GCSE English Language is an important foundation for many of the courses you may take in employment or further education, and a requirement for many university courses. It is a core subject, which helps you to develop your powers of self-expression and improve your reading and writing. It is a qualification essential for your future school and university studies, but it is also a skill you will make use of in all aspects of your life.
GCSE English Language is designed to develop and enhance personal skills of reading, writing, speaking and listening, and to encourage learners to be inspired, moved and changed by following a broad, coherent, satisfying and worthwhile course of study. It will prepare you to make informed decisions about further learning opportunities and career choices and to use language to participate effectively in society and employment.
What is involved in the English course?
GCSE English Language covers a wide range of basic language knowledge and skills. It will allow you to develop a good understanding of a wide range of texts from the 19th, 20th and 21st centuries, including literature and literary non-fiction as well as other writing such as reviews and journalism. You will have the opportunity to read and evaluate these texts critically and make comparisons between them, as well as summarising and synthesising information or ideas.
You will use knowledge gained from wide reading to inform and improve your writing, being able to write effectively and coherently using Standard English appropriately. You will develop your use of grammar and punctuation as well as acquiring and applying a wide vocabulary, grammatical terminology, and linguistic conventions for reading, writing, and spoken language.
How will you be assessed?
The course requires you to sit two exam papers. The first is a Creative Writing and Reading exam. Paper 2 explores the Writer’s viewpoints and perspectives.
You will also sit a Spoken Language Component which involves an independent presentation which is videoed and submitted to the exam board.
What can you do with English in the future?
Almost all jobs and careers require you to have GCSE English Language. The skills and knowledge that you will learn through the qualification will ensure that you are prepared for life.
There are several careers that would directly lead from studying this course, which include law, teaching, lexicography, journalism, Public Relations, marketing, and job roles within the media.
What do you need to do to prepare for the course?
You will need to be able to engage with the complex language of 19th and 20th Century non-fiction. Reading non-fiction such as blogs, diaries, articles now will help this. You will need to also understand a range of structural features; reading fiction will support this. https://www.amazon.co.uk/s?k=aqa+english+language+revision&i=stripbooks&ref=nb_sb_noss_2
Reading, reading, reading! Please do not under-estimate the power of this. It broadens your vocabulary; it enables you to create powerful imagery; it gives you an insight into emotion, tone, and mood. This is key to your success in this paper.
Student/Staff/Famous Person quote about the subject
“The development of language is part of the development of the personality, for words are the natural means of expressing thoughts and establishing understanding between people.” –Maria Montessori
Why is English Literature important?
GCSE English Literature is important in everyday life because it connects individuals with larger truths and ideas in a society. Literature creates a way for people to record their thoughts and experiences in a way that is accessible to others, through fictionalized accounts of the experience.
What is involved in the English Literature course?
This is a core subject which all students are expected to study at GCSE level. As part of this course, you will read the following core texts:
An Inspector Calls by JB Priestley
Macbeth by William Shakespeare
A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens
Power and conflict poetry anthology (provided by AQA)
This course allows you to access and develop a wide range of basic language knowledge and skills. These include understanding a word, phrase or sentence in context, exploring aspects of plot, characterisation, events and settings, and distinguishing between what is stated explicitly and what is implied.
You will be able to identify the theme of a text, as well as being able to support a point of view by referring to evidence in it. You will be expected to understand writers’ social, historical, and cultural contexts and use this to make informed personalised responses that derives from analysis and evaluation of the text.
You will be able to analyse and evaluate how language, structure, form and presentation contribute to quality and impact, as well as using linguistic and literary terminology for such evaluation. You will compare and contrast texts, writing effectively about literature for a range of purposes.
How will you be assessed?
You will sit two exam papers. Paper 1 focuses on Macbeth and A Christmas Carol. You will receive an extract and will need to make links to the wider text.
Paper 2 involves you writing an essay response to An Inspector Calls, as well as writing a response to two of the conflict poems and two unseen poetry questions.
What can you do with English Literature in the future?
Almost all jobs and careers require you to have GCSE English Literature. The skills and knowledge that you will learn through the qualification will ensure that you are prepared for life.
There are several careers that would directly lead from studying this course, which include law, teaching, lexicography, journalism, Public Relations, marketing and job roles within the media.
Literature teaches us how to live. Literature makes the reader visit places, experience events, meet people, listen to them, feel their joys and sufferings. It takes years to acquire so much wisdom that a single book of literary merit instils in a reader. Literature mirrors the society and its mannerisms.
Student/Staff/Famous Person quote about the subject
“The answers you get from literature depend on the questions you pose.” –Margaret Atwood
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