The Challenge of English in the National Curriculum considers how particular aspects of a national curriculum can be reconciled with the best practice of the English teaching tradition. The authors are all practising teachers who look at the lessons of the past as well as their hopes for the future. Each chapter begins from a question raised by teachers when asked at in-service workshops about the issues which concerned them most. The chapters cover most of the more significant aspects of English within the National Curriculum and vary from John Johnson’s survey of practical ways to raise the standard of oracy to Nick Peim’s suggestions for coping with Key Stage 4 which leads him to a radical questioning of the whole nature of English as a curriculum subject.