Hello and welcome to this new video series made specifically for those resitting their
AQA English exams in October and November this year.
For the next ten days I’ll be making one video per day.
I’ll take you through the questions one by one, focusing on the key weaknesses picked
up in the summer 2022 exam reports.
We’re starting off with AQA English Language Paper 1 Question 1, which is a fairly simple
question intended to ease students into the exam.
Question 1 asks you to list four things about a certain topic from a certain part of the
source.
So far this has been between 4 and 9 lines from the opening of the source, so a relatively
short section of the text, and questions might revolve around character, or perhaps setting.
The summer 2022 question actually focused on two things.
This question assesses the first part of Ao1: to identify and interpret explicit and implicit
information and ideas.
Let’s look at a typical question, based on the sample paper which you can download
free through following the link in the description.
Read again the first part of the source, from lines 1 to 7.
List four things about Brightly from this part of the source.
[4 marks] So the first thing to say, is that students
often lose marks for writing about the wrong part of the text (in other words, not choosing
their answers from within lines 1-7).
This might seem like a simple mistake, but do not underestimate the pressure you can
feel, particularly at the start of the exam.
The Summer 2022 exam reports did point this out as a common error.
A simple tip here is to draw a box around the part of the text you’re being asked
to take your answers from.
Just make sure you do that carefully, and don’t strike through any actual lines of
text in the source, because you’re going to need to look back at this opening part
of the text when you’re working on question 3, and you don’t want to find that you can’t
read some of the words.
The main thing for this question is to keep it simple.
You should find four simple points for your answer.
You can write in your own words, or take a direct quotation from the text, either way
making it clear that you are answering the question.
Also, you could use the wording of the question to help focus on the task and avoid writing
about the wrong thing, so in this case you might start each answer with the word e.g.
Brightly or he
So let’s look through the lines in question, and pick out four simple points:
‘Up the road from Brentor to St. Mary Tavy came Brightly, his basket dragging on his
arm.
He was very tired but there was nothing unusual in that.
He was tired to the point of exhaustion every day.
He was very hungry, but he was used to that too.
He was thinking of bread and cheese and cider; new bread and soft cheese, and cider with
a rough edge to it.
He licked his lips, and tried to believe he was tasting them.
Then he began to cough.
It was a long, heaving cough, something like that of a Dartmoor pony.
He had to put his basket down and lean over it, and tap at his thin chest with a long
raw hand.’
So, using Brightly as our sentence openings, let’s pick four simple points about his
character: Brightly was tired
Brightly was hungry Brightly was thinking about bread and cheese
and cider Brightly licked his lips
And that’s it: simple as that!
Full marks!
Now the examiners’ reports have continually pointed out that simply retrieving information
from the text, as I’ve just done there, CAN lead to better results than trying to
interpret that information.
In other words, students who try to draw an inference from a point often get that inference
wrong and aren’t credited with any marks.
Let’s look at an example: In the extract, Brightly coughs.
Some students might infer from this that he is sick and write ‘Brightly was sick’,
but that wouldn’t be awarded any marks.
It’s not a fair interpretation, as coughing is a bodily function and not necessarily indicative
of sickness.
The 2022 exam report highlighted how trying to infer in question 1 can lead to straying
from the focus of the question, so just keep it simple for question 1.
Another common mistake is to slightly misread the text.
For example, in the sentence ‘he licked his lips, and tried to believe he was tasting
them.’, a misreading could see a student write ‘he tried to believe he was tasting
his lips’.
But of course, that’s not correct.
What Brightly tries to believe he is tasting is the bread and cheese and cider of the previous
sentence.
Again, misreading was a common mistake in the summer 2022 exams.
And this is easy to understand: it's the first question in your exam, the adrenaline is pumping
– it’s easy to misread something.
So, follow my three main tips: pick four explicit, simple points for your
answer.
Don’t overcomplicate through trying to infer or analyse.
Use the wording of the question to ensure your answers are on topic
And draw a box around the section of the text you’re directed to, to make sure you take
your points from within the right lines.
If you found this video useful and want more in this November resit series, please give
it a thumbs up and subscribe to the channel.