown to the toe topfull Of
direst cruelty (Act I, Scene v) - Macbeth: Is this a
dagger which I see before me, The handle toward my hand? (Act II, Scene I) - Lady Macbeth: Out, damned spot! out, I say! (Act V, Scene i) - Macbeth: I bear a charmed life which must not yield To one of woman born. Macduff: Macduff was from his mother’s womb untimely ripp’d. (Act V, Scene viii)
Themes:
Ambition - seen as a purely negative quality > Guilt - the play shows the terrible consequences of murdering a king > Kingship vs Tyranny – Duncan and Macbeth embody the qualities of a good king and a tyrant respectively > Order vs Chaos - natural order is disrupted then re-established > Fate > Masculinity/femininity
Symbols:
Blood: a symbol of guilt and violence.
The supernatural: witchcraft, prophesy, hallucinations, ghosts and magic.
The crown: ambition and power.
Light and darkness: good and evil.

5. Knowledge Organiser: Year 11 A Christmas Carol
Key Literary Vocabulary:
Satire- use of humour or ridicule to criticise
Asyndeton- list without conjunctions
Polysyndeton- list with conjunctions (and)
Simile- comparing using ‘like’ or ‘as’
Metaphor- saying one thing is another
Personification- make object human
Pathetic fallacy- weather to create mood
Pathos- language to evoke pity
Allusion- reference to another literary work
Hyperbole- exaggerated statement
Connotation- associated meaning of word
Characterisation- built up description of character in text
Semantic field- words related in meaning
Imagery- visually descriptive language
Quotations to Learn:
‘as solitary as an oyster’ ‘as hard and sharp as flint’ ‘squeezing, wrenching, grasping, covetous old sinner’ ‘tight-fisted hand at the grindstone’ ‘no warmth could warm, no wintry weather chill’ ‘Are there no prisons? Are there no workhouses?’ ‘decrease the surplus population’ “I will honour Christmas in my heart, and try to keep it all the year. I will live in the Past, the Present, and the Future” “I am as giddy as a schoolboy” “I wear the chain I forged in life” ‘ The clerk’s fire was so very much smaller that it looked like only one coal’ “he hoped the people saw him in the church, because he was a cripple, and it might be pleasant to them to remember upon Christmas Day, who made lame beggars walk, and blind men see”“Another idol has displaced me” “A golden one” “brought two children; wretched, abject, frightful, hideous, miserable’
Stave 1 Marley’s Ghost
Ebenezer Scrooge is at work in his counting house. Scrooge's turns down his nephew, Fred’s, invitation to his Christmas party & the request of two men who want money for charity. Scrooge is visited by the ghost of his dead partner, Jacob Marley, who tells Scrooge that, due to his own greedy life, he has to wander the Earth wearing heavy chains. Marley tries to stop Scrooge from doing the same. He tells Scrooge that three spirits will visit him during the next three nights. Scrooge falls asleep.
Stave 2 The First of the Three Spirits
He wakes and the Ghost of Christmas Past soon appears to him - they embark on a journey into Scrooge’s past. Invisible to those he watches, Scrooge revisits his childhood school days; his apprenticeship with a jolly merchant named Fezziwig, & his engagement to Belle, who leaves Scrooge as he loves money too much to love another human being. Scrooge sheds tears of regret before returning to his bed.
Stave 3 The Second of The Three Spirits
Scrooge anticipates the second ghost, sitting up in bed waiting. He is surprised when no spirit arrives. Instead, he follows a light & finds himself in a transformed version of his own room. The Ghost of Christmas Present shows Scrooge Christmas as it happens that year. Scrooge sees the Cratchit family eat a tiny meal in their little home ;Bob Cratchit's crippled son, Tiny Tim, whose kindness & humility warm Scrooge's heart and Fred’s Christmas party. Toward the end of the day the ghost shows Scrooge two starved child-like figures; Ignorance & Want. He vanishes as Scrooge notices a dark, hooded figure coming.
Stave 4 The Last of the Spirits
The Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come takes Scrooge through a sequence of scenes linked to an unnamed man's death. Scrooge is keen to learn the lesson. He begs to know the name of the dead man. He finds himself in a churchyard with the spirit pointing to a grave. Scrooge looks at the headstone & is shocked to read his own name. He is desperate to change his fate & promises to change his ways. He suddenly finds himself safely tucked in his bed.
Stave 5 The End of It
Scrooge rushes out onto the street hoping to share his newfound Christmas spirit. He sends a turkey to the Cratchit house & goes to Fred's party. As the years go by, he continues to celebrate Christmas with all his heart. He treats Tiny Tim as if he were his own child, gives gifts for the poor & is kind, generous & warm.
Themes and Symbols:
Poverty, Fate, Charity, Transformation, Capitalism, Greed, Money, Redemption, Family, Friendship, Religion, Morality, Isolation/Loneliness, Choices, Memory and the past, Compassion, Forgiveness, Guilt and blame, Time, Rationality
Fire, bells, chains, weather
Context:
1832 – The Great Reform Bill gave many middle class property owners the right to vote for the first time. Large sections of the middle classes, the working classes and women still didn’t have the right to vote.
1834 – Poor Law Amendment Act – Led to a cut in aid given to paupers to help them stay in their own homes. Workhouses were created which poor people would have to live and work in, if they were unable to pay for their own housing.
September 1843 – Dickens visits a “Ragged School.”
December 1843 Dickens writes A Christmas Carol focusing on how many of society’s ills can be blamed on greed for money and status.
Charles Dickens:
1824 – Dickens’ father is sent to jail for debt and Dickens has to give up his education until his father inherits some money and he goes to a private school
Dickens was put to work in a warehouse, pasting labels on bottles. He had experience of poverty.
Dickens became a writer of fiction and journalism, reporting on court cases and working for radical newspapers on his disillusionment with politics and the class system.