9 in english lang/lit

Hi,
I am currently in Year 10 on track for a 6 in English Lit and Lang but would really want to get 9s in English.
Does anyone have any tips on getting 9s in Lit and Lang, what did you do, how did you prepare etc.

Reply 1

Brownies1234

I've been using the Lightup Hub to improve my English grades and I got an 8 in my last essay - It is paid though and it doesn't offer all GCSE texts so you may need to weigh up the pros and cons - would highly recommend though it gives u grade 9 analysis and advice on exam technique for both lit/lang

(edited 2 months ago)

Reply 2

emo_ernie2

respect but my english teacher actually strongly advises against lightup hub, analysis is too deep and teaches you lots of extra fancy words. i am getting high 8s (up from low 7s) and i use mr bruff and mr salles on youtube as i find them really helpful.

also make your own mindmaps for each poem and for your texts, do one for each theme, for each character etc - making them yourself is super super helpful because you tend to remember it more! only learn 5-7 poems in thorough detail, the rest just a general outline will do.

don't spend *too* much time fussing over memorising loads of quotes. in my lit mock before christmas i knew about 3 macbeth quotes and 2 from christmas carol and still got an 8. the specification/mark scheme looks for references to the text - using quotes really helps with this as you can analyse the language, but if not there is still plenty to talk about in terms of structure, form, characters, themes...
(deffo worth remembering more for your modern prose - inspector calls, jekyll hyde for example - as you don't get extracts with these!)

for language, past papers past papers and more past papers. look into how the mark scheme works, how the exams are structured (make sure to look at the right spec because the paper is changing after this year). also, reading more from other books, fiction and non-fiction, can help you with the extract questions but also will allow you to see different techniques you could use in your 40-mark responses.

of course i'm not on 9s just yet but i've improved so much from a year ago (in y11 now) so i hope you find this advice helpful!

Reply 3

username7449149

watch mr salles
try and come up with your own interpretations of the text
with language, just spam past papers

Reply 4

aditya nair12344

literally i was in the same boat as you when i was in year 10 ,( i am in year 12 now) literally didn't know how i could improve my english grades, i tried everything and no matter how much effort i put in i used to get 4, 5 or 6, after what i did to improve for english lit is literally watch Mr salles, Mr everything english, first rate tutors on youtube they where literally life savers , like i loved Mr everything englishs' paragraph structure ( PRETZEL) point, reference(quote), explain, techniques used (similes, metaphor etc.), zoom, choose one word to zoom into , explain the word, and then link back to the question this paragraph structure meant if i followed it i would be hitting every point on the mark scheme it is literally a cheat sheet. And then watch them all on YouTube on their videos on best quotes to use and note down their analysis to them as their analysis are normally really good , learn like 3 quotes per character make sure the quotes are really good quotes, quotes that link to a character and a theme so that mean if the question is on a theme you dont have to learn separate quotes for a theme you can use one of the quotes you have for the characters, make sure to use technical words in your writing like soliloquy and iambic pentameter and things and also comment on why the author chose that particular structure, like to foreshadow something later in the play for example. And for poems learns the poems well, learn a few quotes per poem and make sure to learn structure points for each poem like for example if the poet has used a volta what this poem techniques does and if it doesn't rhyme for example to show how if the poem is on the theme of love the poem is like disjointed and breaking up and their is not clarity in their relationship like the poem.
i am not very good at lang( i only got a 6, because English is my second language) i got a 9 in lit.
hope this helps.
i know that a lot, thanks for reading !
anything else feel free to ask ! :woo:

Reply 5

daxax50

Original post by brash-airliner

Have you tried checking top marked essays from tilf website? Or even without doing it yourself, they have a bunch of top grades essays , you can check what makes them good and make your own model answers like this one https://tilf.io/evaluations/67b4d1f8abffb3581325dfe6