English literature

[kowari]

DS (year 10) is struggling with English lit and none of it makes any sense to me either. Are they meant to just somehow understand what it all means or symbolises and so on, or is everyone just memorising what they are told it means in class or in the study guide like I did at school? We are both avid readers but hopeless at English, I got a C in GCSE English equivalent. I don't know how to help him.

Study guides may help, they kind of show you how to look deeper into whatever play/book/poem. With examples. I bought them for my daughter when she was doing her gcses. I don't think they were too expensive.(I remember using something similar when I did o levels many moons ago, using the biology one was the only way I passed);)

I've bought DS the study guide for the book he's doing at the moment. They didn't help me beyond memorising though, I had no idea where to start with questions that weren't similar to what we had already done in class or that were in the guide.

What board is he doing? If you have a look at the past papers and mark schemes, also exam feedback, it will give you a good idea.

What examiners want is that the student knows the text. So for the Shakespeare, what happens and in what order. You don't tell the story in your essay, but you need to know "just before this scene, Romeo has declared his love for Juliet".

It's not about loads of quotes, more about short quotes that are relevant to the theme and what point you are making. Also make use of the extract you are given.

What books is he doing? If he is struggling with the text itself, try things like drawing up a timeline of what happens and when, then lists of characters and who does what. That will help give it a bit of context.

If my DS's GCSEs hadn't been cancelled, he was very much going to memorise lots of stuff to regurgitate in an exam. He quite enjoyed reading the texts, but found the analysis very tedious and was clueless as to how to answer in a way that would get him marks in an exam.

He worked on creating character summaries, theme summaries and learning quotes to support both. Then in theory you are in a position to answer any question that comes up.

I'm sure that's not the "proper" answer, but might be the pragmatic one if he's only looking to scrape a pass.

I think it's WJEC?

I don't think he has a problem with the reading part, he was assessed as having a reading age of 16 in year 8 and has been reading adult sci fi since he was 10. He spends most of his waking hours reading when he isn't at school.

He showed me some of the questions he was supposed to answer for English today. He doesn't know where to start with half of them. It just seems so impossibly hard compared to maths and science. He has a target of a 4.

He's doing A Christmas Carol, before that was poems, he'll be doing Romeo and Juliet and Lord of the Flies.

@RedskyAtnight
That's what I think DS will have to do. I think I just wrote everything vaguely related that came into my head and hoped some of it was 'right' as I had no idea.

It is helpful to read the mark scheme, I haven’t but DD seems to have been told about it by her school. She gets tips after she hands in home work from her teacher about how to get the next grade up. Humour, reference to other texts, quotes, use of a verity of techniques from similie to empathy, finding common themes, context etc.

I can only talk about AQA specifically but all the boards examine the same skills in different configurations. 1. The What: show understanding of the content to answer the question e.g. How is the Cratchit Family presented? They are shown as poor. Use quotation to support this. Comment on how the quotation/ textual detail shows this. Frequent use of quotation is important - at least one in each paragraph. 2. The How: comment on methods used to show they are poor. This might be at word level ie an adjective used, technique level- such as a metaphor or a symbol or a more structural mehod such as character contrast
(Bob's character is used to contrast Scrooge's - the penny pinching miser vs. the penniless clerk). There should be some consideration of method in every point ( point = paragraph). Subject terminology should be used and is assessed but more important in terms of skill level is clear explanation of the use of the method and how it creates the meaning for the reader. 3. The Why: Comment on theme and/ or context e.g. What was Dickens exploring/ asking the reader to consider, ie the importance of family unity and love ( theme) over material acquisition. Why did he explore this: his concern over the plight of the poor in Victorian England. At the end of each paragraph ( point), try to link to a contextual detail. Precise factual details are good. This essentially illuminates why Dickens might have created the character in the first place.
Look to make three or four developed points (paragraphs) in an essay response.

Mr Bruff and Mr Salles do some good YouTube videos for English.

Looking at the WJEC spec, he'll get a letter grade not a number? Are you in Wales OP?

Spec makes it look as tho you can't do Lord of the Flies and Chr Carol as they are on the same paper? Unless I was looking at an out of date one. Better check as the board and spec are key.

oh totally ignore that last post, don't know what on earth i was looking at. It looks v similar in terms of exam to AQA, which us the most commonly taken one, so any resources will be good.

Thanks, I'll point him towards some videos. I got the York notes study guide, so he can look at that when it arrives. He doesn't know how to do notes in the book if they are not doing it in class and told what to write. One chapter was set for homework and he's only been able to underline bits that look like they might be important but he really has no idea. So hoping the York notes will help.