Embed Size (px)
Citation preview
Year 11 Success EveningAim of the sessions:
To ensure you understand what your child is preparing for in English
To give you strategies to help them revise and prepare for the final exams
Increased demand of new specificationsThe new specifications will be more demanding in
four ways:
• Content – texts from 19th, 20th & 21st centuries (Eng Lang);
Romantic poetry, 19th century novel, substantial whole texts -
no short stories (Eng Lit)
• Examination – end of course only; no controlled conditions
assessments
• Assessment – less scaffolding; comparison of unseen
passages
• Grading – mid grade of new 9 to 1 scale (grade 5) to be a
half to two-thirds of a grade higher than that required for a current grade C [Ofqual proposal under consultation]
A new GCSE for September 2015: The Highlights
English Language
• 100% Exam
• No set texts. Students must read a wide range of texts from 19th to 21st Century
• No Speaking & Listening to count in the final mark (but reported separately)
• 20% of marks for Spelling punctuation and grammar
English Literature• 100% Exam• Focus on classic literature and
whole texts• Must include Shakespeare, 19th
century novel, poetry from 1789 Inc. Romantics & drama post 1914
• Unseen texts and comparison• No creative responses• 5% of marks for Spelling
punctuation and grammar
English Language GCSE - AQA
Paper 1 - FictionReading (40 marks) (25%)
One text Literary fiction1 short form question (1 x 4 marks)
2 longer form questions (2 x 8 marks)
1 extended question (1 x 20 marks)
Writing (40 marks) (25%)
Descriptive or Narrative Writing1 extended writing question (24 marks for content, 16 marks for technical accuracy)
Paper 2- Non FictionReading (40 marks) (25%)
Two linked texts1 short form question (1 x 4 marks)
2 longer form questions (1 x 8, 1 x 12 marks)
1 extended question (1 x 16 marks)
Writing (40 marks) (25%)
Writing to present a viewpoint1 extended writing question (24 marks for content, 16 marks for technical accuracy)
Skills & Confidence
Self belief is one of the most important features of success. Students sitting the exam are performing their skills and need to believe they are good at English. We need to reinforce this and build their confidence.
English Language: The Reading skills (Assessment Objectives 1-4)AO1: Read a text and identify explicit and implicit information. Be able to synthesis information
AO2: To be able to comment on the language and structure used by authors and the effect it has.
AO3: To be able to compare texts
AO4: To be able to evaluate texts
English Language: The writing skills (Assessment Objectives 5-6)AO5: Communicate clearly, effectively and imaginatively, selecting and adapting tone, style and register for different forms, purposes and audiences. Organise information and ideas, using structural and grammatical features to support coherence and cohesion of texts
AO6: Candidates must use a range of vocabulary and sentence structures for clarity, purpose and effect, with accurate spelling and punctuation. (This requirement must constitute 20 % of the marks for each specification as a whole.)
Revise the Objectives: Reading
Paper 1Fictional Passage written 1900-2016
AO1
AO2
AO4
AO5 & AO6
Paper 2Non-Fiction Passages written 1800-2016
AO1
AO2
AO3
AO5 & AO6
AO1 – Read and understand
Jason folded the piece of paper as small as he could and stuffed it in the secret compartment in the heel of his boot. He glanced down at its previous owner, still and white. ‘Funny how they always look so peaceful afterwards,’ he thought. Pausing for a moment, he washed his hands, put on some of the man’s cologne and quietly closed the door.
What has Jason done and how do we know?
AO2 – Analysis of Language
Then, as it was so bright that it hurt my eyes to go on staring at it, I looked up ahead and saw, as if rising out of the water itself, a tall, gaunt house of grey stone with a slate roof that now gleamed steelily in the light.
Sibilance to convey the sounds of the water and the moving carriage. Also alliteration of G A sinister sound that underpins the description
The adjective ‘gaunt’ personifies the building with connotations of death and illness.
The embedded clause suggesting pain.
The adverb ‘steelily’ suggesting the qualities of steel namely coldness and hardness both negative atributes
AO3 – Comparison of ideas
Two texts about parents and education. One written in 19th Century and a second written in 2015. The question asks students to compare the attitudes shown. They must identify the attitude, prove how they know it is there & compare it to the second text.
Jay Rayner uses humour to good effect in his article and uses it both in his attitudes to parenting, ‘too busy killing things on Skype’ – showing his warm, relaxed attitude to his son and in his attitudes to education. He refers to his own education using self-deprecating humour however, using the simile, ‘like a line of Pac-Men doing a conga to refer to his own grades. This is in direct contrast to ….
AO4 – Evaluation‘The environment around Eel Marsh house makes it more frightening’.To what extent do you agree with this statement?
Susan Hill uses images associated with death in her description of the environment around Eel Marsh house to build up our anticipation of the approaching House supporting the idea that it is frightening.
‘Here and there were clumps of reeds, bleached bone-pale, and now and again the faintest of winds caused them to rattle dryly’
Hill describes the environment as being increasingly sparse by starting the sentence ‘here and there’ to convey they are infrequent. The idea of limited growth suggest an environment with limited life which is suitable for a ghost story and therefore frightening. She further intensifies this when she uses the imagery of ‘bleached bone-pale’. The idea of a ‘bone’ suggests a skeleton and that immediately makes us think of death just before we are introduced to the house. The verb ‘rattle’ in the next sentence also has connotations of death as we think of a death rattle when someone is close to dying. All of these feature make the reader feel anxious and nervous before we are introduced to the house so we are more likely to be frightened. However, it could be argued that this description isn’t frightening, it is just tense and full of foreboding.
How to support at home
• The English language exam is all unseen. Students need to read as many text as possible that are similar to the ones they will find in the exam.
• For Paper 1 these are classic books. (See the reading list 7 example texts)
• For Paper 2 these are non fiction passages. For example a newspaper article about football! (See the example texts)
• Revision guides – See the one we are selling but there are others on the market (Check it is AQA and 9-1)
General Points: How to help
1. Give them opportunities to read these text. Buy a broadsheet Sunday paper.
2. Read articles with them and discuss the objectives
3. Ensure they complete the short exam homework tasks.
4. A small amount of revision once a day is better than hours on one day.
‘I can’t revise for English’!!!!
1. Write a persuasive opening to a letter, a brochure, a leaflet etc. No more than a few sentences but it uses important skills that will gain them marks.
2. Write two paragraphs on a chosen topic and focus on the way you connect them.
3. Write an example sentence for a range of rhetorical techniques
4. List common spellings you know you get wrong and learn them by rote.
5. Identify conventions that may help you.
6. Read an article
7. Highlight features of language used in a headline
8. Spot features of language used by an author
9. Identify the purpose & audience of a text – How do you know?
10. Picture the opening scene of your favourite film and describe it as though it is a still photograph
‘I can’t revise for English’!!!!
1. Select a passage from a fiction book and then identify 4 key things about the setting / main character / plot etc
2. Select a paper from your fiction book and look at how the structure changes. What does the author focus on at the start, middle end? Why the change
3. Read an article from facebook that is controversial. Can you spot any features of language that are used to persuade you to agree?
4. Read a newspaper and see how many different language features you can spot in 5 minutes.
5. Complete one question from a practice paper
6. READ!
A revision task involving parents!
1. Both read the same article
2. Discuss what it is about? Get a sense of whether they have understood everything.
3. Give your opinion and encourage them to agree / disagree
4. Get them to give their opinion and challenge them to prove it. Can they select quotations
5. Read another article about the same subject. Compare what is different. Do the writers have the same opinion? How do you know?
