English Paper Two

Killer_banana

Okay so my mocks are soon and we've done hardly any work on paper two in English. I know what sort of questions come up but I know very little about the specifics of an answer.

Firstly what's the recommended time for each question?

I know you're meant to know your single text 'in great detail' but what exactly does that mean? I know the plot well enough to reference it but how many quotes should I have and how long is the average answer? Is there any sort of question which tends to come up regularly for 'Wuthering Heights' or that is expected to come up?

Any information at all on the comparative study is welcome tbh. We have barely covered this at all and what we have covered we have done badly. We're studying genre and cultural context and our texts are Circle of Friends, King Lear and Inside I'm Dancing. Does anyone know where I could find a sample answer for either of these or if any of the revision books on this topic are any good because I have no idea what to write for it?

For unseen poetry how much are you generally expected to write and how detailed is your answer expected to be?

Prescribed poetry we've spent a lot of time on and I'm aquainted with so I don't really need any information on that although it couldn't hurt.

Thanks. My teacher's not that good so I'm pretty stressed atm.

pathway33

have you seen the marking schemes and chief examiners reports on www.examinations.ie ? Might get some guidance there

rebel girl 15

breakdown of timing can be found on this site http://www.mocks.ie/index/timeandmarksbreakdown#

pathway33

rebel girl 15 wrote: »

breakdown of timing can be found on this site http://www.mocks.ie/index/timeandmarksbreakdown#

breakdown for english paper 2 on that site can't be right can it?

rebel girl 15

pathway33 wrote: »

breakdown for english paper 2 on that site can't be right can it?

Yeah, just checked it properly, looks funny alrite!

rebel girl 15

Total exam time - 200 minutes

Reading time at start 10 mins

ONE question from SECTION I – The Single Text 54 mins
 ONE question from SECTION II – The Comparative Study 63 mins
 ONE question on the Unseen Poem from SECTION III – Poetry 18 min
 ONE question on Prescribed Poetry from SECTION III – Poetry 45 mins

10 mins @ end to read over the paper


The way I made out the timing was on the basis of the marks given to each section - 60 marks in section 1, is 30 per cent of the paper, so got 30 per cent of the time left after taking out the reading time

gemxpink

Killer_banana wrote: »

I know you're meant to know your single text 'in great detail' but what exactly does that mean? I know the plot well enough to reference it but how many quotes should I have and how long is the average answer? Is there any sort of question which tends to come up regularly for 'Wuthering Heights' or that is expected to come up?

Lots of quotes, references, descriptions. Basically follow the aul point, quote, explain system. I'd say 4 quotes per page, thats what most people in my class use and they all do well.

Any information at all on the comparative study is welcome tbh. We have barely covered this at all and what we have covered we have done badly. We're studying genre and cultural context and our texts are Circle of Friends, King Lear and Inside I'm Dancing. Does anyone know where I could find a sample answer for either of these or if any of the revision books on this topic are any good because I have no idea what to write for it?

Okay so you're going to need to have a lot of comparisons and differences for cultural context, a few quotes here and there where you can. Have you tried the revision books? I use Keynotes which is for Dancing at Lughnasa, Lies of Silence and Il Postino and it covers them all really well. Try and find a book like that, and you're sorted, next time you take a trip to Easons. You can try skoool.ie too: http://www.skoool.ie/skoool/examcentre_senior.asp?id=5091. Try searching for some notes here too: http://www.sparknotes.com/.

For unseen poetry how much are you generally expected to write and how detailed is your answer expected to be?

About 10 minutes our teacher said. There's not a lot of marks and not worth the bother really.

Prescribed poetry we've spent a lot of time on and I'm aquainted with so I don't really need any information on that although it couldn't hurt.

Just remember to relate it to the question asked.

implausible

Easiest thing to do is give yourself an hour for each section. You have twenty mins then for reading over the paper.

Don't forget to give yourself enough time for the unseen poetry (20 mins), it's worth nearly a third of your poetry mark.

MoyVilla9

Whatever you do do not just throw off the plot to them. "Knowing the plot" is a given, you need to know the themes of the play and how it affects the characters.

zam

In the EDCO exam papers it has a little code at the bottom of each question which you can type into www.e-xamit.ie
That tells you how to answer the question and gives sample answers/essays. Great for the comparative!

Killer_banana

Thanks for all ye're advice. It's been very useful.

I'm currently re-reading WH and marking any quotes I think could be useful since out teacher didn't really give us many. I'm planning to get the edco exam paper codes off a friend and download a few sample answers. I like WH and remember the plot fairly well so I think I should do reasonably well.

I'm pretty screwed for the comparative as I'm just not prepared enough at this stage. I know the cultural context enough to write a decent answer myself but I think I'll end up having to rely on a sample answer for genre. Is anyone doing Casablanca with Circle of Friends and/or King Lear? Is it easy or difficult to compare because the other class is studying and tbh I think I'd find it easier to compare and contrast with the other two texts than Inside I'm Dancing because there just aren't enough similarities imo?

MoyVilla9

Killer_banana wrote: »

Thanks for all ye're advice. It's been very useful.

I'm currently re-reading WH and marking any quotes I think could be useful since out teacher didn't really give us many. I'm planning to get the edco exam paper codes off a friend and download a few sample answers. I like WH and remember the plot fairly well so I think I should do reasonably well.

I'm pretty screwed for the comparative as I'm just not prepared enough at this stage. I know the cultural context enough to write a decent answer myself but I think I'll end up having to rely on a sample answer for genre. Is anyone doing Casablanca with Circle of Friends and/or King Lear? Is it easy or difficult to compare because the other class is studying and tbh I think I'd find it easier to compare and contrast with the other two texts than Inside I'm Dancing because there just aren't enough similarities imo?

Don't worry about the comparative, it's unreasonable to expect you to be able to answer it at this stage. I had a brilliant English teacher last year and he kept saying that this question wasn't going to "click" until May and you know what he was right, I only really got the question and how to answer it right a week or two before the Leaving. My advice is to keep using works like "Similarly", "Unlike" and so on. Keep dropping in phrases like "Similarly in Casablanca we witness conflict between the main Characters" and go on to explain. What examiners said to teachers was that students weren't actually comparing enough, merely regurgitating the plot of three texts at the same time.