ABSTRACT
English teaching, learning and planning in the UK are driven by initiatives which seem to rewrite themselves with increasing frequency. The Framework for Teaching English in Years 7, 8 and 9 (DFEE 2001) (which I will call the first Framework) was a fabulously well supported system with extensive training and lorry-loads of materials, and, though it has been superseded by the Framework for Secondary English (DFE 2008) (the second Framework) it remains a powerful and for the most part benign influence. Our current notion of what a lesson looks like – starter, main course, plenary – derives from the first Framework, as does the habit of planning in the short,
