AQA GCSE English Literature

Hi, I’m aiming for all grades 8s and 9s in my GCSEs and I am progressing pretty well in all of them except for English Lit, which is really confusing me as I seem to be doing well in English Language and all of my other subjects. Here are my current grades at the moment -

Maths - 7 (I’m predicted an 8, when my next exam is taken)
Biology - 9
Chemistry - 9
Physics - 9
Spanish - 8 (if the grade boundaries are low or average), 7(+) (if the grade boundaries are high)
Geography - 8
RE - 7(+)
English Language - 8
English Literature - 5

(I know that you can’t have a + or - grade but my school gives you them to show you how close or far you are away from the next grade etc.)

Does anyone have any ideas why my English Lit grade is so much lower than my grades in my other subjects? Also, does anyone have any tips on what I can do to boost this grade? I’d just like to note that I do lots of revision for English Lit and do things like annotating books/ scripts in detail, linking to context, key themes and assessment objectives.

(edited 3 years ago)

Reply 1

jamie404

7

Original post by username564368

Hi, I’m aiming for all grades 8s and 9s in my GCSEs and I am progressing pretty well in all of them except for English Lit, which is really confusing me as I seem to be doing well in English Language and all of my other subjects. Here are my current grades at the moment -

Maths - 7 (I’m predicted an 8, when my next exam is taken)
Biology - 9
Chemistry - 9
Physics - 9
Spanish - 8 (if the grade boundaries are low or average), 7(+) (if the grade boundaries are high)
Geography - 8
RE - 7(+)
English Language - 8
English Literature - 5

(I know that you can’t have a + or - grade but my school gives you them to show you how close or far you are away from the next grade etc.)

Does anyone have any ideas why my English Lit grade is so much lower than my grades in my other subjects? Also, does anyone have any tips on what I can do to boost this grade? I’d just like to note that I do lots of revision for English Lit and do things like annotating books/ scripts in detail, linking to context, key themes and assessment objectives.

To boost your grade, there's great free youtube videos you can watch for English lit. Englishwithsim is my fav! check her out.

Reply 2

username564368

OP

9

Original post by jamie404

To boost your grade, there's great free youtube videos you can watch for English lit. Englishwithsim is my fav! check her out.

Thank you - I’ll check her out. Do you have any ideas why my grade in Lit is three grades lower than my average grades for my other classes? I’d really appreciate any ideas.

Reply 3

jamie404

7

Original post by username564368

Thank you - I’ll check her out. Do you have any ideas why my grade in Lit is three grades lower than my average grades for my other classes? I’d really appreciate any ideas.

no prob! she's amazing.

and, usually, when grades in English lit are low, it's due to pressuring yourself to constantly try and analyse a text in a sophisticated way, straight away. It's always best to approach an analysis by starting out simple. Pick out the obvious things, write them down. Once you have the obvious written down, then you can begin to analyse your text in a more sophisticated way- it's like warming up for an exercise. Start of gentle, then get tough on yourself...you can't just delve into something straight away!

Also, with English CONTEXT IS KEY. So, if you're doing a poem, it's best to research the author and time that the poem was written. Then, when you're analysing your text, it's really good to link contextual points to your analysis. Thats usually what gets me really high marks, because the examiner is going to like the fact that you've done your research and that you understand that a poem is equally about the context and author's life as much as it is about the language. same with books/plays, always do your research on the author or playwright- find out interesting things about them and link that to your analysis.

(these are the two things I struggle with most of all)

PM me if you want to go over anything specific, though.