Tip For Gcse English Language Success Using The Literature Course

Too often students view the English Language and Literature GCSEs as entirely separate: an understandable, yet unhelpful outlook. Below are some tips to help you recognise and utilise some of the links between the two GCSE exams and papers.

For your Literature exam, you will obviously be required to study 3 texts plus an anthology of poetry. For the Language exam, you will be exposed to 4 unseen texts - 2 fictional extracts in one exam, and 2 non-fiction excerpts in the other. The emphasis is on identifying and analysing features of language which have an effect on the reader.

For the Language exam, you can use the extensive knowledge and skills you have built up analysing your set texts in your Literature studies to form a basis from which to `unpick` the unseen texts and get to the heart of the extracts straight away.

Step 1: The answer is in the question (kind of)...if you look through a range of exam questions (like us teachers do!) you begin to notice that many of the questions on the paper give you clues / guidance on how to `read` the extracts. For example, take this modified question from an unnamed Language (Fiction) exam about a fictional extract:

"How does the writer use language and structure to present the women`s increasing joy at the thought of their party?'

As long as you don`t fall prey to skim-reading this question under exam pressure, you will notice that the examiner clearly wants you to use your answer to explain how their joy builds from the beginning of the extract and is intensified at the end - this is basically your answer! You just then need to find at least 2 good quotations to support the lack of joy from the beginning and one to show their intense joy at the end, and focus on the key words!

Here`s another example: "Explore how the writer presents the girls` game of hunting pigeons."

Now I know from having actually marked this paper, and my students having sat it, that it is not immediately obvious that the hunting of the pigeons is actually a game, due to the use of metaphor comparing it to a real-life hunt. HOWEVER if you READ the question carefully it clearly labels it as a game, and is therefore prompting you to try and analyse the fun and joy to be had by the girls in this game, as opposed to taking the `hunt` too literally - a point missed by many students when sitting this exam paper.

Step 2: ALWAYS read `the blurb` before the unseen texts, I.e. the bit in italics at the top of the page.

- TIME: What century was this written in? Is this during the same time of any of your studied Literature texts? If so, how might this inform your reading of the themes, viewpoints and ideas in the unseen text? I.e. is it a modern, progressive take on women for a 20th Century text? Or, is the narrator blatantly showing a backwards and sexist attitude towards women, given the text was written in the modernistic 21st Century? Use your base knowledge of the time the text was written to understand what the writer wants you to think/feel.

-GENRE: What appears to be the genre of both texts? Dystopian? Fantasy? Crime? Tales from childhood? Are there any similarities with the unseen texts and your studied Literature texts, which might help you to understand WHY the author makes certain choices in their presentation of setting/character/themes/ideas in the short extracts?

Step 3: LOCATE the extract structurally (for fiction texts, mainly - although can work for biography/ autobiography). The fiction extracts can be quite bewildering in that they will be a randomised section of a completely unseen fiction text and you not only have to try and contextualise what`s happening, but also answer a set of increasingly demanding questions on the text. A good 3rd step is to try and figure out where the text is from - does it sound like the beginning, where character / setting is being established? Or, is it a dramatic, climactic part that seems to be at the heart of the action? Or, are mysteries being resolved - indicating some sort of ending? Locating where the text is from could help you to decide what effect the writer is trying to create as often (but not always):

- Beginnings are designed to create mystery & establish character and setting and create a certain mood / the `status quo` of the story to allow a contrast later on. For example, the use of soft, pink lighting at the beginning of `An Inspector Calls` through stage directions creates a sense of illusion associated with the Birlings` denial / the placement of animals in the barn at the beginning of Animal Farm reveals the hierarchy on the farm.

-Middle of stories are moments of high tension, drama, conflict between characters/ environment, climax, reveals or a change in fortune for a character(s), e.g. the battle of the Windmill in Animal Farm / murder of Banquo in Macbeth.

-Endings are full of resolutions or, conversely, & NOT so (cliff hangers), a change in tone, revealing of deeper `meanings` or `messages` / a `winding down`, restoration of order or establishing of the new `status quo`, e.g. The emphasis on Scrooge`s changed appearance and behaviour at the end of A Christmas Carol to show his transformation.

Try and get to THE HEART of what the extract is doing overall - is it leaving the reader with unanswered questions? Is it making us fear for the protagonist? Explain this, using quotations to support your response.

Step 4: Finally, show some enthusiasm (or fake it `till you make it!). Your examiners are probably English experts who will want to see you engage with the exam and the reading material, or at least appear to be enjoying the exam process! How do you do this? Show appreciation of the writers` craft. Adverbs like `skilfully` / `cleverly` / `interestingly` really help to elevate your response and make it sound more enthusiastic to read!

E.g. "The writer skilfully creates tension in this effective ending to his story when X is used..."/ "The author effectively uses the features of the gothic genre to...'

Hope this helps!