Lesson Plans

Alongside our resources for individual entrants, our lesson plans support teachers to use The Orwell Youth Prize in the classroom.

These lessons are designed to invoke debate, discussion, reading and the formation of an entry in response to each year’s theme. While they follow the steps of our Submissions Pathway, they can be used in any order (or individual lessons can be used as a one-off), and can form activities for use in the classroom, in an afterschool club, or as a homework task.

As we are opening entries to Year 7s for the first time this year, we have created a lesson plan resource specifically for this age group, with an introduction to Orwell and the Youth Prize and some activities to get students thinking creatively about the theme of home.

Lesson Plan for Year 7s – Getting Started, Dream Homes

INSPIRATION

Three lessons to get you inspired about this year’s theme!

1. Lesson One: In Defence of English Cooking

2. Lesson Two: Local Problems, Local Solutions

3. Lesson Three: England Your England

RESEARCH

A lesson to help you begin your research!

4. Lesson 4: Research

FIND YOUR FORM

Explore and experiment with different forms of writing, to find the perfect form for your own writing!

5. Lesson 5: Find Your Form

START WRITING

6. Lesson 6: Start Writing

A lesson to help you conquer the blank page and start writing!

GAME DESIGN – Created by Orwell Youth Prize 2023 Winner, Heike Ghandi

A template and worked example to support students to develop their ideas in the form of a game design.


KEY QUESTION: CLASS DISCUSSION & DEBATE 

We are asking all young people who enter their work into the Orwell Youth Prize this year to also submit a short answer to the following question:

What one change would you make to improve life in your local community?

We’d really like to encourage you to debate this question with your students with our 2024 theme in mind. We’re hoping students will think personally and tangibly about this question. Rather than stating the outcome we want the idea – and something small and local could be linked to a global problem. What would it take to make this change happen? And what’s standing in the way?


You can still access lesson plans from previous years below.


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