Between a Rock and a Hard Place IGCSE Lessons and Activities

'Between a Rock and a Hard Place' IGCSE Lessons and Activities

Between a Rock and a Hard Place, as well as being a popular idiom, is the title of a book written by Aron Ralston. An extract from the book – the part in which his hand is crushed – is currently studied as part of the IGCSE Edexcel English Language exam Section A: Non-fiction texts. This article takes you through a step-by-step guide to teaching Between a Rock and a Hard Place IGCSE lessons and activities with linked resources.

Ralston wrote an account detailing a near death experience. Whilst on a solo hiking trip, Ralston got his hand trapped between a cliff face and a boulder in a freak accident. With no way to escape, he was forced to saw his own arm off to survive. It was made into a Blockbuster movie, 127 Hours, starring James Franco and winning 23 awards.

It’s both suspenseful and didactic; but how can we support students to capture that in their exam essays? How can we break it down to consider not only the message from a critical stance, but how Ralston conveys the perilous event through multiple language and structural techniques?

Teaching Ideas for The Between a Rock and a Hard Place

I’ve created Between a Rock and a Hard Place IGCSE lessons and activities for busy teachers to take you step-by-step through the text from engaging, thought-provoking starter, to evaluating the film trailer for 127 Hours, to analysing and annotating the text, to practising an Edexcel GCSE style question on the text. This resource contains editable Google slides, quizzes with answer keys, exam questions, techniques and model answers and close textual annotations of the whole text.

Edexcel IGCSE English Language Paper 1 Exam Structure

The 2 hour 15 minutes Edexcel IGCSE English Language Exam is split into Section A and Section B. Section A is the reading assessment and candidates are presented with one of the 10 Anthology non-fiction texts and one thematically linked unseen text. They have 5 questions to answer in Section A:

A 2 -mark retrieval question. Lifting and copying two brief and relevant quotes from the unseen text is the skill being assessed in this question.
A 4-mark summary question. Candidates are asked to paraphrase a certain event, character or theme from the unseen text.
A 5-mark ‘SQUID’ question (it’s an acronym not a slimy sea creature!). Students identify five distinct details from the unseen text and use quotations to support their points.
A 12-mark extended analytical response on the seen text.
A 22-mark comparative essay, usually based on the writers’ perspectives, experiences or feelings.

Section B is a writing assessment. Candidates choose between two options, which are normally loosely based on the Section A texts. The text types include a letter, article, speech or leaflet. Both Section A and Section B are equally weighted, worth 45 marks each.

Between a Rock and a Hard Place Meaning

The title is a crucial part of this extract as it represents both a literal and figurative meaning. However, some students, especially those in international schools and English as a Second Language pupils, may not have the cultural reference point to decode the idiomatic phrase. That’s why it’s useful to ensure that students understand the meaning of the title and how it relates to the central theme. For the pre-starter, display some example situations and ask students to work out the meaning of ‘stuck between a rock and a hard place’.

As an extension, they can come up with their own scenarios warranting use of the idiomatic expression. Then, once we begin reading, I clarify that students understand the double connection: Ralston literally jamming his hand between a ‘rock and a hard place’ and having to choose between almost certain death or sawing through his own arm.

127 Hours

Learning that the book we are studying an extract from was made into a movie starring James Franco often piques students’ interest. To engage them, I play the trailer and give them some questions which urge them to consider a range of reactions to such a life-threatening event in preparation for reading Ralston’s responses. We discuss the trailer after viewing it before moving on to close textual analysis of the text.

'Between a Rock and a Hard Place' Textual Analysis

Before close textual analysis, I often ask students to do an initial reading with 3 different coloured highlighters. They highlight language which illustrates Ralston’s expertise in one colour, phrases suggesting that climbing is a difficult endeavour in another colour and finally, they identify sentences or words depicting the danger of the situation. It is a fairly straightforward extract for students to understand once they know the movie plot – most comprehend the dramatic event. The more challenging skill comes in unpacking how Ralston conveys the experience to the reader.

When it comes to closely analysing the text of the extract, there are a few ways of approaching the activity. You can read and annotate together with students completing the annotations in real time. Alternatively, you can split students into groups and ask each group to focus on a certain paragraph before feeding back to the class. Or you could read and discuss, then ask students to complete the annotations for homework.

There are many ways of approaching close textual analysis; I find that varying the method for different texts keeps students interested through the unit. Detailed annotations of language and structural techniques are included in these Between a Rock and a Hard Place IGCSE lessons and activities.

'Between a Rock and a Hard Place' Edexcel IGCSE Questions and Answers PDF Worksheet

After analysing the text, I do a quick AFL quiz with students to assess their understanding of the language and structure of the text, then introduce exam practice questions. Quiz questions and answers are available with this resource as editable Google slides and as a PDF worksheet to hand out to students. This can be done as a whole class activity on the interactive whiteboard or handed out to students to do in pairs or individually, depending on your time and the nature of your class. I find quizzing students in a fun, low-stakes way breaks up the intensive exam-style teaching of the text, but also gives you an opportunity to gauge students’ understanding during the lessons.

Edexcel IGCSE English Language Exam Questions and Example Essays

Questions 1, 2 and 3 on the Edexcel IGCSE English Language A exam test students’ understanding of the unseen text, whereas question 4 assesses analysis and evaluation of the previously studied text. When you teach the 10 non-fiction texts, it’s useful to focus on one or two of the questions per text. That way, you can teach the structure, rubric and help students to plan and write quality responses. You have time for self and peer assessment as well as model answers. Over the span of studying all 10 texts, students will cover all question types from the language exam.

For Between a Rock and a Hard Place, there is a prompt in the style of the 12-mark question 4 from the Language Exam Section A included with the resources. Firstly, take students through the rubric so that they familiarise themselves with how the response is awarded. Then, ask students to structure an analytical PETER paragraph (point, evidence, technique, explain, refer) and provide prompts so that they can organise their ideas before they attempt to answer the extended essay.

After the class has written the answer under timed conditions, ask them to self or peer assess their responses against the rubric. Offer them a full mark model answer (included with the activities) to demonstrate how the marks are awarded for this question type. Ensure multiple relevant quotations support a range of clear points, subject terminology is identified and discussed, and arguments are developed.