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English literature ao2

I have a question for ao2. I am now getting 7/8 for my essays, but im trying to aim for a 9. Ao2 is the only thing holding me back. Can anyone tell me how to get full marks for ao2 for aqa english literature

Reply 1

Parker Tracy

what feedback have you had from your tutor/teacher on your performance/areas for improvement? Knowing this is a good way of moving forward.

Reply 2

Jahayna

My teacher always told us to write how and why. How does the writer do something (techniques or whatever) and why they do it (their intentions, for example in an inspector calls you could say he’s trying to highlight the beauty of socialism or the dangers of capitalism) ... this is what it says on the examiners report for last years paper 2 (AQA): The overall ethos of the qualification is to enable students to demonstrate their engagement with the text they have read in terms of its ideas, the varying contextual factors that influence its creation and reception, and how the writer has consciously constructed the text in order to communicate meaning.

Reply 3

Jahayna

Original post by Jahayna

Not sure if the bit from the ER is for ao2, think its general but thought it might be useful

Reply 4

Jahayna

Found the relevant bit: Students who dealt with AO2 most successfully were the ones who had not been too restricted by subject terminology. Some students became tied up in the confusion and found themselves wrongly identifying parts of speech without actually saying anything about meaning, let alone effects. There were however some very successful treatments of AO2 that concentrated on why and how a writer has crafted a character / moment / exchange of dialogue / point of tension. For example, in response to Q2 about society, one student wrote about the significance of dramatic irony in An Inspector Calls. They focused on unpicking Mr. Birling’s speech about the Titanic, ‘absolutely unsinkable’. A short quotation such as this, alongside the acknowledgment that this is dramatic irony, followed by a consideration of why Priestley chooses to present Birling in this way, is a good example of how AO2 can be addressed. Sometimes, too much terminology impeded responses and seemed to constrict liberation of ideas and expression.

Reply 5

Jahayna

Remember this is from AQA. Try to read the examiners report of the secTion of the exam youre struggling with. Sorry i keep adding some more i dont want to bother you just trying to help😂: Some students moved into Level 6 for AO2 via a thread that ran throughout their response explaining how the writer was working to present ideas rather than focusing solely on analysis of techniques, words or phrases. In An Inspector Calls, much good use was made of stage directions, lighting and structure to comment on AO2. Students who had used character development / purpose as their focus for AO2 produced some very effective responses as they were explicitly focusing on writer as maker of the text. For example, in response to Q2 on An Inspector Calls, the most able students often used the task as a vehicle by which to demonstrate their perceptive understanding of Goole’s function. There was much discussion of the tensions between capitalism and socialism, and how Goole is Priestley’s agent to re-set the social equilibrium. Students of some of the best responses to Lord of the Flies were able to synthesise their confident conceptual grasp of Golding’s ideas with a forensic analysis of how they are made manifest in the novel because of the methods that he deploys. One particularly impressive response sensitively debated whether the shattering of the conch was in fact an image of hope, reflecting Golding’s own sense of the world post-WWII, that had been shattered, but would re-emerge from the ‘fragments’ of its destruction. This was by no means untypical: many students wrote with real imagination about Golding’s symbolism and what this might mean in terms of how society reconfigures itself in the aftermath of untold horror.

Reply 6

Fangshow

I think my teacher is just harsh to me lol. I write gigantic paragraphs with a technique and the writers intention but i still get 9 out of 12.

Reply 7

Fangshow

Thx jahayna. I think you saved my english lit grade.

Reply 8

Jahayna

Hey sorry ik its been 2 days but i found this for paper 1 😂 http://filestore.aqa.org.uk/sample-papers-and-mark-schemes/2017/june/AQA-87021-WRE-JUN17.PDF . It has a lot for ao2 you can read about

Reply 9

Fangshow

Oh. I get it now. You dont merely state techniques and analyse them. You can can analyse any language that doesnt neccesarily have a technique, but you can analyse that just as effectively with the same plethora of marks. Thx so much good luck to you english lit tommorow guys.

Reply 10

Isabellawill06

Hello, just completed my english literature gcse paper 1 and realised I did not write about that many techniques. However, i was very analytical when it came to writers intention and effect on audience. Can I still get a high grade if I included quotes and language analysis yet i failed to mention terminology many times?