YEAR 10 English Language GCSE Homework Tasks

You must complete each of the tasks for when they are due. Each task will be assessed using the
GCSE mark scheme. If you are struggling with a task, or would like some tips, you should attend Extra
English club on Wednesdays.
Due week B
When it is Due Homework Task Completed
Half Term 1
Creative writing

Create a character think about: age,

Task 1 gender, hobbies, personality traits, the
way they interact with others
Task 2 Write two paragraphs describing a
setting- think about your senses. Your
character can be in the setting
Task 3 Create a plan for a story- think about
the 6 Ps (people, place, problem,
progress, panic, peace). Use one of the
following titles: What a night
The Creature
Never Again
Task 4 Spend 45 minutes writing your story
Challenge Tasks Write an alternative setting
Create a dialogue between two
characters
Mind map different ways to build
tension
Half Term 2
Component 2 writing

Task 5 (1) Your school is considering whether

to ban detentions as they are not
popular with students or parents.30
mins

Write a formal letter

persuading the board of
governors to ban detentions.
You could use these bullet points to
help you plan your ideas:
• Explain why detentions are not
popular.
• Why do students dislike
detentions?

Task 6 The government believes that we, as a

country, need to be much better than
 YEAR 10 English Language GCSE Homework Tasks
You must complete each of the tasks for when they are due. Each task will be assessed using the
GCSE mark scheme. If you are struggling with a task, or would like some tips, you should attend Extra
English club on Wednesdays.

we currently are at learning and

speaking foreign languages. 30mins
Write an article for a newspaper, as a
young person looking to the future,
giving your views on learning foreign
languages.
You could use these bullet points to
help you plan your ideas.
• Do we need to be better at
learning foreign languages?

• What is your experience of

learning a foreign language?

• Why is it important? Should it be

compulsory in school?

• Will it become more important

in the future?

Task 7 Your school/college is keen to amend

the uniform policy. 30mins
Write a report for the
Headteacher/Principal suggesting ways
this might be done.
You could include:
• examples of waste at the moment;
• your ideas about how the situation
could be improved. [20]

Challenge Tasks Think of something you would like to

change at your school.

Write a speech to give to students in

which you try to persuade them to
agree with your opinion.

Half Term 3
Component 1 Reading

Task 8 Create a poster to help you learn the

DC DASTARDS techniques
 YEAR 10 English Language GCSE Homework Tasks
You must complete each of the tasks for when they are due. Each task will be assessed using the
GCSE mark scheme. If you are struggling with a task, or would like some tips, you should attend Extra
English club on Wednesdays.

Task 9 Read the Extract from Winter in Madrid

by C.J. Sansom and answer the
questions
Task 10 Read and annotate the extract from
‘Faith and Hope go shopping’ by Joanne
Harris. How does the narrator feel
about the nursing home she lives in? [10
marks] PEE in a sentence and think
about how (DC DASTARDS)
Half Term 4
task 11 Read the extract from ‘Billy the Kid’ and
fill in the grid answering the question:
What are your thoughts a feelings
about how Billy’s life has turned out?
[10]

task 12 Read: The Waste land and answer the

questions A1 and A2
task 13 Continue reading The Wasteland and
answer the questions A3 and A4
Challenge: Create a revision resource for the
component 1 paper: mind map/ poster/
cue cards
Half term 5- component 2
Task 14 Read the three extracts about school life
and answer the questions
task 15 Answer the impression question based
on the three extracts. Think about how

Half term 6
task 16 Read the newspaper article by
John Humphrys. And answer
questions A1 and A2

Task 17 Read the letter by Charles Dickens and

answer the question
Task 18 Read both extracts: Dickens and
Humphreys and answer the compare
question.
 YEAR 10 English Language GCSE Homework Tasks
You must complete each of the tasks for when they are due. Each task will be assessed using the
GCSE mark scheme. If you are struggling with a task, or would like some tips, you should attend Extra
English club on Wednesdays.

Resources:

Task 9

Extract from Winter in Madrid by C.J. Sansom

At Victoria it had been as busy as a normal Monday; it seemed the reports that London was carrying

on as usual were true. As he walked on through the broad Georgian streets everything was quiet in

the autumn sunlight. But for the white crosses of tape over the windows to protect you from the

blast, you could have been back before the war. An occasional businessman in a bowler hat walked

by, there were still nannies wheeling prams. People’s expressions were normal, even cheerful. Many

had left their gas masks at home, though Harry had slung his over his shoulder in its square box. He

knew the defiant good humour most people had adopted hid the fear of the invasion, but he

preferred the pretence that things were normal to reminders that they now lived in a world where

the wreck of the British army milled in chaos on a French beach, and deranged trench veterans stood

in the streets happily forecasting Armageddon.

Answer the following questions to locate explicit details from this extract. You should write your
responses in full sentences, using quotes from the text to support your points. An example of how
to start your answers is given for A.

A. What immediate information are you given about the atmosphere at Victoria station?
The information we are given is that the atmosphere is ‘quote’.
B. What made the houses look different from the way they had looked before the war?
C. What additional details do we learn to convince us that it is an ‘occasional businessman’
or a nanny who walks past Harry?
D. What was Harry carrying ‘slung over his shoulder’?
E. What did Harry think most people ‘hid’ with their ‘defiant good humour’?
 YEAR 10 English Language GCSE Homework Tasks
You must complete each of the tasks for when they are due. Each task will be assessed using the
GCSE mark scheme. If you are struggling with a task, or would like some tips, you should attend Extra
English club on Wednesdays.

Task 10

How does the narrator feel about the nursing home she lives in?
[10 marks]
You must refer to the language used in the text to support your answer

Extract from ‘Faith and Hope go shopping’ by Joanne Harris

I’m not saying it’s a bad place here. It’s just so ordinary – not the comfortable ordinariness of home, with its

familiar grime and clutter, but that of waiting-rooms and hospitals, a pastel-detergent place with a smell of air

freshener and distant bedpans. We don’t get many visits, as a rule. I’m one of the lucky ones; my son Tom calls

every fortnight with my magazines and a bunch of chrsyanths – the last ones were yellow – and any news he

thinks won’t upset me. But he isn’t much of a conversationalist. Are you keeping well then, Mam? and a

comment or two about the garden is about all he can manage, but he means well. As for Hope, she’s been here

five years, even longer than me – and she hasn’t had a visitor yet.

Task 11:
Read the extract from ‘Billy the Kid’ and fill in the grid answering the question: What are
your thoughts a feelings about how Billy’s life has turned out?
 YEAR 10 English Language GCSE Homework Tasks
You must complete each of the tasks for when they are due. Each task will be assessed using the
GCSE mark scheme. If you are struggling with a task, or would like some tips, you should attend Extra
English club on Wednesdays.
 YEAR 10 English Language GCSE Homework Tasks
You must complete each of the tasks for when they are due. Each task will be assessed using the
GCSE mark scheme. If you are struggling with a task, or would like some tips, you should attend Extra
English club on Wednesdays.
 YEAR 10 English Language GCSE Homework Tasks
You must complete each of the tasks for when they are due. Each task will be assessed using the
GCSE mark scheme. If you are struggling with a task, or would like some tips, you should attend Extra
English club on Wednesdays.

Point Evidence Technique Explanation

You feel happy for ‘I was so happy, happy for Repetition of the verb He seems really pleased at
Billy them, happy for me…’ ‘happy’ the prospect of a baby,
which is heart-warming.

Task 12
The Wasteland

A1. List five clues that suggest that Mike is in danger. [5]

Read lines 16 - 28

A2. What makes this part of the story tense and exciting? [10]
 YEAR 10 English Language GCSE Homework Tasks
You must complete each of the tasks for when they are due. Each task will be assessed using the
GCSE mark scheme. If you are struggling with a task, or would like some tips, you should attend Extra
English club on Wednesdays.

You must refer to the language used in the text to support your answer. you need to PEE in a
sentence and think about DC DASTARDS

Task 13- Continue reading The Wasteland

Read lines 29-40

A3. How does the writer show that Mike is frightened in these lines? [10]

You should write about:

• What happens

• The writer’s use of language

• The effects on the reader

Read lines 41 to the end

A4. What do you think and feel about these lines as an ending to the passage? {10]

You should write about:

• Your own impressions of what has happened here and in the passage as a whole

• How the writer has created impressions

You must refer to the text to support your answer.

To answer A5 ask yourself the following questions:

• What happens?

• Why does it happen?

• How do you feel about it?

• What does the writer do to manipulate your feelings?

• How successful is the ending? (If appropriate, reflect back on the rest of the story.)
 YEAR 10 English Language GCSE Homework Tasks
You must complete each of the tasks for when they are due. Each task will be assessed using the
GCSE mark scheme. If you are struggling with a task, or would like some tips, you should attend Extra
English club on Wednesdays.

The Wasteland by Alan Paton.

Intro

The story takes place in a desperately poor part a South African town at night.

It is the story of a man who finds himself being pursued by a gang of young men and
becomes trapped in an area of wasteland. He describes his struggle to survive, and the
tragic consequences which happen as a result of this. Look out for the twist in the tale at
the end!

The theme is of crime and desperation in a desperately deprived area and, although it is
set in South Africa, could so easily happen in a similar area of town or city in Britain.

The Wasteland:
 YEAR 10 English Language GCSE Homework Tasks
You must complete each of the tasks for when they are due. Each task will be assessed using the
GCSE mark scheme. If you are struggling with a task, or would like some tips, you should attend Extra
English club on Wednesdays.

1 The moment that the bus moved on he knew he was in danger, for by the lights of it he saw
2 the figures of the young men waiting under the tree. That was the thing feared by all, to be
3 waited for by young men. It was a thing he had talked about, now he was to see it for
4 himself.

5 It was too late to run after the bus; it went down the dark street like an island of safety in a
6 sea of perils. Though he had known of his danger only for a second, his mouth was already
7 dry, his heart was pounding on his breast, something within him was crying out in protest
8 against the coming event.

9 His wages were in his purse; he could feel them weighing heavily against his thigh. That was
10 what they wanted from him. Nothing counted against that. His wife could be made a
11 widow, his children made fatherless, nothing counted against that. Mercy was the unknown
12 word.

13 While he stood there trying to decide what he should do, he heard the young men walking
14 towards him, not only from the side where he had seen them, but from the other also. They
15 did not speak, their intention was unspeakable. The sound of their feet came on the wind
16 to him. The place was well chosen, for behind him was the high wall of the convent, and the
17 barred door that would not open before a man was dead. On the other side of the road was
18 the waste land, full of wire and iron and the bodies of old cars. It was his only hope, and he
19 moved towards it; as he did so he knew from the whistle that the young men were there
20 too.

21 His fear was great and instant, and the smell of it went from his body to his nostrils. At that
22 very moment one of them spoke, giving directions. So trapped was he that he was filled
23 suddenly with strength and anger, and he ran towards the waste land swinging his heavy
24 stick. In the darkness a form loomed up at him, and he swung the stick at it, and heard it
25 give a cry of pain. Then he plunged blindly into the wilderness of wire and iron and the
26 bodies of old cars.

27 Something caught him by the leg, and he brought his stick crashing down on it, but it was no
28 man, only some knife-edged piece of iron. He was sobbing and out of breath, but he pushed
29 on into the waste, while behind him they pushed on also, knocking against the old iron
30 bodies and kicking against tins and buckets. He fell into some grotesque shape of wire; it
31 was barbed and tore at his clothes and flesh. Then it held him, so that it seemed to him that
32 death must be near, and having no other hope, he cried out, “Help me, help me!” in which
33 should have been a great voice but was voiceless and gasping. He tore at the wire, and it
34 tore at him too, ripping his face and his hands.
 YEAR 10 English Language GCSE Homework Tasks
You must complete each of the tasks for when they are due. Each task will be assessed using the
GCSE mark scheme. If you are struggling with a task, or would like some tips, you should attend Extra
English club on Wednesdays.

35 Then he turned and began to run again, but ran first into the side of an old lorry which sent him
36 reeling. He lay there for a moment expecting the blow that would end him, but even then his wits
37 came back to him, and he turned over twice and was under the lorry. His very entrails seemed to be
38 coming into his mouth, and his lips could taste sweat and blood. His heart was like a wild thing in his
39 breast, and seemed to life his whole body each time that it beat. He tried to calm it down, thinking
40 it might be heard, and tried to control the noise of his gasping breath, but he could not do either of
41 these things.

42 Then suddenly against the dark sky he saw two of the young men. He thought they must
43 hear him; but they themselves were gasping like drowned men, and their speech came by
44 fits and starts.

45 Then one of them said, “Do you hear?”

46 They were silent except for their gasping, listening. And he listened also, but could hear
47 nothing but his own exhausted heart.

48 “I heard a man . . . running . . . on the road,” said one.

49 “He’s got away . . . let’s go.”

50 Then suddenly he was free. He saw the bus returning, and he cried out again in the great
51 voiceless voice, “Help me, help me!” Against the lights of it he could plainly see the form of
52 one of the young men. Death was near him, and for a moment he was filled with the
53 injustice of life, that could end this way for someone who had always been hard-working
54 and law-abiding. He lifted the heavy stick and brought it down on the head of his pursuer,
55 so that the man crumpled to the ground, moaning and groaning as though life had been
56 unjust to him also.

57 Then some more of the young men came up, gasping and cursing the man who had got
58 away.

59 “Freddy,” said one, “your father’s got away.”

60 But there was no reply.

61 “Where’s Freddy?” one asked.

62 One said, “Quiet!” Then he called in a loud voice, “Freddy.”

63 But still there was no reply.

64 “Let’s go,” he said.

65 They moved off slowly and carefully, then one of them stopped.
 YEAR 10 English Language GCSE Homework Tasks
You must complete each of the tasks for when they are due. Each task will be assessed using the
GCSE mark scheme. If you are struggling with a task, or would like some tips, you should attend Extra
English club on Wednesdays.

66 “We are saved,” he said. “Here is the man.”

67 He knelt down on the ground, and then fell to cursing.

68 “There’s no money here,” he said.

69 One of them lit a match, and in the small light of it the man under the lorry saw him fall
70 back.

71 “It’s Freddy,” one said. “He’s dead.”

72 Then the one who had said, “Quiet” spoke again.

73 The man under the lorry heard them struggling with the body of the dead young man, and
74 he turned once, twice, deeper into his hiding-place. The young men lifted the body and
75 swung it under the lorry so that it touched him. Then he heard them moving away, not
76 speaking, slowly and quietly, making an occasional sound again some obstruction in the
77 waste.

78 He turned on his side, so that he would not need to touch the body of his son. He buried his
79 face in his arms, and said to himself in the idiom of his own language, “People, arise! The
80 world is dead.” Then he arose himself, and went heavily out of the waste land.
 YEAR 10 English Language GCSE Homework Tasks
You must complete each of the tasks for when they are due. Each task will be assessed using the
GCSE mark scheme. If you are struggling with a task, or would like some tips, you should attend Extra
English club on Wednesdays.

Task 14

Extract 1

Having left a sheltered school environment one month earlier, and facing up to a real adult world, I
accepted the first job I was offered, which I regretted. Not having passed any exams, I decided to
attend college. My evenings were spent studying: I went to college three evenings a week, taking
lessons in shorthand, typing and

English (O Level), and had one extra shorthand lesson. I attended church on Sundays, visited
grandparents and did homework. Occasional cinema visits and cycling with friends filled some time
at weekends. I didn’t have much money as I

was on a low wage. What I did have I put towards clothing and shows. Being a teenager I felt lonely
at times – not an adult – not a child. It was hard work with a job and college. I was always wanting
something better!

Extract 2

Aged 15, I was still travelling 9 miles on the bus to the grammar school, so I was up fairly early in the
morning and home later than some. My family were fairly poor so I didn’t live a lavish lifestyle. In the
evenings, I did my school homework and watched some TV at an aunt and uncle’s house as we didn’t
own one! I played tennis and football on the local Miner’s Welfare facilities at weekends, went
cycling and coarse fishing in the local canal. My Saturday job doing a baker’s round meant I worked
from early mornings to evening. I spent my money on model railway sets, AIRFIX kits and model
gliders. I had a few really good local friends so time passed quite quickly.

Extract 3

I am a sixteen year old girl living in this messed up generation. I know what it feels like. I cannot
relate to everyone, but I know there are people who feel the same as me. I am still learning new
things about myself; I do not know who I am. I’m getting to that age where I am expected to know
everything. I need to think about the rest of my life. I don’t want to; I want to be a kid as long as I
can. I don’t want responsibility and as much as I say I do, I don’t want to be on my own. I don’t want
to be alone, more than I already am.

Teenage girls are not kids anymore, no matter how hard they try. They are expected to act like
adults but treated like children. They make mistakes, more than once. They are curious and insecure
and mature all at once. How does society outcast that? As wrong. Society kills little girls. We are
teenagers, we want our privacy but we still want love. We are still little girls.
 YEAR 10 English Language GCSE Homework Tasks
You must complete each of the tasks for when they are due. Each task will be assessed using the
GCSE mark scheme. If you are struggling with a task, or would like some tips, you should attend Extra
English club on Wednesdays.

We have feelings that we try to hide. We have pain that gets hard to bare. We are not perfect, we
don’t want to be. We pretend that we have perfect flaws. We pretend everything is okay when it
isn’t. We try to be the girls society wants us to be. We can’t.

Read Extract 1.

A1. (a) After leaving school, how long did it take the writer to find
employment? [1]

(b) How did the writer feel about accepting her first job offer?
[1]

(c) What did the writer spend most of her money on?
[1]

Read Extract 2.

A3. (a) What does the writer mean when he says he ‘didn’t live a lavish lifestyle’ in
the third line? [1]

(b) What does the writer suggest about the lifestyle of teenagers at the time?
[2]

Task 15

What impression do the writers of the three extracts give us of school?

Task 16

Read the newspaper article by John Humphrys.

A1. (a) What are two ways that the British Medical Journal claims that children
exposed to constant noise can suffer? [2]

(b) What problems does the article say were caused for children living near a
railway line when compared to children who lived somewhere quieter? [1]

A2. Humphrys is trying to persuade us that noise is a serious problem. How

does he try to do this?
[10]

You should comment on:

* what he says to influence readers;

* his use of language and tone;

* the way he presents his argument.

 YEAR 10 English Language GCSE Homework Tasks
You must complete each of the tasks for when they are due. Each task will be assessed using the
GCSE mark scheme. If you are struggling with a task, or would like some tips, you should attend Extra
English club on Wednesdays.
 YEAR 10 English Language GCSE Homework Tasks
You must complete each of the tasks for when they are due. Each task will be assessed using the
GCSE mark scheme. If you are struggling with a task, or would like some tips, you should attend Extra
English club on Wednesdays.

Task 17

Consider the letter by Charles Dickens.

A4. What do you think and feel about Charles Dickens’s views about the street
entertainers?

You should comment on:

* what he says to influence readers;

* his use of language and tone;

* the way he presents his argument.

[10]
You must refer to the text to support your comments.

Task 18 To answer this question you will need to use both texts.

A6. Both of these texts are about the effects of noise. Compare the following:
* the writers’ attitudes to the effects of noise;
* how they get across their arguments.
[10]
You must use the text to support your comments and make it clear which text you are
referring to.