Metaphor in the Curriculum

This project emerges from a need, identified during the AHRC-funded 'Mapping Metaphor with the Historical Thesaurus' project, for educational resources on metaphor in English targeting secondary school learners and teachers. In the final stages of that project, the team worked closely with a group of school teachers and other education professionals to establish the form that materials should take to best address learners' needs.

The main public output of Mapping Metaphor is a 'Metaphor Map', which shows through an interactive visualisation what the vocabulary of English reveals about the metaphorical connections that speakers and writers have made between semantic areas over the entire history of English (from Anglo-Saxon times to the present, a period of thirteen centuries). Recent research in linguistics has firmly established that underlying the metaphors visible in text and speech (e.g. linguistic expressions like 'He gave me the cold shoulder', 'Small dogs have fiery temperaments', 'She was burning with embarrassment') are so-called 'conceptual metaphors', systematic connections between distinct areas of meaning (all three examples above instantiating the metaphor EMOTION IS HEAT).

The Metaphor Map has a dynamic web-based interface that enables users to explore metaphors at different levels of specificity. A top-level view shows metaphor connections between 37 generic-level categories (e.g. The World, Animals, Physical sensation, Mental capacity). A drill-down view shows connections between c.400 readily-understood, basic-level categories (e.g. Atmosphere and weather, Reptiles, Taste, Imagination). Users click to view 'Metaphor cards' which display further details, including example words, date information and direction of transfer. The Map also links directly to specific entries in the Historical Thesaurus of English (HT), allowing users to move seamlessly between the resources. The HT (http://historicalthesaurus.arts.gla.ac.uk/) contains 793,742 word forms and provides the Map's source data: the HT draws on the complete 2nd edn of the Oxford English Dictionary and, for the period c.700-1150 AD, A Thesaurus of Old English (Roberts & Kay 1995). The metaphorical connections displayed in the Map have been identified by the Mapping Metaphor project team through a labour-intensive and entirely bottom-up, evidence-driven methodology. We have identified c.20,000 connections between semantic categories, which underlie many tens of thousands of lexical items with metaphorical senses.

The aim of the follow-on project is to create resources for use by teachers and learners of English Language and Literature at secondary-school level, both in the classroom and in self-study. The initial focus is on the senior phase of the Scottish Curriculum for Excellence (S4-S6); some materials will also be suitable for use in the earlier stages (S1-S3). Within the project's scope we will also investigate the potential for use of our materials in the UK more broadly.

With input from teachers and learners in focus groups and testing sessions, we will create a range of freely available materials: (1) worksheets on metaphor in literary and journalistic texts; (2) a set of interactive online activities focusing on specific areas of meaning in which metaphor is especially productive (e.g. how are concepts like LOVE, ANGER, DEATH expressed metaphorically); (3) downloadable lesson notes for teachers; (4) an educationally-targeted version of the Map with new online instructions, incorporating information pages on topics including metaphor in text, metaphor and language change, and metaphor in literature, and an annotated bibliography of web and print materials on metaphor, aimed at secondary schools; (5) an App to enable learners to interact with the Map on tablets and mobile devices. The resources will be promoted in the first instance through talks at educational events and links on relevant websites.

The beneficiaries of this project will be learners and teachers of English Language and Literature in the UK. In the course of the project we will engage most closely with the English departments in schools in Glasgow and Stirlingshire, and will work with Education Scotland and Glasgow City Council to publicise the materials across Scotland. We will also seek opportunities to publicise the materials more widely across the UK.

The new Scottish Curriculum for Excellence (CfE) was implemented in 2010-11. In 2014 there were 1,716 candidates in English at Scottish Credit and Qualifications Framework Level 7 (Advanced Higher), 31,582 at Level 6 (Higher), 28,798 at National 5 and 19,453 at Intermediate 2. The proposed materials support these learners' attainment in the CfE in several ways: for example, the Higher English assessment comprises three components, in all of which metaphor is highly relevant: (1) close reading of non-fiction texts with a requirement to "analyse features of language [such as word choice, imagery, sentence structure etc.] and discuss their relationship with the ideas of the texts as a whole"; (2) literature (analysis of extracts; critical essay); (3) a portfolio of writing. By providing learners with a means to reach a deeper understanding of the language of all their academic subjects, the proposed materials can also contribute to the explicit aim of the CfE to link learning across subject areas. Through exploring metaphors which arise at particular points in history, or are linked to scientific discoveries and technological advances, learners will acquire new perspectives on school subjects beyond English.

The materials will help secondary school learners to achieve several of the intended outcomes of the CfE. Key aspects of the Experiences and Outcomes for Literacy and English (http://www.educationscotland.gov.uk/learningteachingandassessment/curriculumareas/languages/litandenglish/eandos/index.asp) that the project will address include: exploration of the richness and diversity of language; productive creativity in language; enrichment of vocabulary; exploration of word patterns and text structures. The proposed materials will support learners in attaining many of the specific experiences and outcomes related to Reading and Writing. For example, they will enable pupils to exploit "the full range of digital and interpersonal opportunities to learn about texts", and help them to "find, select, sort, summarise, link and use information from different sources", "investigate and/or appreciate fiction and non-fiction texts with increasingly complex ideas, structures and specialist vocabulary for different purposes", and "apply the elements which writers use to create different types of short and extended texts with increasingly complex ideas, structures and vocabulary".

In addition to the large group of learners and teachers who will benefit, those of Beaconhurst School and the schools in the Glasgow area with whom we will work closely will benefit from the opportunity to engage with researchers and learn first-hand about the research carried out in universities, a goal in line with RCUK's initiative to bring cutting-edge science (broadly conceived) into the classroom and help teachers to inspire their students through a better understanding of advances in research (http://www.ahrc.ac.uk/What-We-Do/Strengthen-research-impact/public-engagement/Pages/Opportunities-for-researchers-to-engage-with-schools.aspx). Glasgow City Council will benefit from closer engagement between schools and the higher education sector, which will have particular advantages in providing additional mechanisms by which pupils can directly interact with universities. Learners and teachers in the rest of the UK will also benefit from new research-driven metaphor materials, as the objectives of A-levels in English Literature and English Language align closely with the relevant aspects of the Scottish Higher English.