[Section 3a. What were some of the things which impressed you about the best responses
– are there any characteristics that they have in common?]
[Tom] Well we saw some really excellent responses last year that we were very happy to give
full marks to. Those were the kinds of answers where the student obviously had confidence
in what they were doing. They showed you as you read through their answer, they knew where
they were going, they knew how to handle the poetry, they could explain things by quoting
plenty of text and illustrating what was going on there and how their thinking was developing.
They knew how to integrate the two poems, comparing them side by side in a truly integrated
way. That's obviously important for this particular part of the paper, it's absolutely crucial
that you're able to balance those two poems. All of that obviously showed they'd been taught
really well. Some students weren’t so successful, we're going to look at some examples later,
but they basically didn’t do so well the kinds of things I’ve just talked about.
They've tended to make general statements, they didn’t support themselves by quoting
in a detailed way from the text but tended to rely on just saying that's what it did.
[Section 3b. Is there just one way to achieve at the higher end of the mark scheme?]
[Tom] Well it would be great, wouldn’t it, if I could say to you “yes there is, and
if you just follow the instructions we're going to give you now you will get there”.
But of course that's just not true. There are lots of ways of achieving a good answer.
What we're looking for is your evaluation, your response to these poems. You show us
what you can do, what you’ve understood about these poems, and convince us by using
the text to make those points. That's what we're looking for. If you look at the marking
grid that comes with the examination paper and the results and everything, you'll see
that it uses some words like these: “a critical and evaluative argument with sustained textual
features”. So that word “evaluative” means you need to be weighing things up, perhaps
thinking “well, I could read it this way, but actually when I think again, it could
be read a different way as well”. In other words, you’re still thinking about it, you're
not looking for one right answer. [Section 3c. Extract 1.] [Student voice speaking]
Both poets examine relationships between parents and children in an emotive, beautiful way.
In “Genetics”, the bond between parent and child is preserved within the narrator's
body, showing in the beginning line "my father's in my fingers, but my mother's in my palms”.
The title itself, “Genetics”, connotes ideas of love and inheritance as the parents
pass on their characteristics through their DNA to their child.
[Section 3d. Tom’s response] [Tom] So that's a really confident assured
opening, there's a clear sense of “I understand this poem, I know where I’m going to go
with it, and also I’ve not missed the fact that the title there can tell me something”.
A lot of students actually don’t realise the title of a poem is very important and
can tell you a lot about what's going to come. And then they move on almost immediately to
talk about the unseen poem. [Section 3e. Extract 2]
[Student voice speaking] Within “When Six O’clock Comes”, though
it is not clear, I get the sense that the narrator is the motherly figure of the new-born
child. There is an instant connection, a certain bond, revealed in the line: “the baby who
cannot speak, speaks to me”. This is a strange, ambiguous line.
[Section 3f. Tom’s response] [Tom] So this is a student who's not afraid
of the tentative personal response. And especially at the beginning of a poem, as you're working
into reading it, that's perfectly valid, and it's immediately supported by an extract from
the text, so I can see exactly what they're talking about.
[Section 3g. Extract 3] [Student voice speaking]The hands become a
recurring motif, symbolising the bond between parent and child. The poem starts with the
poem saying “I know my parents made me by my hands”, and ends with a subtly modified
version, “we know our parents make us by our hands”. Through the change in personal
pronouns from “I” and “me” to “we” and “our”, there is a sense of journeying
in the poem. The ending is suggestive of a love poem, as the focus no longer seems to
be on the narrator and their parents, but on a new relationship, as she begins a persuasive
argument, perhaps addressing a lover, “so take me with you”.
[Section 3h. Tom’s response] [Tom] OK, so the student's now moving on to
look at “Genetics”, really exploring in detail. Has picked on things like hands, which
gives them a nice link to the unseen poem. They’ve seen that that very simple shift
between “we” and “I” transforms the poem. Surprisingly, a lot of students miss
this, and that's a key detail that shows the poem being changed in a really significant
way. And the student was also equally astute when they went on to talk about the unseen
poem. For example, she quotes, she says this: “there's a slightly comedic element of the
baby's previous inability to hold her head, with a comparison to a drunk person who flails
about, unable to control themselves”. Now less thoughtful readers I think immediately
thought that was literally true, the parents were alcoholics, they didn’t see that this
was a metaphor and really intended to have a slightly jokey effect. I hope now that this
just shows you that the approaches that we’ve talked about already can actually inform the
way that you’re going to write about the poem in the exam.