hello year 11 this is going to be a guide to paper one that is the reading paper from your language English GCSE so you can see here the instructions that see how you put on the front is rule very self-explanatory the only thing that I would add here is that I really strongly recommend that you bring three different color highlighter pens with you because when you are extracting information from the passages it will save you time if you can make sure you find it once and then can identify it and access it very quickly rather than having to sort of go back and and keep rereading so yes bring three highlighter pens please to your exam right let's move on to the actual questions themselves say question one a fairly straight forward really you'll notice here that the command word used at the start is gift now if CIE asked you to give or identify that means that they are encouraging you simply to lift the word or short phrase directly from the text in other words you do not need to put it into your own words so give or identify just means lift the information from the text and show you that you know what it's referring to so you will probably remember from having done this paper and looked at various different points over the last two years the answers here very straightforwardly passenger pigeon and dodo okay and if you get both of those you get on mark so let's move on to one V now this is a little bit different you can see already that the command word has changed here it is explain I'm gonna scroll up a bit explain now explain means you have to use your own words and see how you make this abundantly clear by saying a nice bow letters use your own words okay so you know what you're dealing with here now how do we actually approach this question well you'll notice that there are two marks available for each part and there's a reason for that it requires a little bit of thought and you have to give the full answer so how do you make sure you do that well I suggest quite a sort of methodical approach to this and that means looking at each word in turn okay so if we look here is asking you to explain what candidates for the extinctions means so I would begin by thinking well or it's a candidate or what a candidates candidates are possible choices okay then I'd look at the second part the extinction and obviously if something has made extinct it dies out so if it's made the extinct it is brought back to life so then we bring all of that together candidates for the extinction means possible choices to be brought back to life we might want to just for clarity add and show that we know what with what the text is about add in a little bit of contextual detail and say possible choices old extinct species to be brought back to life okay and that would just make it super clear right let's apply the same method to be part two here it asks you to explain what the text means by not just distant dreams so again let's go through word by word and and see what that could mean well not just I think we could say means more than and then let's look at distant something is distant it is far away or far off and dreams in this context is a hope and we might even say an unrealistic hope something's just a dream might be a some slightly unrealistic hope perhaps okay so let's bring all of that together and what we get is more than far-off unrealistic hopes okay and I think we put that we would guarantee ourselves the two marks and what's the ie actually say in the mark scheme is that if you give a partial answer you only get one of the two marks so for instance if here you missed out the sort of faraway element and simply said more than unrealistic hopes they might only award you one mark case you really need to make sure that you are engaging with and explaining the full phrase here that's really important okay let's scroll down to question one see now here it says reread paragraph three and in case you don't feel like counting it actually guides you towards at the start the first few words or that paragraph so let's have a look at that paragraph three scientists working on such projects estimate that a variation of the first new wooly mammoth which disappeared four thousand years ago may soon be born they hope these animals will play a role in slowing or reversing the effect of climate change okay so fairly straightforward here again but what it's actually checking you can do is find the relevant information but also just to make a little bit of sort of light inference okay because you're having to slightly read between the lines or infer about what it is that might be exciting for scientists about this okay now it should be fairly clear hopefully I think the first thing probably that scientists probably excited about is simply the fact that woolly mammoths have been extinct for around four thousand years okay so obviously that would be quite a huge achievement to sort of to bring them back and so that might be something that scientists would find exciting and let's keep going and see and then in the second sentence it says later scientists hope these animals will play a role in slowing or reversing the effects of climate change now who doesn't want that okay say I think that would also be something that scientists might find exciting so then we would get back to our script and what are the two recent scientists might be excited by the possible birth of a woolly mammoth well for the fact that wooly mammoths have been extinct for four thousand years and secondly the fact that doing so might help in the fight against climate change okay so you're picking out the relevant information and you're making a small bit of inference about about that information as well okay fairly straightforward and remember the command when it's give so you don't need to worry about putting it in your own words you can again simply lift from the text okay let's move on to 1d now and it asks you to reread paragraphs four and five and identify two main tasks that scientists will need to complete in order to breathe the hybrid identify again means simply you need to pick how the information you don't necessarily need to reword it so let's have a look at those paragraphs form five and and here we go it says the basic idea behind how it works the scientists would first retrieve DNA from the remains for a wooly mammoth that had been preserved in for centuries in the frozen tundra and use that to alter the DNA of modern Asian elephants so already we actually have the two main tasks that the scientists needed to do they would need to retrieve DNA from the remains of a woolly mammoth and use that to alter the DNA of modern Asian elephants and we put one of those in here one of those in there and you have your two marks okay now the next one perhaps a little bit trickier because they are asking you to explain so this time you do need to reword things and and put them in to put them into your own words you'll notice that there are three marks available and obviously that means they are asking you to find three different reasons why Asian elephants were chosen for project mammoths so we would keep reading all of these and I'm not going to read through it I will just show you where the or where the answers sort of lie the first the first reason agent elephants are chosen is that they are closely related to two mammoths so we can see that here the two species are so closely related so that's that's the first reason the second reason is sort of linked to that one but it is on the mark scheme as a as a separate reason is that they could successfully breed with with one another so here because remember the question is asking why were agent elephants chosen for project mammoth we would need to sort of again slightly reword it we can't say that they could successfully breed with elephants because it's the elephants that we talk about so we have to say they could successfully breed with mammoths and that would be our second possible reason as to why Asian elephants were chosen the third the third reason is that the Asian elephants are under threat of extinction okay so we can we can see that here that they are endangered Asian elephants okay and so it would help to protect endangered Asian elephants okay so that's a third reason and and there we go it's it's that straightforward really it's about reading carefully understanding what it is you're being asked to find in this case why the asian elephants were chosen and again perhaps making a little bit of inference and being able to put those into your own words so just to recap we would have something along the lines of the fact that of one that they are closely related to mammoths secondly that they have the potential to breed with mammoths and thirdly the fact that they are themselves asian elephants under threat of extinction and that this project could increase their chances of survival and that way we would gain all three of the available marks so we move on now to one e question one it goes on and on so the gift that keeps on giving so this one says reread paragraphs six and seven and using your own words so that is key it's in bold neat easier and where to explain why some people disagree with project mammoth so we would go to the text and look at the relevant paragraphs here would reread those and then consider why it is that some people disagree with this project now we do need to as I said use our own words so let's have a think about what this might look like if we read it it says the project is not without its critics who claim the idea is no more than a gimmick okay so here we have our first criticism if you like of this project or a reason why some people disagree with the project they say that it is a gimmick now we need to put this into our own words okay so what is the gimmick well it's a sort of slightly hollow meaningless stunt really that has no genuine practical application okay so we need to that be pretty confident with defining some of these some of these words okay and if you're not sure then you can at least try to work it out by thinking for instance or what type of word is it okay we can work out that it's a noun okay so it's a it's a thing and no more than so that suggests that it's it's a thing of maybe low quality okay in this way by sort of reading carefully and closely we could have start to work it out even if we're not even if you don't know exactly what a gimmick is you might be able to work out by figuring out that it's a noun by by sort of looking at the context it's no more than a gimmick you might be able to sort of at least give yourself a good go of sort of working out what it means okay so that's the first reason and then though there's a comma and I noticed this actually because it's it's quite useful to think about what the function of a comma is here it's sort of separating bits of information and now we want don't we multiple bits of information we need three different reasons why people might disagree with project mammoth so we can use that comma to sort of help us understand that actually what's going on here is that we're being given a further reason okay in this reason is that it is seducing scientists into thinking they are saving the world seducing scientists into thinking they're saying well how are we going to express that in our own words maybe something along the lines of fooling scientists into thinking that this is the answer to all of Earth's problems so you'll see that I've taken that word seducing and I've kind of thought what's actually telling us what information is that giving us and really it's telling us that that people believe that it's it's sort of fooling the scientists or it's sort of leading them down a kind of a path that they shouldn't really be going down and it's into thinking that they are saving the world so that this is the answer to all of the Earth's problems might be a way of putting it now obviously a word like scientists you know you don't need to to find another way of saying that you know needs to I know labora treat dwellers or anything like that the scientist is a scientist so you just you stick with that where something like a gimmick or seducing that's what they're testing your ability to understand okay so it's about using your judgment when you think about which words you need to actually put into your own words so we've got two of our reasons and then rather than a comma we've got here haven't we the word and now and joins together doesn't it parts of a sentence so that again might be a clue that after the end we've got another point that we could use to help us answer this question so let's see what it says and distracting us from guaranteeing our planets biodiversity Wow okay so distracting we need to think about don't we first of all so it's sort of perhaps preventing scientists or stopping scientists from guaranteeing well from you know sort of shoring up or from from saving we could even say our planets biodiversity while biodiversity you hopefully again could work out even if you weren't sure because you think well look at that word what's it actually mean by Oh obviously to do with biology to do with the earth diversity you probably know is is the sort of the range of things I suppose so biodiversity is the range of different species so it's distracting us from guaranteeing our planets biodiversity so it's preventing scientists from working on the problem of extinction okay so that would be our third point and then we'd keep keep reading if we we don't need a fourth point but there is a fourth point in here for future generations with promises of being able to fix mistakes later and really another way of saying that might be to say that actually this project is excusing our current environmentally destructive actions ok so again this question or this part of question one rather is asking you to to show your understanding of some of these you know quite tricky words but there are ways of doing it and I think being careful paying attention to detail and really thinking carefully you know what type of word is that what is the context what is the broad sense of this that might help you work out some of the more specific words that you need to be able to define ok then obviously we would simply go back to here and in our own words put in three reasons why some people disagree with project mammoths okay so now we get to the final part of question one all the way to question one F and this is also known as the summary question you'll notice immediately it says read text B okay so we are now moving on to to the second of the three passages that you are given with this paper title so check in reading right one and then it says according to text B what made Lubert such a remarkable and precious scientific specimen and what did scientists hope to discover by studying them well let's think for a moment what the summary question is asking us to do okay so we've got this we've got this question here and what we need to do what you need to do is to extract the relevant information okay so we can see immediately what that relevant information is going to be what made her a remarkable and pressure scientific specimen that's one chunk of relevant information and secondly what did scientists hope to discover by studying a case if that is the second lots of relevant information that you're going to have to pick out now you are also being tested here on your ability to put things into your own words so to show your understanding your ability to group information logically okay and also to write in a formal and concise fashion in other words not wasting words and I'm going to talk a little bit more about that in a moment but let's let's focus briefly on this idea of grouping things logically because I mentioned right at the start of this video the need for highlighter pens and I think this is where they would really begin to come into their own because I would suggest that while you were reading the passage you highlight one color and you can highlight this as well here so you say how about this bit in yellow okay and then you would go through the passage you would find all of those things that made Luba remarkable and precious scientific specimen and you would highlight them in yellow okay as precisely as possible not you know painting the whole page but just picking out those or the information that is relevant that part of the question okay and then perhaps in another color let's say blue you would find the relevant information for this part of the question what did scientists hope to discover by studying her okay and then obviously when you are writing your answer you're not going to sort of give one of these points and then one of these points then go back to this one and go back to that one in fact this would divide I think very neatly into two very concise paragraphs one on the first part of the question and one on the second part question now I'm going to have a look actually this time rather than that the passage itself but I think that would take just too long to sort of go through and pick out all the information see the mark scheme for this question okay so you can see here this is what your examiner will have in front of them again they have the question written out for them all of the information that you're given and then underneath that they've got what's called indicative reading content they don't need to worry too much about that but it says here candidates may refer to any of the points below I can look they've actually divided it as the question is divided have made and that is because hopefully your answer will also split into two along these lines okay so here you can see six reasons that that made leave us at Remagen pressure scientific specimen and here we've got another six reasons of what scientists hoped to discover by studying and now all of these are lifted directly from the text okay so the examiner will know very very clearly if you have simply copied whole phrases from the text okay and they will drag your mark down as a result okay so what you are aiming for with this is a series of points which are very clearly identifiable as these but up hurt in in your own words okay so let's just give one example of what that might look like so in the text itself it says only a handful of mammoths have ever been found so you don't want to use that exact same phrase so for instance you might change it to something along the lines of very few mammoths have ever been discovered okay so that way you've sort of shown that you understand what only a handful means very few and instead of saying found again you said discovered okay so it's it's not you know it so you have to sort of go through every single word and change it and mammoths obviously would stay the same but but you you do need to change it sufficiently to show you that you have understood it okay so so let's go let's go back to this so the way to do this really it involves quite careful planning okay so you would go to the you go to the passage but let's have a quick look this is this is it as I said I'm not going to read through it but with your to highlighter pens you would very very carefully slowly calmly methodically go through the text and begin to highlight the relevant points and the two different colors okay once you'd once you've done that you'd go back to here and you'd start to write up your answer okay remembering to try and group similar points together a few tips about this which you hopefully will will remember from your English lessons firstly you do not want an introduction or a conclusion okay so at no point would you say anything along the lines of there are many different reasons that Luber is a remarkable and pressure scientific specimen some of these reasons are okay you launch straight into it okay no introduction no conclusion okay you also wants to absolutely avoid any commentary okay and what I mean by that really is giving any kind of opinion or a sense of oh this is really good or this is really bad or it's you know it's sad that this is happening or you know I really hope that scientists will be able to discover XYZ not at all to tone your game for what you want is something clear concise factual okay it could be if you want to sort of compare it something would be a bit like really or it should be once you've written your summary a bit like reading something from a very dry textbook okay that's what they want and so therefore they also want you to avoid any informal language I would suggest that you sort of write things out fully rather than using contractions so did not rather than didn't for instance okay just to make sure that it is as formal as possible and in terms of the number of points you want to include so you might assume that given that it says there are ten marks available for the content of your answer that you need ten points actually strictly speaking you don't okay but you do need I would say a minimum of eight points again I'll talk a little bit more about why in a moment okay but you should aim for between eight and ten different points to answer that question okay right let's have a quick look again back at the at the mark scheme and you'll see that this is what the examiner will decide your mark based upon now to get into this top band so it's get nine or ten out of ten for your reading in other words your identification of of the of the key points relevant to the question it says a very effective response that demonstrates a thorough understanding of the requirements of the task demonstrates understanding of a wide range of relevant ideas excuse me now that's why we don't necessarily need ten okay I think from what CIE have said eight would count as being in a wide enough range to access that top band okay and it says points are skilfully selected to demonstrate and overview so again I think what this means is that really you need a balance of different points you don't want to focus too heavily on just one side of this question okay so it can't all just be about what made her remarkable and precious scientific specimen it has to include both parts okay now I should also say it won't necessarily be that you have a sort of a two-part question like this it might just be one thing in which case that's fine as well okay but if it is two parts in a way it makes your life a little bit easier because it it helps you with grouping your points now last thing I'm going to look at is how the examiner determines your mark for writing and that's out of five so obviously got my tenth reading mark out of five for writing so the summary question is out of fifteen overall and it says a relevant response okay so that means you are only choosing information that actually answers the question that is expressed clearly so it's clear what you're saying fluently so in other words your writing has a good sort of flow to it you don't want each point in in its own sentence you know you probably want to be using things like bracket comma sentences okay so revise those if you're not sure about this because that will help your fluency and mostly with concision okay so in other words concisely I can again bracket comma sentences and and and being able to to sort of to handle sub clauses generally within within your sentences will be very very helpful in this regard okay the response is well organized that's what I've talked about in terms of grouping similar points together the responses in the candidates own words were appropriate using a range of well-chosen for capillary which clarifies meaning so again putting putting the information into your own words and and actually having as far as possible the vocabulary to be able to do that and then finally spelling punctuation and grammar are mostly accurate okay so swag actually is something that they are looking at here and if it is all over the place you are probably not going to get into into that top band okay so hopefully that has provided a bit of clarity on the on the summary question okay okay so having worked through a question one obviously we move on to question two now your latest that this refers to text C so that is the third of the three texts that you are given with this paper question two a asks you to identify a word or phrase from the text which suggests the same idea as the words underlined okay so then they give you a sentence with a word or short phrase underlined and you need to find a synonym for that from within the text okay so really this is checking your ability to understand what the words mean and to sort of be able to skim through the the passage and identify them so the first thing we're looking for is something that suggests broken suddenly that Natalia was expecting quite a fair walk to be broken suddenly so let's go to the text and we would start it starts reading it we're nearing the end of our side street and I assumed the science for a walk would be shattered by the bustle along the tramway aha there we go okay that sounds doesn't it like something that would fit the bill so we would go back here broke and suddenly shattered yes that means the same thing so really straightforward all you need to do is to write in the word shattered okay you know you won't lose marks if you put in the silence of our walk would be shattered but really all you actually need is the synonym for the bit that is underlined okay so save yourself some time earn yourself a mark and it's as easy as that okay the second one Natalia slowed herself down and made herself as tall as possible before refusing to go any further okay so we're gonna get back to the text I'm going to look for something that broadly speaking means slowed herself down and made herself as tall as possible so let's see is there anything here got nothing hazy moon grandfather stopped looked up and down Street laughs okay so anything there's anything in there it's not far now he said nope nothing there I caught up with him long enough to see that he was smiling mm-hmm nothing there then we get this and I drew myself up and stopped okay well now we might be getting somewhere I drew myself up and stopped slowed herself down and made herself as tall as possible yeah I think that fits the bill doesn't I drew myself up okay so that's the making herself as tall as possible and stopped that over see first of the sort of thing herself down there we go and then we sort of keep skimming through the text what we're looking for now is something to suggest that her grandfather spoke to her in a low angry voice let's see see you'll notice you know they don't they don't point out exactly where this information is anymore they're not being quite as kind in this question you have to actually go and find it let's keep reading then we've got to drop drew myself um stop I'm not getting any phone till you tell me he turned to look at me indignant lower your voice youthful he hissed a heart ache a lovely sibilant sound there and do you think hist could mean spoke eternal a angry voice I would say say and again we don't need to put much more information in here than simply the word hissed and you've got your third mark finally the homeless person was fast asleep hopefully you're getting the idea now we're looking for something to suggest that the homeless person was fast asleep and immediately my eye on she was drawn to this word beggar obviously synonym for a homeless person sleeping so soundly that I would have thought him dead fast asleep so actually you know the mark scheme says just so soundly would would get you the mark I might be tempted in this case to say a little bit more sleeping so soundly that I would have thought him dead perhaps because that really I think captures the fast asleep bit but either way if you put in so soundly you would get the mark okay so hopefully you can see that's a question to a it is simply about skimming through the text and looking for things that mean within the context of the of the passage something along the lines of the phrases that are underlined here okay so should be again for fairly easy marks but as ever it is about taking care okay not rushing it so yes you do you can skim read but you need to be careful you need to check make sure it does make sense them okay okay so moving on to B and actually this is an interesting sort of inversion of the of 2a because this time you are actually finding synonyms for words that are used in the text and hopefully they actually give you the little chunk of text that they want you to look at to say let's have a look using your own words explain what the writer means by each of the words underlined I peered out into the street on the other side there was a street lamp with a dying bulb I was opening my mouth to say what and then I saw it half a block from us an enormous shadow was moving along the street now there are two things to think about here firstly you need to define define the word as it appears in the context that it is used here and you need to do it as precisely as possible okay so let's start with as precisely as possible bit and ratchet going to start with the word enormous now so it's a half block from from us an enormous shadow it was moving on the street now you could put in the word big but it would get you zero marks because enormous does not mean big enormous means something huge or vast or gargantuan okay and that is what I mean by being precise okay big is not you know completely incorrect but it is not precise enough to get you the mark okay so really think carefully is the definition that you've given accurate and precise okay and you also need to as I said think about the word within cond within the context and so this one actually who are dying is quite a useful example it says on the other side there was a street lamp with a dying bulb okay say obviously you know the word dying could refer to the passing away the human being but if you put they're passing away you would not get the mark but because it's referring to a dying light bulb so instead you'd need to give the definition that showed that you understood that and the context in which the word is being used so for example a word like fading or slowly going out would would would fit better okay and if you said passing away not that I'm sure you would but if you did you again wouldn't get the mark because it would show you that you hadn't really understood the context okay peered quite straightforwardly sort of you know stared looked intently something like that would work for for prepared okay remember you can it doesn't have to be a single word you know it can be a short phrase that conveys the same meaning as well okay okay let's have a look now at question to see which asks you to use one example from the text below to explain how the writer suggests a Natalia's experiences and feelings that night and for this one clearly you are going to have to use your own words and this is the short piece of text that you that you need to look at and choose one example from so I peered out into the street on the other side there was a street lamp of the dying bulb I was opening my mouth to say what and then I saw it half a block from us an enormous shadow was moving along the street so hopefully here it should be fairly self-evident which words or phrases are particularly sort of useful I suppose in helping us understand metolius experiences or feelings that night so I'm going to show you the mark skim in a moment but just you know if we look right at the start I paired out into the street so this is on the mark skin this idea of peered out and you might immediately start thinking well how does this help suggest experiences or feelings I mean if you peer at something it I think conveys doesn't it a little bit of perhaps sort of uncertainty or even a little bit of anxiety perhaps you know it's not a it's not a confident staring out into the street necessarily just a sort of a appearing you're kind of a little bit cautious maybe if you feel simply peering and and that might then therefore tell us a little bit about her feelings perhaps she feels a little bit apprehensive a little bit nervous you know she's in quite an unusual situation isn't she walking through these sort of almost deserted streets and in the middle of the night and peered helps convey that a little bit now there are five other examples that are on the mark scheme within within just this short bit of text so let's have a look at what those are in fact just very quickly I'm going to show you how how you can be awarded three marks so it says here award three marks for an appropriate example so that is an example that is on the mark skin and we'll look at these more fully in a moment so pick an appropriate example and then give a comprehensive explanation which shows understanding of how the writer suggests and that's Holly's experiences and feelings now if you give an attempt at an explanation then you can get two marks and if you give an attempt next patient which shows awareness of her experiences and feelings rather than an understanding then you know you'll get to two or one marks respectively okay so the key here really what all of this means in a nutshell is simply that you need to make sure that your explanation is sufficiently detailed and that it really does actually help you answer the question that in this case it does tell her it does you can explain what it tells us about her experience or feelings okay so let's have a look I'm not going to look at all of these but you can have a quick quick look and see which phrases made it onto the mark skin and what was said about them so if we just take one of these let's say enormous shadowing and and just look how much sort of information can be squeezed out of these two words okay so obviously you know you would phrase this in your own words but broadly speaking I think the idea is that the phrase helps convey Natalia's amazement or surprise because of the sheer size of the thing now obviously that's what the word enormous is doing here you know it's conveying the the massiveness of this elephant and we need to pick up on that and look at that in detail okay so that shows her amazement at the size of it and then looking at the word shadow I suppose and and that suggests something about her experience as well it suggests that she doesn't recognize the elephant at first okay and that's why she describes it as this sort of in this unspecific fashion as a shadow she doesn't say an enormous elephant it's an enormous shadow so that builds up perhaps a little bit of tension and anticipation because you know what is this shadow what is this thing moving through this stream okay so just two words enormous shadow but there is an awful lot that you can actually say about those words okay I'll have a quick look at the others as well you can pause the video if you want and and sort of work out what's being said about these phrases because it'll help you I think to some see what is required now in terms of how you actually answer my suggestion would be to follow this format okay so in here you take the word or phrase that you want to explore remember you only need one example write it out : and then give your explanation okay and try to go into quite a bit of specific detail because that will help you sort of pick up the three marks hopefully okay let's move on to question 2 D now and there are 15 marks available to this question so we're moving into slightly sort of chunkier answers I suppose being being required at this stage so in question 2 D this is what we sometimes refer to as the writers effect questions you'll notice it's divided into two parts a carrot sort of guides you towards firstly paragraph nine and then paragraph 12 now it then goes on to ask you to explain how the writer uses language to convey meaning and to create effect in these paragraphs choose three examples of words or phrases from each paragraph to support your answer your choices should include the use of imagery so just to be very very clear about this what this means choose three examples from each paragraph is that you want in total six mini paragraphs but they have to be evenly divided between paragraph nine and paragraph twelve okay so you'd want three maybe four if you were you know if you have time and then three or four paragraphs mini paragraphs for this one okay you must not focus entirely on one paragraph and then neglect the other one okay and you even don't want sort of an imbalance between them so what's the what's the format for this the way that we suggest you you do this is very very sort of straightforward and it makes it easy for the examiner to see what you've what you have done so the first thing to do is to select the words or phrases that you are going to look at and obviously think about this and we'll talk a little bit about what what you can say about them but in terms of how you write this answer out I suggest you do it this way so you give your piece of evidence put it in quotation marks okay and just put it here it'll be a short phrase and then colon and then you give the meaning and effect in full sentences after it okay so you know it might take up let's say these first three lines okay you have your quotation your piece of evidence you put it in quotation marks colon dot and then in full sentences the meaning and effect okay and you do that three times for paragraph nine three times the paragraph twelve or you know whatever the paragraph numbers are that you are asked to look at say what kind of things should you be picking up on and what should you be saying about them well let's have a quick look at paragraph nine okay see this is when the narrator is is sort of describing the the kind of food the realization I suppose that that what she is seeing is an elephant so at first I thought it was a but its shape was too organic too lumpy and it was going far too slowly for that making almost no noise it was swaying swaying up the street with an even momentum in a rolling motion that was drawing it away from us like a tide and every time it rocked forward something about it made a soft dragging sound on the rails as we watched the thing sucked in air and let out and then let out a deep groan so there are plenty of things that you can talk about and I'm going to show you the marks give in a moment so that you can have a look at what what what is on there but one thing that should immediately jump out hopefully is just because you know you have been looking at them for years and you're in your English lessons similes and metaphors again personification as well as supposed imagery in other words okay so when you see for instance this phrase was drawing it away from us like a tide okay immediately alarm bells should be going off and you should be thinking ah okay that's a simile and if there is imagery in in the paragraph you can firstly guarantee that it will appear on the mark scheme okay because they specifically would like you they say to try and include the use of imagery in your in your choices okay and also you should feel quite confident that there are plenty of things that you can say because image with the whole point of imagery is precisely as the name suggests to sort of create a picture in your mind and your job at this stage is to really explain in detail what what exactly that picture is all right so let's have a look now at the the marks comune you can see there are plenty of choices all of these are paragraph nine and then all of these four paragraph 12 okay see there are plenty of things that you can you can pick from and it might be worth just and pausing this video at some point and looking through very clearly what they have chosen okay and that might help you get a feel for for the kind of thing that that you should be trying to pick out when you come to write your answer so what do you you do what should you do in terms of in terms of how you answer it well first thing today is to give a brief maybe 1/2 line overview of the overall effect of the of the paragraph okay so the one we've just read says on the mark scheme that the overview of the overall effect is that the elephants movement is described in terms reminiscent of a boat on the sea as if traveling from far away or they say it could their view or the general effect could be that it is as though the elephant is moving with powerful natural movement of the sea itself okay so they're kind of various comparisons between the elephant and and so the motion of the sea and or rather it might suggest that the elephant looks somewhat incongruous in the context of the city as though it's a little bit out of place within the context of the city okay so there are really not fixed answers for this one okay as long as you say something that is sort of sensible and that is based on the language that is actually used in the paragraph it will probably be it will probably be fine okay so don't think it has to sort of mirror exactly you know what is on well as on the mark scheme obviously you know you won't know what that is but do you try to be in your overview do try to sort of base it on what is actually in the in the paragraph itself okay so now let's look at the kind of thing that you that you might write I can look at this this example okay say in the paragraph it says there was a rolling motion that was drawing it away from us like a tide that is the the elephant now the key thing here what not to do and I've noticed this quite a lot in marks and and just an answers that I've seen over the years you do not need to define obvious words okay so you should not be saying for instance about like a tide something along the lines of this is when the sea goes on to and away from the beach okay that is unnecessary all right you do not need to give those sort of very literal definitions instead you could say something along these lines the phrase or the simile like a tide helps us see that the elephant is moving with a slow but consistent and unstoppable rhythm this suggests that the elephant is a force of nature that cannot be controlled hurried or alarmed okay so a really thought about what this simile what effect it creates okay I haven't just given a very literal definition I've thought about the effect that it creates and this of the image that it produces in my mind okay and honestly as long as you're doing that as long as you're actually thinking carefully about the language and and sort of trying to explain that get that across to the to the examiner you can be quite creative with this with this question really I can this I think quite a lot of leeway in terms of the kinds of things you are saying as long as it you know is sort of vaguely sensible and it's based on the actual language itself okay so let's just recap what the answer would look like you would put your overview here just a brief overview of what's going on in the paragraph as a whole you would then put here the short sort of word or phrase so like tied for example you've put in quotation marks because it's quotation from the text : and then you would give the sort of a meaning and then the effect okay and remember these beauties don't give sort of very literal definitions instead you really want to be thinking why has the writer written it in this way what are they trying to convey through through their use of language okay and now what you have all been waiting for we get to the final question question three this one is worth 25 marks 15 of those four are for how carefully and thoroughly you have read and shown that you have understood the passage and ten are available for the quality of your writing so it is very important that you leave yourself enough time to answer this question properly okay you do not want to be trying to rush this you know in the last sort of 15 minutes of the exam there are lots of marks available it requires careful thoughtful planning now you will remember hopefully that at the start of this video I suggested that you bring with you three highlighter pens when you do this exam and this question really is the reason why I can I'm going to explain a little bit now about that to say here's what it says you are the grandfather now this is very important this question will ask you to inhabit a character okay and so what you are writing is all from the perspective of this character okay so some years later after this event has happened you were interviewed about your memories of that night for a radio program about local history the interviewer asks you the following three questions only okay I'm not going to read them out but you can see here what the three questions are and this is where the highlighters come into play and I really really think that this is a vital part of your plan you take one of the highlighters let's say yellow you highlight this top one then you could take another highlight so let's say your blue highlighter you highlight this one and then you take your pink highlighter you highlight this third one okay and then you go to the text and you start to pick out details from the text or parts of the text that are going to help you answer these questions from your perspective as the grandfather within the text so you would first of all look for things that would help you answer this what did you see and feel during your journeys through the city that night you would go to the text you'd think okay what can I highlight here just you know launching straight into it the hazy moon seems to gather the silence up around it like a net not a sound no sirens no rats in the bin that lined the street so what did you see and feel well you might talk about having noticed the silence okay and you might sort of think about some of the specific details as well that that help sort of emphasize that you know you might mention for instance the moon and you might talk about the fact that there were no sirens or no rapped in the bins that line the streets it's all these details help convey what you saw and felt okay so you then do that for the second and third bullet points as well so what you'd have by the end is a sort of you know beautifully colored with three different three different highlighters extract okay you don't want to obviously highlight the entire thing you want to be quite selective with the information that you that you pick out okay and let's look now at the at the marketing because I think this is perhaps the the best way to understand what is required here so let's have a look listen zoom in a bit so for the first bullet point you're thinking about what you as the grandfather saw and felt during your your journeys okay so let's have a look at this one because actually talked about this okay say the the emptiness of the of the city the fact that there was no one around okay that's something you saw or observed okay and then you would as he was sort of writing this out in your own words obviously you can't just write empty no one around you you want to sort of put it into the grandfather's voice you know I was astonished at the emptiness of the streets I've never seen it so quiet it's normally a bustling city something along those lines you know there was there was no traffic on the boulevard for the first time I noticed just how vast the street was as it was so empty and then you would give a sort of a development okay so you've given the point that answers the question what did you see or feel okay you then give a detail to kind of bring it to life to show you that you've read the passage carefully and that you can sort of support that idea with some of the other information in the passage so you've got your point you've got your detail and then you give a development now a development is a thought a feeling or a consequence of the point and detail okay so one way that you might choose to develop this is to say that it made the city feel a little bit soulless okay that the complete emptiness and lack of people or traffic kind of took away a little bit of the kind of vibrancy that you normally associate with the city okay equally I suppose you know and I don't think it would be penalized you could have gone the other way you could say it was so tranquil and peaceful for it for example okay so you've got to think you know what would the grandfather's likely attitude be okay so that's the that's the format let's look at let's look at at one more okay here look the sort of the silent or noiseless the signs of the noiselessness of the of the pace okay and then you'd pick out one of the details the fact that there were no sirens and you can actually see this is this is in in the text not a sound no sirens okay say oops sorry wrong one so that's your your point is that it's silent your detail might be that there are no sirens case you again you'd sort of talk about that a little bit more more depth you know the fact that normally it's such a there's a main road and there are constantly sort of you know ambulances or these guys whatever going up up and down but now it was completely completely silent and then you'd give you a development okay it gave a real sense of calm you might say it made the city feel a little bit sort of eerie or mysterious okay but you're giving a development a thought a feeling or a consequence about this okay so hopefully that format is is quite clear now you want to make sure that you are covering the bullet points very evenly as well okay and you want about four to five points per bullet point it doesn't have to be absolutely even but you need to show that you've got a thorough range of different points for each of these three bullet points okay other things to consider so first of all you do need to use your own words throughout this secondly you are getting marks for the quality of your writing okay so the more interesting and vivid and authentically like the grandfather or the character in question it sounds the better okay so so be creative be imaginative use you know similes metaphors equal in terms of the punctuation that you use accurately use a semicolon accurately user : use a variety of different sentence types you know you want your sub clause and main Clause main clause and sub clause or the bracket comma sentence where you've got the start of the main clause then the sub course and then the end of the main clause really mix these things up as far as possible because that will boost your your writing mark and two other two other things to say use the passage don't rewrite the passage okay this is something that CIE are very very strict on if you are simply sort of writing out the passage basically that's no good you need to sort of use the information in there but you are writing something entirely new you are the grandfather and you are writing the words of an interview okay and then the the final thing to say really is that to get into the very top bands you need to try to bring a little bit of subtlety or insight to your answer and this can be a bit tricky but most of the texts will have a sort of element to them that you can really incorporate in an interesting way and in this one I think it's really the the sort of the wartime setting of the of the extract and of this experience with the elephant because you can you can sort of say something along the lines where you could say about something wrong with lines of the fact that you know this experience felt even more meaningful and and sort of intriguing because it was set against the backdrop of this awful war and it was perhaps just this this brief moment of a kind of connection even you know between the grandfather granddaughter and and this and this little elephant and in the way that it sort of brought them together and gave them this sort of intriguing moment in and otherwise you know sort of quite unpleasant in the harsh time and just something like that gives your answer what I would call a kind of a ring of authenticity it makes it sound real as though it actually is an interview with somebody to him to whom this happened so hopefully that is hopefully that's a useful guide to this question I'm just going to quickly look down the the mark scheme and you can sort of pause the video if you like to see see what they're saying so all of these refer to the first bullet point and then the second one which is about the granddaughters behaviors and and reactions that night and then the third one is it's sort of asking about his reasons for taking his granddaughter out that night and looking back at what he thinks she gained from the experience and this third bullet point you can you can see here we'll require probably the most inference okay because the interview is asking you as the ground fog to look back and think what she gained from the experience now obviously there won't be anything in the text that specifically talks about that okay because you know we're we're now imagining that we are in the future and and looking back and so you have to really infer quite quite a lot so you know for instance here notices the the sense of awe that was felt when she saw the elephant you know you might add in the detail this was the second time for him so perhaps you know he wasn't quite as awestruck as as she was at that point and then you might develop it thinking well what did she gain from the experience maybe it gave her a sense of wonder about nature maybe it's sort of this this sort of triggered for her a kind of a deep love for the natural world and so an obsession with with with elephants for you know even for example that might be something that that as the grandfather you might imagine could have happened as a result of this okay so remember this third bullet point will require the most amount of inference okay hopefully that was a useful step by step guide to paper one which is the reading paper for your english-language itcs see if anything is unclear or if you have any questions or comments by on anything that I've said or any parts of this reading paper just pop a comment underneath the video and we will try to answer your questions