AQA 2016 English

Original post by z_o_e

So I just started year 11 and I don't know the exam procedure. Is It true I will need to memorise 3 novels and 15 poems?

^ memorise key quote?

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You have to be familiar with them and be able to pick out key points from them to answer the question given. Some people memorise quotes which does help but as long as you have a rough idea of possible quotes, you should be okay :smile:

Don't worry about it too much - it does seem more daunting than it actually is.

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Reply 2

Original post by Matrix123

Don't worry about it too much - it does seem more daunting than it actually is.

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Heyyy how's this?

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Reply 3

Original post by z_o_e

Heyyy how's this?

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Hi, just remember that I'm not an English expert, but that does sound good to me :yep:

I'd have a comma in the first sentence:
In 'Storm of the Island', Heaney....
^Also try to use quotation marks around the title of the poems. (That was just a point my English teacher made to my class.)

Reply 4

Original post by Matrix123

Hi, just remember that I'm not an English expert, but that does sound good to me :yep:

Yaaay thanks x

No I'm just asking someone who has better understanding of English than me x
I used your example for this

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Reply 5

Original post by z_o_e

Yaaay thanks x

No I'm just asking someone who has better understanding of English than me x
I used your example for this

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No worries!

Aww fair enough :smile:

Aw very nice! :yep:

Reply 6

Original post by Matrix123

No worries!

Aww fair enough :smile:

Aw very nice! :yep:

Heyyyy I did this today ♥

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Reply 7

Original post by z_o_e

Heyyyy I did this today ♥

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Hi, this is great - I can see an improvement from last time! :yy:

Just a few small things you can change slightly, but overall, quite good I think.

Spoiler

So, In your sentence about the quote, maybe say:
"For example, this is shown when he writes..."
^Making that small change ensures that this is a proper sentence. What you had written before isn't necessarily a proper sentence. Hopefully you understand that? If not, do let me know and I'll try my best to explain why :smile:

I also wanted to say well done for this sentence! :top:

The sentence following this is very good as well. For a small improvement, you could say "The positive language" instead of just "The language". Even though you have made your point later on in the sentence, this small change shows you are aware of the impact/intentional impact by the author.
You don't necessarily know that Scrooge is a bad person as you have never met him - you only understand this from the way the author writes about him. In your third sentence, you could say "unlike Scrooge, who is presented as a nasty, unpleasant man by the author."

The following sentence should start this "This is due to the fact that Scrooge..."
^This is because the phrasing "This is due to the fact, Scrooge..." isn't quite right and doesn't necessarily make sense on its own.Another point is to be careful with your tenses. You wrote:
"Scrooge loses his opportunity of family with Belle as he was too focused on providing for her which leads to Scrooge ironically lose Belle."
Firstly, the last bit doesn't make sense. You'd have to say "which leads to Scrooge ironically losing Belle."

Spoiler

Certain verbs are in the past whilst others are in the present tense (e.g. "was", "focused" are both in the past whilst "loses", "leads" are in the present tense)
You could change that so it's all in the past tense:
"Scrooge lost his opportunity of family with Belle as he was too focused on providing for her which lead to Scrooge ironically losing Belle."
Alternatively, you can write it all in the present tense (which is arguably the better choice - you read the book and learn what happens as you read it so this would be logical. If the book is written in the past tense (very likely) then it doesn't matter if you write the sentence in the past tense. :smile:

Just make sure you use the same tense throughout your essay.):
"Scrooge loses his opportunity of family with Belle as he is too focused on providing for her which leads to Scrooge ironically losing Belle."

When referring to the message Dickens portrays in the novel, you should say "Dickens' message tot he readers..." instead of "Dickens message to the readers..." because the message belongs to Dickens.

Check your spelling of "resonate" :wink:

But fantastic choice of word, this is a great vocab choice :yy:

In the penultimate sentence, I'd place the comma before "whereas" so it says "they were brought up by nannies, whereas the poor were..."
Great final sentence :top:

Just check your spelling of "appreciating" :smile:

If you want an improvement to work on for next time, I'd say try looking at some of these little things (remember these are just minor changes). You could also try to do a couple of sentences on word level analysis. This will get you an extra one or two marks :smile:

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Reply 9

Original post by z_o_e

Great improvements! :yy:

Well done for trying to do a sentence about the type of word. Just be a bit careful there because it's not an adjective (describing a noun); it is an adverb (describing a verb). Make sure to write "suggests" and not "suggest" too. I don't think the phrasing of "well manner" is quite right - you could talk about someone being 'well mannered' but not by saying 'well manner'. Maybe you could say 'good manners'? (Try thinking of a good synonym for 'good' if you do choose to say this).
So, that sentence could be:
"The adverb 'pleasantly' suggests good manners and positivity."

Make sure to say "cares" not "care" - you would say "Bob loves and cares for his family..." instead of "Bob loves and care for his family..."

Nice edit in the sentence about Scrooge being presented in the way he is :top:

In that last sentence, you don't need the comma. Some people may do :dontknow:

but personally, I don't feel it fits in well.

Well done! That's a great redraft so far :yep:

Do you want another improvement for this? If you do, I think what may be useful is adding a sentence or two about the impact of the language choices. In order to do this, you could briefly reference a later part of the novel and explain the impact of the author's choice of vocabulary/language/structure (in this paragraph, you'd talk about the impact of positive language).
You could talk about this before you go into the context. However, you may decide you want to do it nearer the end of the paragraph? This idea would be useful for when you're trying to evaluate in your PEACE paragraph. :smile:

Reply 10

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Reply 11

How much would you mark that? I don't know why my teacher grades it like a E/D. I don't know what he expects.

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Reply 12

Original post by z_o_e

How much would you mark that? I don't know why my teacher grades it like a E/D. I don't know what he expects.

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Hmm...do you have the mark scheme or remember part of the mark scheme he used to grade that piece of work?

Spoiler

What's the title of the essay, how long were you given and is this everything you wrote?
Depending on the above, I would have personally graded that as more high C/low B tbh.

Reply 13

Original post by Matrix123

Hmm...do you have the mark scheme or remember part of the mark scheme he used to grade that piece of work?

Spoiler

What's the title of the essay, how long were you given and is this everything you wrote?
Depending on the above, I would have personally graded that as more high C/low B tbh.

What's a solid grade B/A? Do you think I can get that? :/

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Reply 14

Original post by z_o_e

What's a solid grade B/A? Do you think I can get that? :/

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I think you could, definitely. There's no limit to what you can get, it's about how hard you work (you're doing very well here) and the resources and help you get. Do you have twitter? You could maybe tweet mrbruff and ask for help/tips there too? He's an actual English teacher so he'd be able to give better, and more accurate feedback, and maybe point you in a better direction in terms of revision.

Do you by any chance know the title of your assessment? We could try Googling it and seeing if there are any example answers online?

Reply 15

Original post by Matrix123

No I don't have twitter.

And I made this assessment question up haha

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Reply 16

leopard923

You need to add quotations from the novel to your analysis otherwise you will lose marks. Apart from this, your structure is good and your vocab is good ! The exam doesn't expect you to know the books off by heart and having sat the exam last year studying Of Mice and Men and Inspector Calls, I didn't even pick up the books in the exam, you simply don't have time to anyway! If you read the books 3 or 4 times and listen in class you will know enough quotes to use during the time. Study guides are useful also as they highlight key quotations that you should learn. If your doing your GCSEs this year then good luck :tongue:

Reply 17

Original post by z_o_e

No I don't have twitter.

And I made this assessment question up haha

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Fair enough

Ohh I see :rofl:

Reply 18

leopard923

Original post by z_o_e