Unit 2 literature Poetry Exam

Your questions to me.

I dont know how the exam will be laid out
I dont know what we will be marked on Which poems from the anthology will come up in the

exam? What do we have to do in the unseen section of an exam? How do we structure the response for unseen poem? Are there any past examples of work? Are there any practice questions? What exactly are we graded on?

What you will find in this presentation

1. Overview of the poetry exam with section breakdown
2. Mark scheme for section A 3. Past unseen poem with exam question

4. Examiner comments of the type of content they are

looking for 4. Sample student response to this question 5. Examiner comments and feedback on student response 6. Mark scheme for section B 7. Sample student response for section B(i) 8. Practice questions

The Exam Layout

Section Question Type A B (a) Unseen Poem Marks 20 Assessed on Ao2 Ao2

based on 1 poem 15 from the Anthology Compare and 15 contrast the ideas in two poems from the Anthology

B (b)

Ao3

General mark scheme for the paper

Mark Scheme

The questions on the paper have been designed to enable candidates to show what they can achieve in relation to the study of poetry. The specification aims to encourage students to:
Explain how language, structure and form contribute to

writers presentation of ideas, themes and settings

Make comparisons and explain links between texts

(section Bii)

The Assessment Objectives

Assessmen What skills it t Objective assesses Ao2 presentation of

Ao3

Section A The unseen poem

ideas, themes and settings
Make comparisons and explain links between texts

What section it is assessed on Section A and Section B question (a)

Section B (b)

Section A: The unseen poem

You will be given a poem that you have never seen

before. Worth 20 marks You are free to select and comment on textual details in a variety of ways. You are not expected to deal with every possible point and may be rewarded for a comparatively small number of points if these are effectively developed, and supported by well chosen textual evidence.

June 2011 Unseen poetry question

Question Explore how David Harmer

presents his experiences at Cider Mill Farm. Use evidence from the poem to support your answer. (20 marks)

The mark scheme Ao2 explain how language, structure and form contribute to writers presentation of ideas, themes and settings
13-16 Grades C B Assured understanding of the poems content/ideas. Assured explanation of how the writer uses language, structure and form to present the poems content/ideas. Pertinent textual reference to support response. *Purposeful organisation and assured communication of ideas. Spelling, punctuation and grammar are almost always accurate, With minimal errors. 17-20 Grades A-A* Perceptive understanding of the poems content/ideas. Perceptive explanation of how the writer uses language, structure and form to present the poems content/ideas. Convincing, relevant textual reference to support response. *Convincing organisation and sophisticated communication of ideas. Spelling, punctuation and grammar are consistently accurate.

The unseen poem for June 2011 Cider Mill Farm

At Cider Mill Farm I remember my uncles farm Still in mid-summer Heat hazing the air above the red roof tops Some cattle sheds, a couple of stables Clustered round a small yard Lying under the hills that stretched their long back Through three counties. I rolled with the dogs Among the hay bales Stacked high in the barn he built himself During a storm one autumn evening Tunnelled for treasure or jumped with a scream With for all I know three battered Ford cars

From a pirate ships mast into the straw Burrowed for gold and found hed buried Three battered Ford cars deep in the hay. He drove an old tractor that sweated oil In long black streaks down the rusty orange It chugged and whirred, coughed into life Each day as he clattered across the cattle grids I remember one night my cousin and I Dragging back cows from over the common We prodded them homeward through the rain And then drank tea from huge tin mugs Feeling like farmers. Hes gone now, he sold it But I have been back for one last look To the twist in the lane that borders the stream Where Mary, Ruth and I once waded Water sloshing over our wellies And I showed my own children my uncles farm The barn still leaning over the straw

1. Read the poem! 2. See if you can summarise its general meaning in a sentence (understanding the poems content)

3. Think about what the poets key message is.

4. Go through the poem line by line, and annotate it to suggest how the poet makes their message -Look out for adjectives -imagery they use -Repetition of words -Punctuation use -Line length and structure -Rhyme and rhythm -Onomatopoeia - and other terms we have studied. 5. When writing your response, answer the question, consider the effects of language on a reader, and the poets

How do I tackle a poem that I have never read before?

Question Explore how

David Harmer presents his experiences at Cider Mill Farm. Use evidence from the poem to support your answer. (20 marks)

What the examiner were looking for:

(20 marks) Responses to this poem may include references to language, structure and form, and these features may be integrated rather than in discrete sections. The writers ideas and use of words: A nostalgia and fondness for the farm are created through the language:stable/Clustered round a small yard We have the sense of the farm as an intimate setting within a very broad landscape, with hills and distant vistas (lying under the hills that stretched their long back/Through three counties) He recalls the farm in different seasons: still in mid-summer during a storm one autumn evening There is a strong appeal to the senses: heat hazing; and to sound (onomatopoeia) chugged and whirred, coughed, and clattered across the cattle grids (alliteration) There is a sense of adventure and imagination: tunnelled for treasure; (alliteration again), a pirate ships mast, burrowed for gold Sense of bathos: the treasure turns out to be the battered old cars perhaps a better treasure for small children

Continued.
Use of repetition I remember and three battered

Ford cars (the fact that these may still be there creates a sense of continuity across the generations) Strong sense of its being a family farm, with pride in its history and affection for his uncle: vivid personal memories also extending to the animals: cajoling the cows back home: a sense of real power Strong recreation of childish excitement and pleasure: waded/Water sloshing over our wellies (more alliteration), linked to more adult emotions: feeling like farmers Delighted to have the opportunity to pass on these memories to his own children, even though hes gone now, he sold it

-If you make points The way that the poem is structured that werent The whole poem is about childhood experience and memory first his mentioned here, own, and that of his sisters, and then passing on the experience to his can still be you awarded marks, so own children, keeping alive the strength of the recollections long Set out with little punctuation; gives a sense of a series of thoughts as your ideas are convincing and spilling out (stream of consciousness, almost) supported by Not a set rhythmic pattern, but some very rhythmic, dactylic lines almost a nursery rhyme feel tunnelled for treasure or jumped with reference. a scream; three battered Ford cars deep in the hay: compare with -There simply is There was an old woman who lived in a shoe not time to make Vivid pictures of his actions and observations: rolled with the dogs; still all of these points sees the strong colours: long black streaks, rusty orange in an exam! The Cosy images too: drank tea from huge tin mugs warming up after examiner knows being soaked in the adventure with the cows this too! Some of the wistfulness is reinforced by sound: the monosyllables of I have been back for one last look. Creditworthy responses may refer to language, structure and form without using specific terminology/feature spotting.

Continued

Remember!

Exemplar response awarded 15 out of 20 B grade.

Section B part a Poetry Anthology Clashes and Collisions Writing on one

Which poems will come up from the anthology?

* Exposure * The Drum * Your Dad did What? * The Class Game These are for practice for the unseen section, and will not come up in the exam

Exam June 2011 Section B(a) question

Collection B: Clashes and Collisions 3 (a) Explore how the writer presents the violent events in Our Sharpeville. Use evidence from the poem to support your answer. (15 marks )

Mark Scheme AO2 language, form and structure

D 79 Thorough explanation of how the writer conveys his attitudes to create effect. Sustained, relevant connection made between attitudes and the presentation of ideas. Sustained, relevant textual reference to support response. C-B 10-12 Assured explanation of how the writer conveys attitudes to create effect. Relevant connection made between attitudes and the presentation of ideas. Pertinent textual reference to support response. A- A* 13-15 Perceptive explanation of how the writer uses attitudes to create effect. Discriminating, relevant connection made between attitudes and the

 What the examiners are looking

for:
Responses may include: The narrator describes her innocence as a young girl at

the start but by the end of the poem her eyes had been opened to the fears about living in Sharpeville at the time of the violence The girl is watching the miners go past without any real understanding of the significance of their chanting (the alliterative phrase foreign and familiar is used to point up the paradox) The images become confused with her memory of

Example A* response
Candidate has perceptive overview of poem and attitudes conveyed, with discriminating use of evidence. Securely in Band 5. An excellent response, with discriminating comparisons and links throughout. Evidence used is perceptive and wide-ranging. Top of Band 5.

On next slide

Example response 14/15 marks

 The reference to the way the pool of blood was becoming

worse by noon grew like a shadow the simile shows the worsening situation. The pool of blood contrasts strikingly with the jade pool of her memories from Sunday School The reference to the burial of dead people: she could hear the mourners even from her gate The alienation that she, as a white girl, feels from the chanting protesters (they were not heroes in my town, but maulers of children) She realises that our Sharpeville has become an object of fear (this fearful thing) The people from the white enclave have become barricaded behind shut

Section B part b Poetry Anthology Comparing two

A03 - Comparisons mark scheme

C 7-9 Specific and detailed comparisons and links. Developed evaluation of the different ways of expressing meaning and

achieving effects. The selection of examples is detailed, appropriate and supports the points being made.
B 10-12 Assured comparisons and links. Pertinent evaluation of the different ways of expressing meaning and

achieving effects. The selection of examples is assured, appropriate and supports the points being made.
A-A* 13-15 Discriminating comparisons and links showing insight. Perceptive evaluation of the different ways of expressing meaning and

achieving effects.

June 2011 Exam Question for Section B (b) Answer 3(b)(i) OR 3(b)(ii)
EITHER (b) (i) Compare how the writer of Belfast Confetti explores different violent events from those in Our Sharpeville. Use evidence from the poems to support your answer. You may include material you used to answer 3(a). (15marks)
OR (ii) Compare how the writers of Our Sharpeville and one poem of your choice from the Clashes and Collisions collection reflect on the effects of violence on society. Use evidence from the poems to support your answer. You may include material you used to answer 3(a). (15marks)

What the examiners are looking for: Section B (b) (i)

Belfast Confetti At the beginning of

the poem, the riot squad arrives very suddenly (as do the miners in Our Sharpeville) The violence of the disruption is shown by the mixture of the hard, metallic objects (nuts, bolts), the gunshots (burst of rapid fire) and the sustained metaphor of the punctuation (raining exclamation marks broken type, asterisk hyphenated line): a very graphic way of showing the way the normal flow of life was broken This interruption even prevented the writer from thinking normally (trying to complete a sentence) The flow of traffic, and the access to streets, are also blocked by the punctuation marks The rhetorical questions the writer frames are again likened to a volley of gunfire (a fusillade of question-marks)

Our Sharpeville NB Points made about this poem may well include some of those listed under (a) above; however, they should be made in a way that supports the comparison and links: The arrival of the miners disrupts her childish game (playing hopscotch) She is happy to stand and watch until she receives her grandmothers fierce warning Normal life (the wellswept streets) is transformed into a threatening scene of death The innocence of a childs life is overturned by the nameless threats People dare not venture out into the streets (brocade curtains drawn tightly)