KS4: English Language Revision

Dear Parents, Guardians and Students,

Many thanks for taking the time to visit this very useful page. You are one step closer to being adequately prepared to succeed in your English examinations. You will find lots of very useful documents, information and links to aid revision here, but please do not hesitate to speak to your English teachers as well regarding any specific revision support you need.

Because the course is now 100% exam, students are expected to revise throughout the course using online and hard copy guides and resources as recommended by their class teacher. This revision is in addition to any set homework/revision. As we cover more aspects of the course, the number of elements students need to revise adds up. At this stage, students have covered the following sections and should be revising them:

Paper 1 English Language
Paper 2 English Language

How can parents and guardians help?

Where possible, we encourage students to invest in their own copy of the text so that they can write on it, highlight key quotations and read and reread throughout the course.
Make sure your youngster is signed up to and using Seneca.
Encourage students to create a revision timetable for each component.
If students have revision guides, encourage them to use them.
Work your way through this page with your youngster and make sure they are accessing these resources. Students can submit any work they have completed at home to their teacher to mark and grade.
Online sites such as Shmoop and BBC Bitesize have general revision on all components.
Visit Mr Bruff revision sessions on Youtube for all components.

If in doubt, get in touch! Good luck in the examinations to you all.

Alice Hawkins
Head of English

Seneca:
Follow the below link, which will take you to the Seneca login page. Your youngster’s teachers should have set up a collection of units for their classes so that when they login these are now displayed on their home page of Seneca. Your youngster’s teachers will have sent your youngster a link to these specific classes via Class Charts.

Seneca truly is an invaluable resource, in each class there will be a collection of units on each of the topics studied in Language and Literature. Students need to work their way through the units, where they will be exposed to vital information as well as tested on it. This will help them to know the examinations and texts really well and also help them understand where their weakest areas are.

Please make sure your youngster is set up on Seneca as a matter of urgency, and contact their English teacher directly if there are any issues with this. Please encourage your youngster to be accessing Seneca several times a week – particularly to revise the Literature texts.

app.senecalearning.com/login

Year 11 are preparing for the AQA English Language GCSE examinations. They will sit two examinations that are both 1 hour and 45 minutes long.

GCSE English Language Paper 1 – Question Guidance

General tips

Take four different colour highlighters into the exam with you.
Take a cheap digital watch with a stopwatch (not a smart watch!).
As soon as the exam starts, write down key timings: start time + 35mins = start Q4; start time +1hour = start Q5.
Make sure that you move onto Q4 and Q5 no later than these timings.
Use any time you have left at the end of the exam to add to questions you had to rush and to check SPaG for Q5.
Read the question and highlight the key words
Read the text and highlight anything that can help you answer the question

Question 1

Keep it simple – stick to the exact wording from the extract where possible.
Start each point with the focus of the question e.g. if you’re being asked to pick out information about ‘the man’, start each point with ‘the man’ or ‘he’.
Write in sentences rather than fragments e.g. ‘The man is tired’ rather than ‘tired’.
If you have more than four points, feel free to quickly add a fifth or sixth below.

Question 2

In this question, you are assessed on your ability to explain the effect of language in detail.
For higher marks, explain the effect of language in more detail, and more precisely.
The bullet points say ‘could’. You don’t have to discuss them all. Better analysis tends to come from detailed explanations of words and techniques (especially figurative language) than from discussions of sentence structure.
When analysing language, consider the context it is being used in. The word ‘green’ could be positive when describing nature, but negative when describing someone’s complexion; sibilance (a hissing sound) doesn’t automatically relate to snakes.
Use quotes.
Select your quotes wisely – some language (e.g. metaphors, similes, personification) can provide language rich for analysis; other quotes will give you less to say.
Use terminology where you can; if you don’t know the technique being used to create an effect, but can explain the effect, write about it anyway.

Possible structures to use:

Particularly useful concepts/terminology:

Metaphor, Simile, personification, figurative language, semantic field, symbolism

Possible structures to use:

Question 3

The bullet points for this question can be quite useful as framework for your answer.
This question is asking you about whole text structure. You get no marks for discussing sentence structure.
You DO get marks for discussing the effect of structure i.e. explaining why the information in the text has been organised in the order that it has: what happens where and why.
Make sure you discuss how the text interests a reader (even if you don’t find it interesting personally).
It might help you to use boxes and arrows to help you identify the structure. Put boxes around similar sections (e.g. a character being established) and arrows to show where changes occur/where the ending links back to something earlier on.
It might help you to quickly sketch the structure of the text using boxes and arrows (this will help you structure your response).
Make sure you give yourself time to discuss the whole text e.g. beginning, middle and end. Don’t spend all your time discussing the beginning.
Always look for a change in tone (a tonal shift), a change in focus (a focus shift) or a change of ideas.
Always look for patterns in the text and how different parts relate to each other.
Always think about how the end relates to the beginning/earlier parts of the text. Does the end take us back to the beginning to suggest that nothing/something has changed? Are we able to now understand or re-evaluate early parts of the text in the light of what we’ve learnt later on?

Particularly useful concepts/terminology:

(Non-) chronological, foreshadowing, flashback, transition, contrast, cyclical, narrative perspective, focus, beginning/middle/end, shift (tonal, idea, focus), establishing (character, setting, mood, tone, atmosphere, intrigue, mystery, tension, an idea), developing (character, setting, mood, tone, atmosphere, intrigue, mystery, tension, an idea)

Question 4

In this question, you have to respond to a statement about the text.
You can get most of your marks for this question by just explaining whether you agree with the statement and why you think this (using evidence from the text to back up your argument).
There’s no expectation that you will agree with the statement. You may completely agree, partially agree, partially disagree or completely disagree – as long as you can back your ideas up with evidence from the text.
Be aware that there may be more than one part to the statement. For example, it might say that ‘The woman is hated by all around her and they are right to dislike her.’ There are two opinions being expressed here: that the woman is hated by all around her; and that they are right to dislike her.
Plan before writing
Feel free to respond to the different parts of the statement in different ways. For example, you might agree that the woman is hated by all around her, but partially disagree that they are right to dislike her.
Whatever opinions you express, make sure that you back them up with evidence (quotes) and a clear and detailed explanation of how your quotes support your point.
The second most important part of this question is discussing the HOW the writer has used techniques to give you this impression e.g. the methods (techniques) the writer has used to suggest that everyone hates the woman.
These methods could be language, structure choice of content – anything at all.
Analyse these methods in the same way you would in Q2 or Q3.
If you can’t see many methods – don’t worry! You can get a huge number of marks by discussing whether you agree with the statement and why. Although you should always try to include quality discussion of methods, don’t let it stop you writing about the statement.

Possible structures to use:

I partially/mostly/completely agree with the statement because…
I partially/mostly/completely disagree with the statement because…
Even though…
Despite…
Although…

Particularly useful terminology:
See terminology for Q2 and Q3.

Question 5

Plan before writing.
Aim to interest your reader with your writing. The more engaging it is, the more highly it will score.
Don’t try to include too many events or characters in your writing. Focus on quality rather than quantity.
Think about the ways other writers structure their writing (e.g. in Q3). Use these techniques in your own writing.
In particular, try to include a shift (e.g. a tonal shift) and make your ending link back to the beginning (returning us to the start, causing us to re-evaluate the start etc.).
It may help you to draw a quick sketch of your structure when planning to help with this.
Your writing needs to go somewhere – just focusing one thing, then another thing, then another thing can be quite dull (e.g. I can see, I can hear, I can smell). Your description/narrative needs to feel like it’s building towards something (just like the examples of texts you see in Q3).
Always write in paragraphs. Paragraphs should be linked so that they flow (e.g. using adverbials). A single sentence paragraph for impact can be particularly effective.
Use effective words and techniques to enhance your writing (just as you have seen other writers do).
Your spelling, punctuation and grammar should be the best you can manage (so no silly mistakes with capitals etc.).
Be ambitious in your use of punctuation (e.g. using semicolons, colons, dashes etc.)
Use a range of sentence structures.

Possible planning structure:

Language Paper 2 Writers’ Viewpoints and Perspectives Section

A: Reading Q1: True / False statements (5 mins)

Shade in the four correct statements

Q2: Write a summary... (10 mins)

Compare the sources, summarising the explicit and implicit ideas

Q3: How does the writer use language (15 mins)

Focus on one source.
Comment on the writer’s methods, explaining how they want to make the reader Feel, Imagine or Think (F.I.T.)

Q4: Compare different perspectives / viewpoints (20 mins)

How do their viewpoints / perspectives compare / contrast? Why?
What methods do the writers use to convey their viewpoint / perspective?
What implicit viewpoints / perspectives are there?

Section B: Writing Q5:
Write about your own views (50 mins: 5 mins planning + 40mins writing + 5 mins checking)

You will be asked to write your own views on a given subject.
You will have to express your views in the form of a newspaper article, a speech, a letter, or another genre.

Be sure that you...

know the difference between the two papers
know the timings for each question

Useful links for paper 1 and paper 2:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=1J2ZE32oIwA
www.youtube.com/watch?v=h0gDzLhfxRI
www.youtube.com/watch?v=TsNbIIz2zqg
www.youtube.com/watch?v=GeLS4hgfIzY
www.youtube.com/watch?v=uM_0PshTEjs
www.youtube.com/watch?v=AA5mT6xjQ-A
www.youtube.com/watch?v=SivUhpdPOAg
www.youtube.com/watch?v=j6vbvss1rxM
www.youtube.com/watch?v=o7zwS8RyTI0
www.youtube.com/watch?v=n-4cXvVO1Zs
www.youtube.com/watch?v=SivUhpdPOAg

You can find all of the English Language AQA past papers if you follow the below link – this will be useful as you can use these to practise answering real exam questions.
www.aqa.org.uk/subjects/english/gcse/english-language-8700/assessment-resources