English teacher Philip Grosset uses a simple overhead 'visualiser' camera to display material to the whole class. He's working with his Year 7s to convert prose to poetry, and he can quickly and easily show pupils' work to the whole class for everyone to comment on and discuss. English teacher Carol Weale uses school-based wiki pages and discussion threads to help her Year 11 GCSE students study their poetry anthology. She finds they throw themselves into whole class online discussions about the poems between themselves in a way they never did face to face or with her! Year 9 pupils at a Birmingham school make video trailers based on a scene from their set book, Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, to reinforce their understanding of the text. The special 'green screen' video shoot allows pupils to add background 'scenery' during the editing, as well as sound effects, music - and extra blood!

Video Series: Hard To Teach
Release Date 2008