What Does the GCSE English Mark Scheme ACTUALLY Mean? | AQA Language Paper 1 Question 2

What does the GCSE mark scheme actually mean? Now, welcome back to this video. This is video number two in a mark scheme series that I have created where I'm going to be going over AQA's language paper one and paper two mark schemes so that I can explain to you in very simple English what the mark schemes mean and how they relate to your questions and your practice. Let's say you were in year 10 or year 11. you are practicing and getting ready for either your GCSE English language paper on paper two mocks or your final GCSE exams. This is really useful because it's always important to know number one where you may be going wrong, number two what examiners and teachers are looking for in your responses, but also number three when you're doing your own independent practice. It's very important to be able after you do that practice to actually cross reference, look at the mark scheme and think, okay, when I look at my response, this is where I feel it sits because it hits all of these bullet points. Okay. So, obviously uh the reason why I'm going over this mark scheme as well guys is because if of course you want to boost your marks in GCSE English, it's always a really really important practice to number one go off download a pass paper. Number two, look at a model response for a question. Maybe it's a question that you're weak on. But then number three, apply that to your own practice. And finally, number four, look at the mark scheme. Let's say for example your teachers don't have enough time to look over your responses. Look at the mark scheme. See okay when I look at my response this is these this is the bullet points that it hits meaning I'm either in level 1 2 3 and four. Okay. So when it comes to GCSE language paper one question number two because I've already talked about in my previous video how to interpret the mark scheme as it relates to question one in paper one. [snorts] I want to now explain in very simple English how you can interpret the mark scheme because I would say one of the things that a lot of students find quite challenging about reading the mark scheme and even their parents when they try to help them is sometimes it's written in very coded language very fancy language that's quite confusing. So sometimes you might see one of the bullet points says selects judicious information and you think okay what does that mean right? So it's useful to know in very simple English just how to interpret the mark schemes and then of course go off and do some practice yourself. Okay. And of course this relates to language paper one question number two which is a question I got all of my students to practice and it was actually marked by GCSE examiners. And of course if you're one of those students you will of course not only have received your marked feedback but you will also know where on the mark scheme you sit. So, of course, if you find that you want to get actual marked feedback, don't forget as part of my Sunday GCSE master classes every single Sunday, I have live lessons where I go over model responses, but all of my students who join in also get the work marked by actual GCSE examiners. So, let me go over question number two and how to interpret the mark scheme. The first thing is, and of course you probably see this and maybe you have seen this before when you've submitted work in school and your teacher writes A1, AO2, AO3, right? Assessment objective. Question two tests AO2. What does AO2 mean? It means literally your ability to explain how writers use language to achieve an effect depending on the question. And what does language mean? Because remember that AO2 is basically the examiner's way and also the your teacher's way of testing your knowledge, awareness and understanding of language techniques. If you have forgotten what language techniques means, this is stuff like similes, metaphors, personification, hyperbole, alliteration. It by the way is not things like beginning, middle and end or shift in focus. Okay, remember that there's a difference between language and structure and this one strictly expects you to talk about language. Equally of course uh you're expected for this question and in the mark scheme to talk about how the writers use language to affect and influence readers. So you need to mention reader effect and equally AO2 and what the mark scheme expects you to do for this question. This is question two paper one is mention language techniques as well as sentence forms. The easiest cheat code for sentence forms is just mention declarative sentence. All sentences are written as declarative sentences. It simply means a sentence that states a fact, feeling or mood. Okay. So, let me now go into in more detail. If you got for example, so this of course this uh the the marks for this question are eight marks, right? So, if you got one out of eight, two out of eight, three out of eight, all the way up to 8 out of eight. I will now explain how this fits into the different bands or levels and what that means per level. Right? So for example, let's say you currently are getting two out of eight, but really you want to push up to start getting those top band marks. This is level three and level four. This is seven out of eight or five out of six marks. What do you need to achieve to get up there according to the mark scheme? Let me begin by explaining level four. Okay, so let's start from the grade nine band and this is obviously close to four marks/ful marks. According to the mark scheme, if you do well on this question and get seven or eight out of eight, what should your response include? Number one, you need to have to show examples of a range of quotes. Okay, so according to the mark scheme, to get seven out of eight or eight out of eight, that means you've selected a range of quotes. One thing I just want to mention, okay, so range of quotes is a little bit vague. This is something I really want you to be careful about because students will read this or see this and say, "Okay, from now on when I write a response, I'm going to have 10 different quotations in each of my paragraph." No, don't do that. Range of quotes simply means, so the approach I suggest to my students is write two separate peel paragraphs. In each of the paragraph, use one maximum two quotations. If you have even two quotations taken from either the beginning of the little text box that you're given with the evidence that you need to talk about and then you select for your second uh paragraph something from towards the end that is showing a range of quotations. You're selecting something from the beginning versus something from the end. You're showing you're not lazy in selecting your quotations but also you um if you select really good quotations what that means is you don't need to to write about a bunch of different quotes. Okay. So a range by the way I would suggest is in one paragraph you use one maximum two quotations and that's it. Do not start writing about 10 different quotes because you literally won't have time to analyze each of them. Okay? Because the the power in your response is in your analysis. Okay? So number one top band responses use and select a range of quotes. I would say keep those quotes per paragraph one maximum two quotes. Also, if you're in level four, that means you have analyzed language techniques, things like metaphors and so on in lots of detail and also you have shown a level of sophistication in your analysis. Sophistication just simply means you have written using fancy language. Okay, you have also selected really good quotations that not only connect to the question, but also when you look at the same quotation, you've gone into lots of depth and detail in unpacking, for example, specific words within that quotation. zooming in, mentioning is it a noun, verb, adjective, adverb, what does it connote? What imagery comes into our minds? That is sophistication in your writing. And on top of that, if you write using slightly more advanced language and vocabulary in your writing, that again adds to the level of sophistication in your response. Now, let's say you are aiming for a level three, right? Five out of six marks this second band. Okay? So, this is still really, really strong marks. Five out of six is still a really nice solid grade seven/8 category. Okay. So for this if you get level three that means you have used a range of quotes kind of like the top band response. Also [snorts] your analysis is clear kind of like the top band response and you have good language techniques. Probably the only difference that distinguishes level four and level three according to the mark scheme is just the depth in which you go into especially in your analysis. how much detail you go into, how sophisticated your analysis is, how much you zoom in, talk about reader effect and things like that. To be honest, when it comes to level four and level three, the difference between the two is really the level of depth and uh sophistication you go into in your analysis. Now, level two in uh question two, paper one, this is now where if you're operating at level two, you're a little bit in danger zone in terms of passing or failing. Okay, so with this uh uh uh level, this is students who get three or four out of eight marks. Okay, you're in shaky territory. And if your teacher, for example, uh uh marks your work or if you look at the mark scheme and you're told that you're at level two, this is what that means. Firstly, you've used some good quotations, right? So, you've got the question, you're writing about the quotation, you've selected some good quotations, but you don't always select quotes that are relevant or appropriate. That's number one. Okay? So, you've gotten some good quotes here and there. Maybe you've just picked one or two quotations from the beginning. You've ignored the rest of the text and the text box showing that you haven't really taken a range of different quotations. It's coming off as a little bit lazy. Or maybe you've just selected quotations that are just random and don't really help you in answering the question and kind of put you in a corner. Equally students who get level two um what that means is their quotes may be too long or the quotes lack focus and mention some language techniques that either they mislabel right so they pick out a metaphor but call it a simile they pick out personification but call it oxymoron or something like that or even worse still students who pick out a quotation and say this word means blah blah blah right so not even labeling the language anguage technique using words like this word rather than this metaphor, this simile and so on. Right? So very a more limited way of um showing language techniques. Right? So that's level two. And finally level one which is a fail. So of course if you get level one, this is one out or two out of eight marks. What that means is your writing is way too simple. You also try and comment on effects but not really well. So that means your analysis a is a little bit weak and also your language techniques are lacking. Right. So students who tend to not do very well in this question and get level one, they either never mention language techniques, again going back to this word shows this um this word is really important and it's interesting because and usually also students in this band tend to just describe what's happened in that part of the extract rather than analyzing and answering the question. And of course also the language techniques can sometimes also be inappropriate like just not relevant at all to the quote or the question. Okay. So one thing I just want to highlight as well which is really interesting and it comes up at level two is actually students who use really long quotations right the quote is like two lines long three lines long they just spend lots of time just adding long quotations that actually restricts the marks that you're getting because you adding lots of quotations is you just basically using the writer's own language and the writer's own words. you're wasting your time, but more importantly, you're taking time away from analyzing and explaining meaning and effect. Okay? And of course, if that's something you really struggle with, right? If you struggle with an analyzing, if you struggle with, you know, looking at a question on the spot, looking at an extract on the spot and knowing, okay, what should come to my mind here, right? What should stand out to me here? Okay, this phrase stands out, but how can I talk about it? I literally go over this if this is something that you struggle with in my weekly Sunday GCSE master classes at 5:00 PM. Okay? So during those live lessons, obviously it's me that's teaching them. Not only do I go into and go into lots of depth in terms of how to improve your analysis, how to write about language techniques, how to even structure your responses, but as I mentioned earlier, when students join in that class afterwards, what I do is I always set homework every week. I have four GCSE examiners who have literally between them got up to 17 years of experience in marking student uh uh exams. This is in the summer exams and the recent exams. And these are the people who will also be marking your homework. Okay. So, if you struggle with GCSE English and you need some support, you want to know where you're going wrong, you want to also see model responses that you can use and revise from, this is not only offered as part of the Sunday classes, but also you can get your your homework marked every single week by actual real life examiners. So, I hope you can join in in my Sunday class.