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How help DS revise English?!

12 replies

goodnessmeandgosh · 15/04/2024 07:56

Hello, my son is fairly bright but cannot get his head around English nat 5. He can’t see how to revise and finds the subject too vague so he can’t see how to answer the questions to get points.
ive suggested he learns a few quotes but he can’t see which ones to learn as he doesn’t know what the question will be.
please has anyone any tips?

OP posts:
MillsAndBalloons · 15/04/2024 08:07

Hiya

You can get Nat 5 English past papers and practise papers with answers online for a few quid each. My daughter used them when she was sitting her English.

Mrsjayy · 15/04/2024 08:11

I second getting past papers and do them my dc are older they did standard grades so the curriculum is obviously different but past papers is a good start. Also does his school run study groups?

HummingbirdChandelier · 15/04/2024 08:13

Ask his teacher. My DS is given style answers to all the questions, so much so it takes the joy out of literature, but passes exams

Lidlfix · 15/04/2024 08:18

There are YouTube tutorials on the most commonly taught Scottish Texts and RUAE question types that my class quite liked as a wee change from traditional flash cards etc.

The Understanding Standards section of the SQA website is really helpful for him to see why an essay gets a really good mark or why it scrapes a pass.

What's his texts - happy to send you anything I have ?

Curtainconundrum · 15/04/2024 08:33

I've been having this issue with my ds and history GCSE. We've been looking at past papers and then going through the mark scheme to understand what they are looking for, which he has found helpful. We also found a test walkthrough on YouTube which explained how the tutor was approaching the questions. I wonder if there's similar for his exams.

Misthios · 15/04/2024 08:39

Agree with the above advice about practising the techniques for RUAE and looking at videos for his set texts. DS is also doing Nat 5 English and other essay based subjects and has had the "command words" drilled into him - knowing exactly what is expected depending on whether the question says explain, discuss, evaluate etc.

Blanketpolicy · 15/04/2024 19:08

Its a couple of years since ds did NAT5 so I might get some bits confused with Higher.

RUAE -

He needs to know all his different language techniques for sentence structure, imagery, tone etc inside out and get good at finding and explaining them etc. ds created mind maps in powerpoint when he did his. I might still have them somewhere if you want to DM me you email address I can send over.

Practice as many past papers as he can get his hands on and carefully read the marking instructions to see where he could have gained extra points. DS also worked through some practice questions in revision guides - the brightred English Coursebook was good for this, but probably too late to order/work through at this stage.

Critical Essay -

ds's school got them to write essay plans/bullet points with - an introduction and 4-5 paragraphs + conclusion for each type of question - setting, character, (can't remember what other types of questions there were), memorise them, and practice manipulating them to various questions in past papers. This is difficult as he can't really mark yourself, but he should get a good feel of if he is recalling his memorised plans and could ask the teacher to have a look over a couple to see if he is on the right track.

Scottish Text -

A lot of this is similar to RUAE, it depends what his texts are, ds had poetry so he had to pull together themes across different poems, some key lines for themes, and memorise them and then practice questions.

English was also a subject ds found it helped to talk through with someone to bounce ideas off and give him some direction. That was tough as I am very much like ds - logically minded so we tried to take a logical approach to preparing for the English exam and it worked once we got started on it.

Good luck! It is a difficult subject to work out "how" and "what" to revise.

goodnessmeandgosh · 17/04/2024 06:20

This is so helpful, thank you all. Poor lad has got such a mental block about the whole thing.
he’s doing The History Boys, which isn’t the best of books!
Thank you all

OP posts:
YouBelongWithMe · 20/04/2024 19:16

He will have two texts (a critical essay text) and another for Scottish Set Text.

Other than the essay, the other two components have fairly formulaic layouts.

My N5s found this helpful for RUAE this year (I had a supported set). I can send as a PDF if helpful

How help DS revise English?!
motheronthedancefloor · 21/04/2024 07:31

Could he watch the film
(I'm sure there's a film), years ago I found watching sunset sing helped me to "get it"

goodnessmeandgosh · 21/04/2024 10:52

they saw it at school. He doesn’t want to rewatch.
its all about the louche boys telling the teacher he’ll f him if he wants. I’m sure it was very clever in its day, but now it seems disturbing.
either times have changed or I have .

OP posts:
Misthios · 21/04/2024 10:56

DS has a quite old school teacher and is doing An Inspector Calls which is what I did for O Grade in 1988... He has quite enjoyed it though. They are also doing the Nelson Mandela autobiography but haven't read the whole thing, just sections/chapters I think. And Jackie Kay poetry which he loathes but does understand.

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