Alas, Poor Shakespeare: Teaching and Testing at Key Stage 3

In this article I briefly consider the ideological impetus for retaining Shakespeare as a compulsory component of the National Curriculum for English. I take issue with the current Key Stage 3 testing regime. In particular, I question the educational value of tests which ultimately undermine what is generally agreed to be good classroom practice and which force on teachers a narrow theoretical perspective of Shakespeare, where close textual analysis and Bradleyan notions of character predominate.