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A-Level English Literature Study Group 2024-25

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Reply 20

Original post
by Blinkr
I hear ya, that can be quite difficult incorporating that on top of trying to have flair in the essay. Has your teacher shown you any past essays from previous students? I always found that super useful to see what was marked high/low and why

i have seen an a level essay in year 11 to reference how hard a levels are since i was interested in choosing english literature as one of my a level options.

Reply 21

Original post
by Daisy._.7777
Literally nearly the same combo, expect I do Dr Fautus instead of a streetcar named desire. I wish we did that book though cause it looks so interesting! 😭

please can you help me find resources for Frankenstein and Handmaids Tale, I cannot find any good resources to use apart from PMT....

Reply 22

Hi, I'm Year 13 OCR
Doing -

Frankenstein & The Bloody Chamber,

The Merchant's Tale and An Ideal Husband

Hamlet

For coursework I'm doing The World's Wife, A Streetcar Named Desire and A Thousand Splendid Suns

I'm trying to achieve an A but on B or C. If anyone is on the same boat, it would be gladly appreciated if we can share ideas, materials or just have discussions together. Thank you!

Reply 23

Hi everyone! I'm in year 13 and was wondering if anyone else does OCR English lit? The exam texts I'm doing are Hamlet, The Duchess of Malfi, The Merchant's Tale, Dracula and The Picture of Dorian Gray (we're doing the gothic as our overarching topic)! Would love to hear from anyone else doing these texts / doing OCR :smile:

Reply 24

Original post
by jk_202
Hi, I'm Year 13 OCR
Doing -

Frankenstein & The Bloody Chamber,

The Merchant's Tale and An Ideal Husband

Hamlet

For coursework I'm doing The World's Wife, A Streetcar Named Desire and A Thousand Splendid Suns

I'm trying to achieve an A but on B or C. If anyone is on the same boat, it would be gladly appreciated if we can share ideas, materials or just have discussions together. Thank you!

Hi! So happy to have found someone also doing OCR, I feel like it's really not common! I think we're both doing the gothic but unfortunately I do different core texts (Dracula + The Picture of Dorian Gray), we did study the bloody chamber for a little while though as gothic context! I am also doing The Merchant's Tale and Hamlet so would love to talk about those :smile:

Reply 25

Original post
by Blinkr
Welcome to the A-Level English Literature Study Group!

This thread is a place you can connect with fellow students who are also studying English Literature at A-Level. Here we offer a space to support each other support as you prepare for your exams/coursework.
Feel free to share any helpful tips, resources, or advice you find along the way, and share any questions you have about the subject.
Help encourage others, celebrate your achievements, or simply vent when things get a bit overwhelming!
Lil serious note - just a reminder please be aware that sharing or requesting copyrighted materials is against our community guidelines, and moving conversations off-site for this purpose is not allowed. Posts violating these rules will be taken down.
To get started, here are a few questions to break the ice:

Which exam board are you following?

What do you enjoy the most about this subject or course?

What topics within A-Level English Literature do you find most challenging/interesting?


Hi!
I'm currently in Y12 studying EDUQAS English lit. The texts I study are poems by Duffy & Larkin, The Tempest, The Duchess Of Malfi and A Streetcar Named Desire. I have yet to study Christina Rosetti's poems. Its a big jump from GCSE, and I struggle to structure my essays sometimes. Other than that, I'm enjoying it.

Reply 26

Original post
by Blinkr
Welcome to the A-Level English Literature Study Group!

This thread is a place you can connect with fellow students who are also studying English Literature at A-Level. Here we offer a space to support each other support as you prepare for your exams/coursework.
Feel free to share any helpful tips, resources, or advice you find along the way, and share any questions you have about the subject.
Help encourage others, celebrate your achievements, or simply vent when things get a bit overwhelming!
Lil serious note - just a reminder please be aware that sharing or requesting copyrighted materials is against our community guidelines, and moving conversations off-site for this purpose is not allowed. Posts violating these rules will be taken down.
To get started, here are a few questions to break the ice:

Which exam board are you following?

What do you enjoy the most about this subject or course?

What topics within A-Level English Literature do you find most challenging/interesting?


Hi!!
I'm currently in Y12, studying Edexcel A Level English Lit. The texts I've currently started are Othello, Death of a Salesman, and Keats poetry (La Belle Dame Sans Merci and Isabella) - there are other texts, but I've not quite got to them yet 😅
I enjoy being able to share opinions on the texts with classmates and other students studying the course, as well as looking at the context surrounding a text.
To be totally honest, I find the actual writing of essays quite hard, it's a big step up from GCSEs and the essay structure is very different!

Reply 27

Hi, I'm in year 12 and I study A Level Ena Lit on the Eduaas exam board (which it feels like nobody does!) and I study: A Streetcar Named Desire, The Duchess of Malfi, The Tempest, Rossetti, Larkin & Duffy, The Colour Purple, and one more novel that we choose for coursework. I'm currently at an A*/A and actually looking to potentially study eng lit at oxbridge!

Reply 28

Original post
by Blinkr
Welcome to the A-Level English Literature Study Group!

This thread is a place you can connect with fellow students who are also studying English Literature at A-Level. Here we offer a space to support each other support as you prepare for your exams/coursework.
Feel free to share any helpful tips, resources, or advice you find along the way, and share any questions you have about the subject.
Help encourage others, celebrate your achievements, or simply vent when things get a bit overwhelming!
Lil serious note - just a reminder please be aware that sharing or requesting copyrighted materials is against our community guidelines, and moving conversations off-site for this purpose is not allowed. Posts violating these rules will be taken down.
To get started, here are a few questions to break the ice:

Which exam board are you following?

What do you enjoy the most about this subject or course?

What topics within A-Level English Literature do you find most challenging/interesting?

Hi! I'm in Year 13 doing Edexcel! I do Othello, A Streetcar, Frankenstein, Never Let Me Go, Poems of the Decade and Wife of Bath. For my coursework I'm doing The Handmaid's Tale and The Bloody Chamber!

I'm aiming for an A, possibly an A*, but rn I find English Lit my hardest subject and feel trapped at a C. I get very close to B's like literally 1/2 marks off but just can't seem to break into the grade boundaries for it.

Hoping anyone might be able to share any tips they have or any exemplar essays! :smile:

Reply 29

Original post
by chailatte2006
Hi everyone! I'm in year 13 and was wondering if anyone else does OCR English lit? The exam texts I'm doing are Hamlet, The Duchess of Malfi, The Merchant's Tale, Dracula and The Picture of Dorian Gray (we're doing the gothic as our overarching topic)! Would love to hear from anyone else doing these texts / doing OCR :smile:


also doing ocr!! different texts though, except malfi. we’re doing american lit for our genre study :smile:

Reply 30

Heyy, I'm in year 13 studying CIE A-Level Literature in English. The texts I'm studying are
Prose:
Underground Railroad
Dubliners

Drama:
Hamlet
Measure for Measure
Long's Day Journey Into Night,

Poetry:
John Donne
Songs of Innocence and of Experience

I'm finding the essay writing really really difficult, even though the whole exam is just writing essays

Reply 31

Hi! I'm a year 12 student & I really love English!!!!
We do AQA, love through the ages. At first I was convinced I would have to bear through sappy and inconsequential passages as a price for studying my favourite subject. In fact, our overarching theme is so complex and fascinating! (which is also turning me into a "romance girlie" as the poets say).

Anyways, back on track. We study oooooh!!-thello, love poems comparative to GATSBY (EVERYTHING is now "giving gatsby"), an NEA whatwhatwhat, Cuckoo's Nest, and SKIRRID HILL!!! Gatsby is incredibly fun; the great white bard, immaculate as always. I'm fascinated by the theatre & performance side of literature, too. (as u can tell, probably (was this supposed to be formal? (i hope not))).

best bit about englit: everything (except byron (bar ada lovelace)). ugh bury me with ishiguro's books.
the challenge: getting from my A (on alice grades) to an A*. which I would like to have to study English/related sunjects at an academically rigourous uni! i did achieve a 6 on my language gcse (even though i achieved a 9 in the mocks💔) which is a little heartbreaking, but oh. well. own fault. that brought my alice grades down. so if anyone feels like giving advice... how would you reccomend going from an A to A*??

this is très fun. loving seeing all the responses! & very very sorry if this wasn't on par with the formal tone. oops. (did it again).

have a productive week,
Appollo'sceptre

Reply 32

Original post
by jk_202
Hi, I'm Year 13 OCR
Doing -

Frankenstein & The Bloody Chamber,

The Merchant's Tale and An Ideal Husband

Hamlet

For coursework I'm doing The World's Wife, A Streetcar Named Desire and A Thousand Splendid Suns

I'm trying to achieve an A but on B or C. If anyone is on the same boat, it would be gladly appreciated if we can share ideas, materials or just have discussions together. Thank you!

FRANKENSTEIN???? HAMLET????
you are a very lucky person indeed. how are you finding englit now, in year 13? do you have a favourite aspect/genre?

definitely - also trying to reach higher grades. hmmm some advice... a teacher told me what apparently sets apart an A* student to a B student is consistency. that's not fun because how can you enjoy something when it's forced time??? OH for materials i belive oxford is releasing new Shakespeare publications, giving webinars to celebrate each one. may be of use? would love to discuss this too 😌

Reply 33

Original post
by Blinkr
Welcome to the A-Level English Literature Study Group!

This thread is a place you can connect with fellow students who are also studying English Literature at A-Level. Here we offer a space to support each other support as you prepare for your exams/coursework.
Feel free to share any helpful tips, resources, or advice you find along the way, and share any questions you have about the subject.
Help encourage others, celebrate your achievements, or simply vent when things get a bit overwhelming!
Lil serious note - just a reminder please be aware that sharing or requesting copyrighted materials is against our community guidelines, and moving conversations off-site for this purpose is not allowed. Posts violating these rules will be taken down.
To get started, here are a few questions to break the ice:

Which exam board are you following?

What do you enjoy the most about this subject or course?

What topics within A-Level English Literature do you find most challenging/interesting?


im in y13 and take aqa A B :smile:
i do othello, gatsby and aqa pre-1900 anthology for p1 and then streetcar, handmaids and feminine gospels for p2 !

im currently struggling at it tho icl i just did some mocks and fear they did not go well

Reply 34

Original post
by jk_202
Hi, I'm Year 13 OCR
Doing -

Frankenstein & The Bloody Chamber,

The Merchant's Tale and An Ideal Husband

Hamlet

For coursework I'm doing The World's Wife, A Streetcar Named Desire and A Thousand Splendid Suns

I'm trying to achieve an A but on B or C. If anyone is on the same boat, it would be gladly appreciated if we can share ideas, materials or just have discussions together. Thank you!


Exemplars can be really helpful, google scholar for all papers and YouTube

Reply 35

Hi all -

Anyone interested in study buddying / group?

Thanks!

Appollo'sceptre

Reply 36

Original post
by Blinkr
Welcome to the A-Level English Literature Study Group!

This thread is a place you can connect with fellow students who are also studying English Literature at A-Level. Here we offer a space to support each other support as you prepare for your exams/coursework.
Feel free to share any helpful tips, resources, or advice you find along the way, and share any questions you have about the subject.
Help encourage others, celebrate your achievements, or simply vent when things get a bit overwhelming!
Lil serious note - just a reminder please be aware that sharing or requesting copyrighted materials is against our community guidelines, and moving conversations off-site for this purpose is not allowed. Posts violating these rules will be taken down.
To get started, here are a few questions to break the ice:

Which exam board are you following?

What do you enjoy the most about this subject or course?

What topics within A-Level English Literature do you find most challenging/interesting?


I’m in Year 13!
Doing Eduqas,
I like Faustus Enron
And I find Yeats and Abse most challenging

Reply 37

Just sharing the link to the post I made today. Check it out if you would like some support in reviewing your essays, for free. 🙂

https://www.thestudentroom.co.uk/showthread.php?t=7583418
(edited 7 months ago)

Reply 38

Original post
by Apollo'sceptre
FRANKENSTEIN???? HAMLET????
you are a very lucky person indeed. how are you finding englit now, in year 13? do you have a favourite aspect/genre?
definitely - also trying to reach higher grades. hmmm some advice... a teacher told me what apparently sets apart an A* student to a B student is consistency. that's not fun because how can you enjoy something when it's forced time??? OH for materials i belive oxford is releasing new Shakespeare publications, giving webinars to celebrate each one. may be of use? would love to discuss this too 😌
Are Frankenstein and Hamlet seen as easy texts???
I think the Gothic is definitely very interesting to me, but scoring a higher grade is another issue. It's so hard for me to get the gist of it but that might just be me. And one more funny thing is that somehow I find Frankenstein's written style very hard to read or remember. I like the themes explored but I just don't like the way Shelley wrote it, if you get what I mean.
I also like Hamlet because I find him a little relatable, I don't know why some people see him as this lazy and cowardly character. I just think that his concerns are very valid.
The other texts are fine but I don't particularly like them.
Consistency...I have a little more than one month left so I don't know if that'll work out.
Thank you for the advice though - it's very much appreciated

Reply 39

Hi I'm in year 12 and I'm doing King Lear, Death of a Salesman, and Keats' poetry for AQA
I'm starting to make revision materials for English since my mocks are coming up and I was wondering how many quotes should I learn? For this set of mocks I'm only doing one paper so it's just the texts I mentioned earlier.

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