Hi there, Mr. Barnsley here.

Fantastic to see you today.

Thank you for joining me as we continue a deep dive into "Leave Taking" by Winsome Pinnock.

In today's lesson, we are gonna be focusing on the technique of turning points and we're gonna be thinking about scene three in particular.

You are gonna want to make sure you have a copy of the text in front of you.

So that's Winsome Pinnock's "Leave Taking" by Nick Hern Books.

That's the version that you are probably gonna want to have in front of you.

And I just want to remind you, this shouldn't be the first time that you are ever studying this text.

I'm gonna expect you to have some understanding of plot or characters and bring that knowledge to today's lesson.

All right, time for us to get started.

Let's go.

So by the end of today's lesson, you are gonna be able to explore the significance of Mooma's death as a turning point in Enid's character development in "Leave Taking".

So four keywords, we're looking out for.

That first one we saw in our outcome, turning point.

And this is a pivotal, a really important moment in the plot where the story takes a significant shift in one direction or another.

These are often high stakes.

This means a situation where the potential consequences of the actions or decisions that are made are really significant.

They might have an air of irreversibility and this means a quality of an action or event, meaning that it cannot be undone.

It cannot be reversed.

And the other word we're gonna look out for today is catalyst.

Now this is a person, an event, or a thing that triggers or accelerates a change or process.

You might have even heard of the word catalyst in science.

A catalyst will often bring about significant transformation.

All right, keep an eye out for these four words and see if you can use them in your own discussions and writing today.

So there our two learning cycles in today's lesson as we focus on scene three in particular, we're gonna be thinking about turning points in drama as a whole at first, and then we're gonna move on to a very specific turning point in "Leave Taking".

So let's start by thinking about turning points in drama.

So I want you to start, I'm gonna hand over to you to start off, can you think of a story or a play that you've either recently read or recently watched and was the moment where the story significantly changed direction and what was that change? So if you've got a partner, you can just share some ideas with them, tell 'em about what you've been reading or watching lately.

But don't worry if you've been working by yourself, you can just think through this question independently.

All right, pause the video, have a think, and press play when you're ready to continue.

Welcome back.

Andeep, one of our own pupils had been thinking about this question and he thought about the play of "Macbeth".

Hopefully "Macbeth" is a play that you recognise, you might have studied, but you certainly might know the plot.

And Andeep talks about act two, scene two of "Macbeth" as being really a good example of a turning point.

This is the moment where Macbeth decides to kill King Duncan.

So previously, if you don't know the story, Macbeth had been one of the king's loyal subjects, loyal servants, loyal soldiers.

But he was told by some witchers that one day he would become king.

And so to speed this premonition along, he and his wife decides to kill King Duncan.

And Andeep is arguing here that this really marks the moment where he fully commits to his ambition, his desire to rule Scotland.

And we know, or if you've watched the play or read the play, you will know that this act of murder sets off a chain of events.

This leads to his downfall in the end because he feels guilty, he feels paranoid, and he becomes so much more violent than surrounded by violence and all of these things take over his life.

So we can think of moments like this in plays as being turning points.

So a reminder that a turning point in drama is a really pivotal, a really important moment where the story takes a significant shift.

It alters the direction of the plot or it might alter the direction of the character's individual journeys.

It's a really decisive moment and it will often introduce new conflicts, new challenges, or it give us new insights either for the characters or for us as the audience as how we view the characters.

It will often give characters new things to navigate within the story.

Now turning points are often really crucial for plot development.

Okay, they move our plot forward, they build tension, they change relationships, and they can often build up to the climax or the resolution of the story.

So what do you think turning points need to have then in order to be successful in driving the action forward? When you think of turning points, maybe this one from Macbeth or from other stories or plays that you have read or watched, what do you think, what do you think the features of a really good turning point to drive action might be? Pause the video, have a think, either in pairs or by yourself, and press play when you're ready to continue.

Welcome back.

Let's have a think about some of the things that you might been saying then.

So you might have talked about turning points containing any of the following.

Well done if you went back to our key words and mentioned that phrase high stakes.

Often there is a very high either emotional or physical consequence for the characters after this moment.

You might have talked about character transformation.

It might be a change in a character's beliefs or attitudes or it might change key characters' relationships with each other.

Well done again if you were thinking about one of our key words and said irreversibility.

Often these turning points, things can't go back after them.

They have to stay or they change the direction of the plot of the play of the characters.

And these things that can't be kind of turned back, changed, and everything going back to how it was before that.

That's why they are so high stakes because once these moments have happened, things can never go back to how they were.

So let's take another look at Andeep's example of the murder of King Duncan as being the turning point in the play "Macbeth".

Okay? A reminder that this is a really key moment he chooses to kill the king, commits regicide, the killing of the king to fuel, because he's fueled by his own ambition and power.

But this sets off a chain of further disastrous events which lead to his downfall.

Let's have a think about why Andeep's example is a great example of a turning point.

Well, is it high stakes? Yes, of course it is.

He risks everything killing the king.

Okay, if you are discovered to have killed the king, certainly this time you would've been put to death.

So of course, this is high stakes.

He destroys his honour, he destroys his relationships with some of the other characters who obviously when they find out or suspect that their opinions of him change, and ultimately, this leads to his death.

It propels him into a world of tyranny where he, you know, he thinks that he is, he deserves to be the only leader.

He rules with power and violence.

It's definitely high stakes.

Do we see a character transformation? Well, yes, we do.

Macbeth starts the play as a noble warrior, but he becomes this ruthless tyrant.

You know, his ambition takes over his morality and obviously it leads to him committing further atrocities.

If you know the play, you will know King Duncan is not the only character to die at the hands or as the result of Macbeth.

Now is it irreversible? Well, I'd argue all murder is irreversible.

Of course it is.

We cannot go back.

We cannot bring King Duncan back to life.

But it's not just that King Duncan cannot be brought back to life, it's that Macbeth will never be able to live the life that he was living before he chose to have king, or to murder King Duncan, he can never undo the act, but he can also undo the feelings, the guilt, the remorse that he is left feeling after he's killed King Duncan.

All right, let's check to see how we're understanding, what our understanding is of turning points so far.

So the fact that Macbeth cannot undo the murder of King Duncan best links to which of the below key aspects of turning points.

Is it A, irreversibility, B, high stakes, or C, character transformation, A, B, or C? Pause the video, have a think, and press play when you think you've got the answer.

Okay, well done if you said A, that's irreversibility.

All right, over to you then for our first task in today's lesson.

And I want to go back to those earlier discussions that you were thinking about.

So other stories or plays that you might be watching or reading.

And I want you to discuss the recent, the turning points that those stories contained.

And I want you to use the questions below as a guide.

So when you're thinking about high stakes, what emotional/physical consequences were at risk in the stories that you were thinking about? What did characters have to lose or to gain? When thinking about character transformations, how did these turning points change the characters' beliefs, attitudes, or relationships? And was there a, why was this moment irreversible? How did it ensure things would never be the same again? Okay, I'm gonna hand over to you now.

If you've got a partner, you can discuss this with them.

Or if you're working by yourself, you can just think through this question independently.

All right, time to put all of our learning together so far and apply it to a story that you have either read or seen recently.

Pause the video, give this a go, and press play when you're ready to continue.

Welcome back.

So did your turning points match our criteria for excellent turning points? Why don't you self-assess the discussions or the thoughts that you've just had using the following questions.

Did you explain the turning point to show why this moment matters? Did you consider both emotional and physical stakes? How well did you explain the character's transformations and why they mattered? Did you explore why that moment was irreversible? And did you connect this turning point to the overall arc of the story or character development? All right, pause the video, take a moment to reflect on the discussions you've had, and then press play when you're ready to continue.

Okay, welcome back.

I'm hoping we now are feeling really confident with our understanding of turning points.

So now it's time to start applying this learning to the play "Leave Taking".

So for you, what do you think are the biggest turning points in "Leave Taking"? You might feel there's more than one.

If you've got partner, you can discuss this with them.

Otherwise you could just think through this independently.

Pause the video, have a think.

What do you think is the biggest turning point in "Leave Taking"? Welcome back.

Now I'm sure you might have picked, you know, some key events you might have even talked about, for Viv personally, her walking out of the exams might have been the biggest turning point for her.

I want us to focus on scene three though, because I think there is a turning point in scene three that I think we could all agree has really significant character, impact for all the characters in the play, but one in particular.

So I want us to think about the death of Mooma at the end of scene three because I think this really shifts the direction of the character's relationships in the play.

So I think we're gonna argue in today's lesson that Pinnock uses the death of Mooma as a catalyst.

Something that kind of creates the process of change and also kind of speeds up the process of change.

So I think Pinnock uses the death of Mooma as a catalyst for change in the play in regards to generational conflict.

Okay? So we can see probably the greatest impact this has on Enid.

And I think when you were having those discussions, you were probably thinking, "Well, Mooma's death and the impact it has on Enid." But I think we need to think about the wider impact it has on Enid's relationships, specifically Enid's relationships with her daughters, okay? Because it really forces Enid to reevaluate her relationship with her mother and therefore, the relationship she is having with her daughters where she is the mother figure in that relationship.

So Mooma's death, while she's a character we never meet, becomes really influential in at least three of our characters' relationships.

Okay, so let's think about Mooma then though, because she's a character that we don't meet on screen, on stage, sorry, she's a character that's spoken about but is never present on the stage.

Let's think about those references.

What references are made to her across the play? So you might want a copy of your text now in front of you.

You're going to take a moment to pause the video and think about this very carefully.

All right, so over to you for this.

If you've got a partner, you can look through this together.

Otherwise you can just flick through the play by yourself.

But try and find some of those references that are made to Mooma.

Pause the video, give this a go, and press play when you're ready to continue.

Welcome back.

I hope you noticed while you were doing that, while you're doing the activity that whilst, as again, we've said Mooma is not a character who appears on stage, she is referenced a lot, not just in scene three, you know, when her death occurs.

So things that you might have picked out, of course, these are not the only references but these are some important ones.

You might have picked up right from the very beginning in scene one we learned that Mooma is ill, that she needs money for a doctor, but we also learned that Enid is a little bit, doesn't really trust her sister.

She thinks her sister may be lying to get money.

So she doesn't really believe her sister.

And by kind of extension to that suggests she doesn't believe that Mooma herself is ill.

We also learned in scene one that Enid said that she hasn't seen her mother for years, five years ago.

She does talk about Mooma's qualities.

She says she was very strong.

We know actually that kind she's having this Obeah reading because she wants to learn the truth.

And it's act three or the end of act, so the end of scene three where Mooma dies and something drains out of Enid when she hears the news, which here she has this quite, almost quite visceral, like, a very kind of reaction to this news, which, of course, is expected losing a close relative, even one that you might not have had a particularly close relationship with, you might have not seen for years.

And in scene four, we see Enid speaking really late into the night with Viv.

She's remembering these positive memories of Mooma singing, but also this really painful memory that Mooma never said goodbye when Enid left Jamaica.

And even by the end of the play, we see Enid opening up to Del.

She tells her that her mother never liked her and she explains kind of how tired she is.

So Mooma's relationship with Enid we see throughout represented throughout these references across the play.

I wonder if you spotted all of these.

I wonder if you spotted some different references as well during your exploration of the text.

Now the one thing I'm sure we can all agree is that we can see that Mooma's death has a really profound effect on Enid.

So before Enid's death, she feels quite distant from her daughters.

She says, "I should have had boys." She also feels quite distant from Mooma and her life in Jamaica.

We know that she's not visited for at least five years and we know that actually she feels at home in England.

She didn't see Jamaica as her home really anymore.

She didn't dream about going back there.

Yet after Mooma's death, not immediately, but we see Enid begins to make peace with her daughter's decisions in her life.

You know, one example is that she kind of turns a corner on Viv's education.

She also acknowledges that the difficulty her relationship with her mother and she tries not to repeat that with her own daughters.

You know, she says, "I would chop off my own hand if it would help you." So she shows that she has grown.

She's realised that the negative relationship she had with her own mother, which she was in danger of replicating with Del, in particular, but also with Viv.

And, you know, she makes an effort to change that.

So let's look again at our definition of a turning point.

Okay, a turning point in drama is a pivotal moment in a story.

It takes a significant shift, alters direction of the plot or the character's journey, is a decisive moment, introduce new conflicts, new challenges, new insights for the characters to navigate.

If we refer to that definition then, how can we say that Mooma's death can definitely be considered a turning point for Enid? Why don't you pause the video, have a think in pairs or by yourself, and press play when you're ready to continue.

Welcome back.

So you might have said that the death of Mooma forces Enid to reflect on her decision to leave Jamaica and the difficult relationship she had on Mooma.

So we can say, we can think about the character's journey, it forces her to reflect maybe these things that she had kind of pushed away to the back of her mind.

But it also introduces new conflicts and challenges 'cause she starts to question if she's repeating some of this generational conflict with her own daughters and questions does she want to do this? Does she want to have a similar relationship that both, that she had with Mooma with her own daughters? And it then all of this forces Enid to navigate a new future.

One where she needs to start understanding the needs of her daughters, supporting them to pursue their own journeys.

Del as an Obeah woman and Viv through her new chosen academic path.

So true or false then.

Mooma's death only highlights the generational conflict between Enid and her own mother.

Is that true or false? Pause the video, have a think.

A think why.

Why did you choose the answer that you selected? Welcome back.

You should have said false there because we've learned that, yes, it highlights the generational conflict that she had with her own mother, but more importantly for the plot of the play that we're watching, it really highlights the generational conflict between Enid and her own daughters.

And it starts to make her question if she's repeating some of the same mistakes that maybe Mooma had made.

All right, onto our final task of today's lesson.

We're gonna bring all of today's learning together.

I would like you to complete the sentence stems below outlining why you think scene three is a turning point for Enid in the play.

There are some sentence starters on the screen and there are also some keywords.

You can use the sentence starters exactly as they are if you wish.

Otherwise you can just use them to inspire a paragraph here where we're bringing all of our learning together.

All right, pause the video, give this a go.

I know you can do it.

All right, press play when you're ready to continue.

All right, welcome back.

How was that? I hope you're feeling really confident about turning points and in particular, this specific turning point in "Leave Taking".

Let's have a look at some of the things that you might have written.

Of course, these things that I'm about to share with you are just models.

They're just examples.

There might have been other things or other things you could've said or other ways you could've worded them.

So the stakes are high for Enid in this moment because Mooma's death acts as a catalyst.

It forces Enid to confront her difficult relationships with her own unresolved identity crisis.

Losing Mooma leaves Enid without a direct link to her heritage.

It intensifies the emotional stakes as she navigates life in Britain without her mother's presence.

This event transforms Enid so she must come to terms with a generational conflict between her and her daughters.

Mooma's death pushes Enid to accept Del's decision to embrace Obeah and Viv's academic ambitions, making her rethink her expectations as a mother.

It's an irreversible moment as Mooma's death permanently removes the possibility of reconciliation between them.

But Enid is now forced to face the consequences of their unresolved tensions and focus on not repeating the same mistakes with her daughters.

Why don't you take a moment now to reflect on the answers that I've just shared on the screen.

Compare these to some of the things that you've written down, and of course, if there's anything that you now want to add to enhance your own work, now is the time to do so.

Pause the video, take a moment to reflect, and press play when you are done.

Right, that's it.

We have reached the end of today's lesson and what a fantastic journey of learning we have been on together.

On the screen, you can see a summary of everything that we've covered so far.

We're gonna quickly go through this so you can feel super confident before you move on to your next lesson.

We've learned that a turning point is a moment in a dramatic work where a plot takes a decisive shift.

We've also learned that turning points often involve high stakes, character transformation, and irreversible consequences.

We've learned that scene three is a turning point that forces Enid to confront her identity and her relationships with her daughters.

And the death of Mooma serves as a catalyst for a resolution to some of the generational conflict in the play.

All right, well done.

You've done a fantastic job today.

I hope you've enjoyed learning alongside me, and I hope to see you all again in one of our lessons in the future.

Have a good day.

Bye-bye.