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Alarm at the Country House

Agatha Christie’s Seven Dials revisits a lesser-known whodunit, translating the logic-driven country house mystery into a contemporary Netflix miniseries.

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Hamnet

The latest film by Chloé Zhao is the adaptation of Maggie O’Farrell’s award-winning novel Hamnet , where she imagined the life of Shakespeare’s son and his wife, and their influence on his greatest tragedy. O’Farrell had been fascinated by the resemblance between Hamnet’s name and the Prince of Denmark’s since she discovered it while studying Hamlet as a teenager. He was one of twins born to Shakespeare and his wife Anne Hathaway, but died at the age of 11, a few years before Shakespeare wrote the play. In her 2020 novel, Farrell imagines the young boy sacrificing himself to save his twin sister from the Plague, and his mother, a skilled herbalist, trying to save him. Despite giving his name to the novel, the focus is really on Agnes, as Farrell calls her, giving form to a woman who left little trace in historical record. The main things that have remained in the national memory about Hathaway were that she was older than Shakespeare and pregnant when they married, and that in his will the now comfortably off playwright left her his second-best bed. O’Farrell makes her a fully rounded character, and full partner in the marriage. She is most at home in the forest with the plants she uses for medicine and the hawk she has tamed. The film is light on dialogue, allowing actions and gestures express the different ways Agnes and Will grieve their beloved son. The couple are played by two Irish actors, Jessie Buckley ( The Lost Daughter, Wicked Little Letters ) and Paul Mescal   (All of Us Strangers, Gladiator II).  Jessie Buckley won the best actress Golden Globe and Critics' Choice awards for her performance, along with the film receiving best film at the Golden Globes and the audience awards at the BFI London and Toronto film festivals. Chloe Zhao ( Nomadland, Eternals) adapted the novel for screen, along with Maggie O’Farrell. As in her early films Songs My Brothers Taught Me and The Rider , viewers are plunged into a natural universe, in this case the woods of southern England. That is contrasted with the half-timbered houses of the town of Stratford-upon-Avon where the couple live with Shakespeare’s family, and the riverside in London where are the final scenes show a performance of Hamlet at the Globe Theatre. Agnes and her brother Bartholomew are amongst the groundlings directly in front of the stage, discovering the play that Shakespeare has told them nothing about. Agnes is transported by Will Shakespeare playing the ghost of Hamlet’s father and by Hamlet’s fatal sword fight. https://youtu.be/xYcgQMxQwmk Hamnet On general release 21 January 2026    

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Claudette Colvin: Civil-Rights Activist

Claudette Colvin sparked the protest movement that led to Rosa Parks refusing to give up her seat on an Alabama bus, and the end of bus segregation after a long boycott. Colvin, who was just 15 at the time of her protest, died on 13 January at the age of 86.

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Your Students Have Talent! Number the Stars

Dans notre série "Your Students Have Talent", des élèves de troisième ont présenté une exposition sur la Seconde guerre mondiale et le roman Number the Stars à leurs camarades au CDI. Deux classes de troisième de la Maison d'éducation de la légion d'honneur des Loges à St-Germain-en-Laye ont travaillé, dans le cadre d'un projet pluridisciplinaire Histoire/Anglais, sur le Reading Guide "Number the Stars". Après avoir étudié la période de la Seconde guerre mondiale en Histoire, les élèves ont découvert le point de vue du Danemark en cours d'anglais grâce à cette touchante histoire écrite par l'autrice américaine Loïs Lowry. S'inspirant des tâches intermédiaires proposées dans le Reading guide, les élèves ont confectionné de poignantes lettres et extraits de journal intime relatant la crainte d'Annemarie de voir sa meilleure amie juive arrêtée. Par petits groupes, d'autres élèves ont établi une mise en contexte (historical background), quand d'autres ont créé de faux journaux illégaux d'époque. Enfin, l'autrice, le livre et les personnages ont été présentés, le tout ayant fait l'objet d'une exposition dans les couloirs du collège.   [gallery ids="14858,14859,18926"] If you like working with long-form fiction with your pupils, check out our Reading Guides anglais collection: as well as Number the Stars by Lois Lowry, you'll find Gangsta Granny by David Walliams  and Matilda by Roald Dahl. Find out more  and watch the collection director Corinne Escales walk you through using the Reading Guides in class . Your students have talent, too! We are always happy to celebrate students' work at any class level. If you have examples you would like to share, please send them to us , letting us know about the task pupils were responding to.

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Australian Social-media Ban for Teens

On 10 December, the ban on under 16s accessing social-media platforms in Australia came into force. When the legislation was passed in late 2024, many detractors said it would impossible to make it work. But, despite protests from the platforms, the government went ahead. 

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Modern Nigerian Art

Nigeria, the hugely populous West African country, is famous for its contributions to fashion, cinema and literature. It also has a vibrant art scene and an exhibition at the Tate Modern in London offers an overview of 50 years of Modernist art in Nigeria, with artists from the country and around the world. The exhibition spans the struggles for independence from Britain, independence, civil war, up to the present day. The early period in the 1940s and 50s features a double perspective as artists from Nigeria trained in the West, where modernism in art and literature was itself informed by a fascination with African arts and cultures. Independence in 1960 brought a period of optimism when artists participated in the quest for a national identity in a country which somewhat arbitrarily brought together more than 250 ethnic groups. In visual arts, the Natural Synthesis movement deliberately mixed modern western expression with indigenous art forms. In the university city of Ibadan, the Mbari Artists and Writers Club including authors Chinua Achebe and Wole Soyinka debated Pan-African ideas.  Many artists drew on Nigerian or wider African traditions. In the 1950s, J.D. Okhai Ojeikere,  who was raised in a small village in rural southwestern Nigeria, used photography, a new medium in Nigeria, to document Nigerian culture. His Hairstyle Series includes nearly a thousand photographs, captures the intricate hairstyles worn by Nigerian women. You can view a selection on this Google Arts essay. Ojeikere, commented, “All these hairstyles are ephemeral. I want my photographs to be noteworthy traces of them. I always wanted to record moments of beauty, moments of knowledge. Art is life. Without art, life would be frozen.” The Nigerian Civil War (1967-1970)  ended with the defeat of the Igbo Biafra region, which had seceded from Nigeria. The Nsukka Art School revived ‘uli’ - linear Igbo designs - traditionally passed down between women. Obiora Udechukwu's Our Journey (1993) is an example of this school.  Nike Davies-Okundaye works in traditional batiks and textile designs passed down from her grandmother. She also promotes other Nigerian artists, having opened in 1983 the Nike Centre for Art and Culture just outside Lagos. It is one of Africa’s largest galleries with more than 8,000 artworks. Nigeria around the World Nigeria has a population of 233 million but also a vast diaspora settled around the world. Authors like Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie and Ben Okri, and artists like Yinka Shonibare have a double, inside-outside vision of their home country. The last section of the exhibition is dedicated to Uzo Egonu, who is typical of these diaspora artists. He lived in the UK from the 1940s till his death in 1996. His Stateless People paintings series, begun in 1980,  reflects on questions of nationhood and cultural identity.  Each painting depicts a single figure,  musician, artist or writer, emblematic of the growing visibility of Nigeria’s diaspora around the world. https://youtu.be/8hDXkgxZHGs Nigerian Modernism Tate Modern Till 11 May 2026  

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The Bahamas Celebrate Junkanoo

In many places, 26 December and 1 January are days for quiet recovery from the celebrations the day before. But on the West Indian islands of the Bahamas, they are filled with noise and elaborate costumes as Junkanoo is celebrated, an event which is unique to the islands. Junkanoo is such an intrinsic part of Bahamian culture that the United Nations cultural organisation UNESCO added it to its list of the intangible cultural heritage of humanity in 2023. The celebration dates back to the slavery era in the West Indies. Legend has it that an enslaved West African tribal leader, possibly called John Canoe, demanded that his people could have celebrations at Christmas time when even on plantations there was some downtime. The enslaved people took inspiration from their West African culture to make music and costumes with what they could find around them. They made music by blowing on conch shells and creating rhythm with cowbells and goat-skin drums. In modern times, brass bands have joined in the music, which starts in the early hours of the morning. Similar to carnival celebrations on other islands or in New Orleans, organised groups of 500-1000 work together over months to create costumes and floats. The main material is cardboard to create a rigid structure, with paper cut into strips to make fringes that add to the movement. The first minute of this video gives a flavour of the festival and can be used from A1. The following minute is an excellent description of slavery that could be used with lycée students. https://youtu.be/zALVCexXM6g   Find lots more on the Caribbean in Shine Bright 5e File 1 Caribbean life, in Shine Bright 1e File 7 Caribbean vibes and Shine Bright LLCE cycle termina l File 8 From Isle to isle.

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Wake Up Dead Man: Knives Out 3

Daniel Craig is back as detective Benoit Blanc in Wake Up Dead Man, surrounded by an A-list cast.  Can he solve an apparently impossible crime in a church?

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Your Students Have Talent! Gangsta Granny on Stage

Dans notre série "Your Students Have Talent", découvrez le travail d'élèves qui ont écrit et joué une pièce comique inspirée par Gangsta Granny de David Walliams.

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Your Students Have Talent! Dear Diary

In our series "Your Students Have Talent", check out these amazing diary entries created as an intermediate task by pupils using our Reading Guide Gangsta Granny.

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Simple Thanksgiving Video

This 4-minute video is a simple explanation of Thanksgiving, designed for young learners in the U.S.A. It would work well in an ESL classroom. We've indicated the content of the sections if you don't want to use the whole thing.

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Meet Miss Austen

Two hundred years after her death, Jane Austen remains one of Britain's best-loved authors. Yet in her short lifetime, she was unknown.

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Malala Looks Back... and Forward

There aren’t many people who publish two memoirs by the time they are 28 years old. But then there aren’t many people who have lived as much as Malala Yousafzai.

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Biobox: Mary Shelley & the Frankenstein's creature

Our bioboxes are short "Who Am I?" quizzes to help introduce pupils to famous figures in the English-speaking world. This one is about  Mary Shelley & the Frankenstein's creature

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This is England 2025 films for Cycle 4

The This is England short-film festival in Rouen has a specific programme of short films for cycle 4e classes. This year you can access screenings all school year all around France. The cycle 4 selection has ants and a sporting dog, children living in rural communities, the 2012 Olympics and a DIY spaceship.

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Del Toro’s Frankenstein: A Gothic Vision for Netflix

Guillermo del Toro resurrects Mary Shelley’s myth in a gothic and deeply human vision. Premiered at the Venice Film Festival in late summer 2025, Frankenstein marks Guillermo del Toro’s long-awaited return to the themes that define his work: monstrosity, compassion, and creation itself.

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Wicked for Good

The famous Wicked musical is now a film. How about embarking your 6e students on a trip to Oz and the Emerald City in order to make them discover the world of Wicked while revising the present simple and learning words about school and wizardry?

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Eight French Young Women Could Be Ambassadors for a Day

For International Women's Day each year, British Embassies organise a competition in each country for a young woman aged 15-18 to come and discover what it's like to be an ambassador for a day. In 2026 the opportunity will be opened to eight young women. Applications need to be in by 4 January 2026.

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Margaret Atwood and Stephen King Defend the Freedom to Read

Over the past two years, North America has witnessed a resurgence of book censorship in public and school libraries.

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New Reading Guide: Americanah

Many of you asked if we would be producing a Reading Guide on Americanah by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, which is now on the  LLCER Terminale curriculum. We are happy to announce that it is now at the printers and will be available in the middle of November.

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Halloween for All

A man in Austin, Texas, has made it his personal mission that every child can have a Halloween costume. In 2016, Christopher Waggoner moved into a house rather than an apartment and so trick or treaters came to his door on Halloween. He saw some kids watching the elaborate costumes other kids had ruefully. Now he spends all year collecting Halloween costumes to give away.

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Breaking News: Women are Persons

On 18 October each year, Canada celebrates "Persons Day" in memory of the day in 1929 when women were legally recognised as "persons" in Canadian law, giving them access to political and institutional roles.

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Mystery House

Tradition says that ghosts have fun at Halloween. But in San Jose, California, they have fun all year in a 160-room eccentric house built for them.

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