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A2 English Language Exam tomorrow!

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Reply 20
Okay am I the only person who talked more about Ruby's mistakes more than her good stuff? :P talked about her mistakes with inflexions on 'glass' and 'bitted', use of phonological processes, the mistakes with the copular, then said that her use of the passive was good, was was her polysyllabic lexis. Then moved onto the aunt using positive reinforcement, and scaffolding wh-questions. Talked a lot about Skinner, Bruner and Chomsky, but didn't find much room for Piaget and Vygotsky. So much to write though!


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Reply 21
Original post by Wbez
Okay am I the only person who talked more about Ruby's mistakes more than her good stuff? :P talked about her mistakes with inflexions on 'glass' and 'bitted', use of phonological processes, the mistakes with the copular, then said that her use of the passive was good, was was her polysyllabic lexis. Then moved onto the aunt using positive reinforcement, and scaffolding wh-questions. Talked a lot about Skinner, Bruner and Chomsky, but didn't find much room for Piaget and Vygotsky. So much to write though!


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I did write about her mistakes! Just apparently you're meant to be quite positive. So I started by saying she was clever- knowing diff between jacket as coat = network building, stage 4 of forming questions, stage 4 of using negatives, using heuristic imaginative and repsentational taxonomies! Then I mentioned she missed inflection from glass but said its cos children make mistakes when forming complex questions, she overgeneralised with 'bitted' as its irregular, she couldn't pronounce digraph 'th' and used 'b' or 'f' and she paused a lot and self corrected but that's good as she's thinking about what she says! So I justified her mistakes mostly :smile:
Also mentioned she hadn't grasped pragmatics of politeness as she didn't say please and about her aunty using some CDs but some more sophisticated language as she appreciates Ruby's ZPD
i didn't mention Piaget or Chomsky! It's mad there was loads to write even though the text wasn't long
Reply 22
Original post by Mewmew8
Yeah good little Ruby giving me plenty to say haha!
I'm sure it's fine that you talked about Lexis a lot, it is about language after all! I said a bit about religion too :smile: no I think you were fine to say that- it's probably about how you interpret it as it's not like the examiner will have been able to dosing what he really meant with the author haha! Oh yeah I mentioned a bit about money- cos he said women read novels and romances etc but in 1700s not many women were educated and booked were expensive! So he was massively overgeneralising there.
yuckkkk I've seen how hard English lit is with having to learn the plays etc


Hoepfully:smile: And that's a good point about money I didn't think of that. But your right I think the examine likes to see how we viewed the extract. And yep English Lit this year is all unseen text so we just read lots of plays, poems, and novels and then have to find links between what we have read outside the exam and the extracts they give us in the exam as well as anaysing the extract.
Reply 23
Original post by Wbez
Okay am I the only person who talked more about Ruby's mistakes more than her good stuff? :P talked about her mistakes with inflexions on 'glass' and 'bitted', use of phonological processes, the mistakes with the copular, then said that her use of the passive was good, was was her polysyllabic lexis. Then moved onto the aunt using positive reinforcement, and scaffolding wh-questions. Talked a lot about Skinner, Bruner and Chomsky, but didn't find much room for Piaget and Vygotsky. So much to write though!


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No I did a bit but ran out of time and had to move on to the next question. I annotated the glass bit but didn't have time to add it to my essay :frown:. But I mentioned her saying "Bets" instead of Vets and wiz and wiv instead of With. I used the theorist Skinner, Bruner and Halliday. Also mentioned a lot about the role of Aunt Lou (I think that was her name can't remember now :biggrin:) and how she is very clever etc. Same here no time for Piaget and Vygotsky
Are the examiners positive with marking? I wrote about Caxtons printing press, however read the language change time of publication incorrectly, going on to explain how I thought that the Caxtons printing press PROCEEDED the text, when infact it had already been implemented by this time. Worrying they will mark me down because of this though... apart from that however all in all I found the language acquisition text (Q1) a lot easier than the language change text (Q3). What did everyone else say in regards to the Language change text (Q3)? :smile:
Reply 25
Original post by Rebecca-Kate
Are the examiners positive with marking? I wrote about Caxtons printing press, however read the language change time of publication incorrectly, going on to explain how I thought that the Caxtons printing press PROCEEDED the text, when infact it had already been implemented by this time. Worrying they will mark me down because of this though... apart from that however all in all I found the language acquisition text (Q1) a lot easier than the language change text (Q3). What did everyone else say in regards to the Language change text (Q3)? :smile:


You might lose a couple of marks but generally they try to give you marks for points rather than take them away! So you should be ok!
Definitely agree about that- Q1 went well I think :smile: but not sure about how Q3 went! I wrote about gender- how he was saying he's not a woman hater and he holds women in high regard- and how he was clearly saying this to mask the judgments he made, and in modern days it wouldn't need to be stated that women are held in high regard etc. Wrote quite a lot on his language portraying his attitude towards women and his attempts to cover it up with compliments! How he thinks he has right to judge. How he said he's Christian. How he claims women read novels and romantic books when at the time most women weren't educated and books were expensive and hard to access. The fact a man wrote about how horrible the petticoats were when he had no right yet this author claims women should have been ashamed to then carry on wearing them. Context- how women could not inherit property or vote for a longtime after the text. Lexis-describing women as 'fair ones' 'dear' (which has narrowed) 'creatures' which I said has pejorated, mentioned POlotical correctness a few times and how different attitudes are now. Multi clausal sentences from Latin, the f instead of s due to pronunciation changes, cap letter used more. Then said he thinks his attitude is modern and it has changed from 50 years before. Said the anecdote where women kept wearing their petticoats showed a small but significant triumph for women and the fact the author tried to justify and mask his judgements towards women showed progress as it wasn't as acceptable anymore.

What did you put??
I did this too, surprisingly found acquisition much easier to write about! Chose the Ruby question :smile: there was a lot to say and although I usually absolutely hate transcripts and wanted children's writing to come up, it went well!

For the other section I did daily mail/soldier thing. It was alright, I thought there were quite a lot of features to talk about but not sure how well I did on actually comparing them :s-smilie: eek, don't want to think about it. But all I know is I definitely don't want to resit that exam - need an A for uni so really hoping I did enough to get that :daydreaming:
Original post by Wbez
Okay am I the only person who talked more about Ruby's mistakes more than her good stuff? :P talked about her mistakes with inflexions on 'glass' and 'bitted', use of phonological processes, the mistakes with the copular, then said that her use of the passive was good, was was her polysyllabic lexis. Then moved onto the aunt using positive reinforcement, and scaffolding wh-questions. Talked a lot about Skinner, Bruner and Chomsky, but didn't find much room for Piaget and Vygotsky. So much to write though!


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Argh you've just reminded me I forgot to mention glass in the exam, oh god hah, I remember looking at it and thinking I should use that. Kind of hate reading these threads cause I think so much about what I should've done :tongue: I think I talked more about her mistakes than her good stuff though, by a mile!

I got Skinner and Chomsky too, and managed to put a bit of Piaget/Vygtosky but by a possible long shot :colondollar: eek, so much more nervous for results now.
Reply 28
Original post by Rebecca-Kate
Are the examiners positive with marking? I wrote about Caxtons printing press, however read the language change time of publication incorrectly, going on to explain how I thought that the Caxtons printing press PROCEEDED the text, when infact it had already been implemented by this time. Worrying they will mark me down because of this though... apart from that however all in all I found the language acquisition text (Q1) a lot easier than the language change text (Q3). What did everyone else say in regards to the Language change text (Q3)? :smile:


Actually no, you were very much correct here. Although the printing press was created in 1436 (was it? Already deleted it out of my mind) it was not particularly widely used for another 350 years. It's evidenced in the text by the ct digraph (where they're conjoined), the medial S and the use of the ampersand in etc, all of which died out with the standardisation of characters due to the emergence of the printing press.

I wrote about the orthographical changes in the spelling of the ed inflexion, and use of archaic graphemes/digraphs (what I've just been talking about), the semantic change of the phrase 'cock'd up' and how it changed as the working classes got educated and the phrase went from being a fashion statement of the upper classes to a euphemism for messed up (relating to the view of the upper class as messing up in politics, although this is something I got from further reading a while back so I don't know how reliable this is), the lexical change in the use of archaic lexis, the use of the semantic field of religion, the issues with gendered lexis i.e. the fairer ones, the grammatical change in the capitalisation of all nouns, and the syntactical change in the almost entire use of complex syntax.

*phew*

And that's just AO1! Don't even want to think about AO2 and AO3 :'(


Original post by ktlaurenroe
Argh you've just reminded me I forgot to mention glass in the exam, oh god hah, I remember looking at it and thinking I should use that. Kind of hate reading these threads cause I think so much about what I should've done :tongue: I think I talked more about her mistakes than her good stuff though, by a mile!

I got Skinner and Chomsky too, and managed to put a bit of Piaget/Vygtosky but by a possible long shot :colondollar: eek, so much more nervous for results now.


Don't be nervous, sounds like you did well ^_^
(edited 11 years ago)
Original post by Mewmew8
You might lose a couple of marks but generally they try to give you marks for points rather than take them away! So you should be ok!
Definitely agree about that- Q1 went well I think :smile: but not sure about how Q3 went! I wrote about gender- how he was saying he's not a woman hater and he holds women in high regard- and how he was clearly saying this to mask the judgments he made, and in modern days it wouldn't need to be stated that women are held in high regard etc. Wrote quite a lot on his language portraying his attitude towards women and his attempts to cover it up with compliments! How he thinks he has right to judge. How he said he's Christian. How he claims women read novels and romantic books when at the time most women weren't educated and books were expensive and hard to access. The fact a man wrote about how horrible the petticoats were when he had no right yet this author claims women should have been ashamed to then carry on wearing them. Context- how women could not inherit property or vote for a longtime after the text. Lexis-describing women as 'fair ones' 'dear' (which has narrowed) 'creatures' which I said has pejorated, mentioned POlotical correctness a few times and how different attitudes are now. Multi clausal sentences from Latin, the f instead of s due to pronunciation changes, cap letter used more. Then said he thinks his attitude is modern and it has changed from 50 years before. Said the anecdote where women kept wearing their petticoats showed a small but significant triumph for women and the fact the author tried to justify and mask his judgements towards women showed progress as it wasn't as acceptable anymore.

What did you put??


Wow, sounds like you have scored very highly... you really understood what the text was about! Think I began to panic slightly and didn't look behind the actual meaning of the text in as much depth as yourself! But, I also like you said how language change over time has caused different social acceptability, and likewise mentioned about how the word 'creature' perhaps now may be perceived as somewhat sexist etc, with the idea of the text being slightly prejudice against women, something we wouldn't see today. I also went on to address the context of religion, saying how the text continues to refer to the Bible and Christianity, something that would be less usual today due to globalization meaning that we now have to be more tentative when writing about religions because of the increased diversity of different religions now. In terms of lexical items I explained how perhaps for ease of articulation we have gone on to change words such as 'laugh'd' and now add an 'e' to the word so that is spelt more as it is sounds. I suggested that the general form of te text seemed very Latinate perhaps due to the trend and superior prestige such constructions gave off, (Subject verb object etc). Again, like yourself I mentioned how it was likely such texts would be more for the aristocracy and upper class, as these were the minority of people who would be able to read such passages, with the text being published pre 1884 education act. Mentioned the elongated 'S' also, as well as the use of semi-colons and commas rather than full stops, both of which I suggested were convention of the periods. Can't remember what else I wrote, a lot of it was rambling! :smile:
(edited 11 years ago)
Original post by Wbez
Actually no, you were very much correct here. Although the printing press was created in 1436 (was it? Already deleted it out of my mind) it was not particularly widely used for another 350 years. It's evidenced in the text by the ct digraph (where they're conjoined), the medial S and the use of the ampersand in etc, all of which died out with the standardisation of characters due to the emergence of the printing press.

I wrote about the orthographical changes in the spelling of the ed inflexion, and use of archaic graphemes/digraphs (what I've just been talking about), the semantic change of the phrase 'cock'd up' and how it changed as the working classes got educated and the phrase went from being a fashion statement of the upper classes to a euphemism for messed up (relating to the view of the upper class as messing up in politics, although this is something I got from further reading a while back so I don't know how reliable this is), the lexical change in the use of archaic lexis, the use of the semantic field of religion, the issues with gendered lexis i.e. the fairer ones, the grammatical change in the capitalisation of all nouns, and the syntactical change in the almost entire use of complex syntax.

*phew*

And that's just AO1! Don't even want to think about AO2 and AO3 :'(

Don't be nervous, sounds like you did well ^_^



Oh awesome, wasn't aware that was the case but brilliant if that's so! And yes, I said also how it would be unusual for the elongated 'S' to be present after the printing press, the same with the ct digraph! Sounds like you have done well also!
You have really put my mind at rest after reading that, so thanks a bunch! :biggrin:
Original post by Wbez
Don't be nervous, sounds like you did well ^_^


You too, everyone here seems to have done amazingly! :tongue: I suppose you can't write about every single feature or you'd be there all day so no point worrying about what I haven't put in haha! Fingers crossed for March results now.. :smile:
Reply 32
Original post by Rebecca-Kate
Wow, sounds like you have scored very highly... you really understood what the text was about! Think I began to panic slightly and didn't look behind the actual meaning of the text in as much depth as yourself! But, I also like you said how language change over time has caused different social acceptability, and likewise mentioned about how the word 'creature' perhaps now may be perceived as somewhat sexist etc, with the idea of the text being slightly prejudice against women, something we wouldn't see today. I also went on to address the context of religion, saying how the text continues to refer to the Bible and Christianity, something that would be less usual today due to globalization meaning that we now have to be more tentative when writing about religions because of the increased diversity of different religions now. In terms of lexical items I explained how perhaps for ease of articulation we have gone on to change words such as 'laugh'd' and now add an 'e' to the word so that is spelt more as it is sounds. I suggested that the general form of te text seemed very Latinate perhaps due to the trend and superior prestige such constructions gave off, (Subject verb object etc). Again, like yourself I mentioned how it was likely such texts would be more for the aristocracy and upper class, as these were the minority of people who would be able to read such passages, with the text being published pre 1884 education act. Mentioned the elongated 'S' also, as well as the use of semi-colons and commas rather than full stops, both of which I suggested were convention of the periods. Can't remember what else I wrote, a lot of it was rambling! :smile:

Thank you! I don't think I did to be honest I definitely agree about rambling ahaha I felt like I was rambling loads- I think it's necessary for the subject! I think I probably concentrated far too much on meaning, dunno how many marks ill get for it :frown: Oh man you made some good points wish is put them in! Completely forgot to mention inflections :frown: oops! Good luck for results :smile: you'll have to post on here with how you've done!
Reply 33
Original post by Rebecca-Kate
Wow, sounds like you have scored very highly... you really understood what the text was about! Think I began to panic slightly and didn't look behind the actual meaning of the text in as much depth as yourself! But, I also like you said how language change over time has caused different social acceptability, and likewise mentioned about how the word 'creature' perhaps now may be perceived as somewhat sexist etc, with the idea of the text being slightly prejudice against women, something we wouldn't see today. I also went on to address the context of religion, saying how the text continues to refer to the Bible and Christianity, something that would be less usual today due to globalization meaning that we now have to be more tentative when writing about religions because of the increased diversity of different religions now. In terms of lexical items I explained how perhaps for ease of articulation we have gone on to change words such as 'laugh'd' and now add an 'e' to the word so that is spelt more as it is sounds. I suggested that the general form of te text seemed very Latinate perhaps due to the trend and superior prestige such constructions gave off, (Subject verb object etc). Again, like yourself I mentioned how it was likely such texts would be more for the aristocracy and upper class, as these were the minority of people who would be able to read such passages, with the text being published pre 1884 education act. Mentioned the elongated 'S' also, as well as the use of semi-colons and commas rather than full stops, both of which I suggested were convention of the periods. Can't remember what else I wrote, a lot of it was rambling! :smile:


Hi,

I'm the same as you found the CLA much better than the language change. I did question one and found a lot to say about the role of Aunt Lou and Ruby's lexis, grammar and purpose of speech etc. Language change I didn't go into depth about the context and meaning of the text but more about the lexis and the Eth and capitalisation of certain words and the Religious references. I got in about perscriptivism and how the text would be aimed at people of a high social status a they would be the ones educated enough to read. And mentioned latinate lexis. So I hope that will be ok. But if not I can always retake in June lol.

Good luck though :smile:
Reply 34
woah evryone seems to have found the exam a doddle,wish i could say the same mannnn! when we came out the exam our english teachers were stood outside to chek how we found it & i was one of the few that that came out &just admitted 'MY GOD THAT WS HARD' :frown: I knew my 'quality' of writing was abit naff so I tried to equal it out with 'quantity' by writing around 7 sides for each section for Lang aq : talked briefly about overgeneralisation (irregular verbs+how it applies to chomksys universal grammar stuff) ,halliday (regulatory/insturmental/imagintive),contxt of kitchen &social conventions of not wearing coats in doors[what aload of *******s&commons sense. iknow:l ] the aunties us of CDS only in terms of interrogatives+recasts,&aspects of gender when the aunty said 'sorry '&piaget :abstract concepts in terms of Rubys ability to mntion past tense?&pragmatics of shared humour& hyponyms of out door clothing (coat&jacket) p.s.im unsure about tthe latter comment?are 'jacket +coat 'hyponyms or hypernyms or waat?:/ my handwriting looked like i wrte with my FOOT.structure of essay mde clearly showed my stress-head-ness cs i jimped frm 1point to tthe other. ohhmaaayn another resit ontop of the 6 tht iv alrdy got waiting in summer! BLOODY G R E A T
Reply 35
I write too slowly :/ annoying - no conclusion on Q1 and little conclusion on Q4.

I spoke primarily about Ruby's acute Pragmatic awareness for the most part of my analysis which might serve to my detriment come grading time :/. I just need a low B in this exam to get an A overall so I'm hoping I've scraped through haha!

I said that the tag question in 'big girls use glass (.) don't they' could bear significance to Lackoff's (1975) theory that females use 'weak language'; I continued to suggest that Ruby was probably quite confident that 'big girls' do use glasses, however, her use of the tag question may have been employed to mitigate her responsibility of the authenticity of the declarative in case she was wrong.

I then said that from an alternative perspective, she is forcing her Aunt to agree with her. The tag question can be seen to contradict the expectations made by Deborah Tannen in the Difference model and Ruby is consequently seen to be very aware of how to manipulate her conversational partner's response.

I also spoke about when she changed the topic of conversation. She nodded and laughed for a bit and then went on to change the conversation. This complement of paralinguistic and linguistic features probably suggest she is imitating adults, for whom this approach to topic change is subtle, non-face-threatening and permits the holding of the floor. I then went on to say this supported the Behaviourist theory of language acquisition.

Then went on to talk about her failure to correctly inflect 'glass'; she also resisted her Aunt's recasting support. This opposed the Behaviorist theory and I, at this stage, suggested that imitation was an essential part of pragmatic language development as observed previously, however, when it comes to the learning of other frameworks, this theory fails to justify itself.

I then made a short point on her saying Felma. Her Aunt said Thelma, but it didn't phase Ruby suggesting that Ruby must recognise that Thelma is the appropriate pronunciation but Felma is what she could produce. Linked in Fis phenomenon.

---

Is that enough to get a decent grade? I need a B :colondollar:. I can't write much under pressure and it's really stressful.
Reply 36
my oh my!youv bagged urself an A* right their :tongue:Sounds legit.youv managed to home in on the gender aspect of the text really well so theyl credit you for for mentionin synposis.What kind of language features did u mention?anythn similair to mine?:
or is mine just aload of waffle :s omg i mentioned humour/laughter as a paralinguistic feature too bt i was unsure if tht made sense so i ddnr elabourate.
For lang change;majority seems to have pickd the older fashion transcript whereas I mde a quicktime decision by picking the compare Q.spent 40 mins notes+essay:L mntioned : graphology :serif typeface (reflects traditionalaity of 1942 era:s-smilie:) grammar: short simple clauses&abbreviation &backformation of 'lingo' thn jst whent off on one talking about how the purpise is to advice amerixan service men on 'acommadatin/converging' to brit lang &then i said somthng) vague like' even tho the aim is to converge to brit language,the authour is making it clear that their is a diffrence between the two cultures by making brits look like were a diffrnt species (ddnt word it like that obv lol bt thats what my explanation meant in a nutshell)&then compared the graphology with the modern text sayng that advances in tech have allowrd variation.in printing /fonts?:s-smilie:& then how the actual subject differs. blaaa bla idk i messed up on lang change bigtime.focussed to much on the 1942 text.anyone else similar? am the only one whos in for a resitd.flipping heck,on the bright side-thats my last exam fr ths month!!what a blimmin stressesfull nightmare
Reply 37
Original post by omgilyx
I write too slowly :/ annoying - no conclusion on Q1 and little conclusion on Q4.

I spoke primarily about Ruby's acute Pragmatic awareness for the most part of my analysis which might serve to my detriment come grading time :/. I just need a low B in this exam to get an A overall so I'm hoping I've scraped through haha!

I said that the tag question in 'big girls use glass (.) don't they' could bear significance to Lackoff's (1975) theory that females use 'weak language'; I continued to suggest that Ruby was probably quite confident that 'big girls' do use glasses, however, her use of the tag question may have been employed to mitigate her responsibility of the authenticity of the declarative in case she was wrong.

I then said that from an alternative perspective, she is forcing her Aunt to agree with her. The tag question can be seen to contradict the expectations made by Deborah Tannen in the Difference model and Ruby is consequently seen to be very aware of how to manipulate her conversational partner's response.

I also spoke about when she changed the topic of conversation. She nodded and laughed for a bit and then went on to change the conversation. This complement of paralinguistic and linguistic features probably suggest she is imitating adults, for whom this approach to topic change is subtle, non-face-threatening and permits the holding of the floor. I then went on to say this supported the Behaviourist theory of language acquisition.

Then went on to talk about her failure to correctly inflect 'glass'; she also resisted her Aunt's recasting support. This opposed the Behaviorist theory and I, at this stage, suggested that imitation was an essential part of pragmatic language development as observed previously, however, when it comes to the learning of other frameworks, this theory fails to justify itself.

I then made a short point on her saying Felma. Her Aunt said Thelma, but it didn't phase Ruby suggesting that Ruby must recognise that Thelma is the appropriate pronunciation but Felma is what she could produce. Linked in Fis phenomenon.

---

Is that enough to get a decent grade? I need a B :colondollar:. I can't write much under pressure and it's really stressful.


Oh gosh! Well done you've got more than a B there very detailed and descriptive well done. I foucsed a lot on Aunt Lou's role in Ruby's language development. Used bruner and mentioned her tone, questions and topics etc. Then mentioned Skinner and Halliday and the functions of language that children use and how Ruby uses them. Then spoken about Ruby's understanding of turn taking structure and how she is at the telegraphic stage of her language development. Then went into detail about her lexis and grammar. But ran out of time to do a conclusion lol.
Reply 38
Original post by Yellowiris
But ran out of time to do a conclusion lol.


No need for a conclusion, so you're fine there :wink:


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Reply 39
Original post by Wbez
No need for a conclusion, so you're fine there :wink:


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Really! Thanks for that :wink:

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