Preparation for Tuesday’s assessment

Hey you lot,

Some tips for Tuesday’s assessment:

• To prepare, attempt some practise questions from past WACE exams (uploaded to this post). Give yourself an hour to complete each question. Remember, if you don’t practise the writing process, you will not improve.
• Select the easiest and most straightforward question, Also select a question that best suits the text you’re discussing.\
• After you’ve selected your question, ‘unpack’ the question by deciding what sort of response the question is asking for. Ask yourself, what are the key words and what do they mean? Should I be writing a persuasive essay? What text will I use? Am I arguing FOR or AGAINST a contention, if so, which will I argue? (Don’t try to argue both sides!)
• Write a statement of intent outllining: Audience, Context (where your essay would appear) and Purpose.
• Remember to plan your response. You get marks for this!
• You’ve got a whole hour, so it is expected that you write a detailed introduction, three body paragraphs and a conclusion.
• You actually get marked on whether your introduction ‘engages the audience’. So begin your introduction in a interesting way e.g. rhetorical question.
• Use persuasive language devices: rhetorical question, emotive language, generalisations, hyperbole, superlatives, repetition, triples etc. If you’re going to chuck in imagery (simile, metaphor etc) be careful and don’t use too many.
• Maintain a formal tone
• Use examples and quotes from the text
• When discussing Painted Babies, make sure you use the correct terminology for documentary techniques.

English_Stage_2_examination_2011_Web_Version_Only_PDF[1]

English_Stage_2_exam_2012_Web_only_version[1]