Poppies -Jane Weir

Revision notes for Poppies by Jane Weir

Exposure - Wilfred Owen

If you missed the lesson or missed some key points, you can use this video to help.

War Photographer analysis video

For revision, this is a nice, brief analysis of the poem. Also see the lesson annotations, below.

War Photographer annotations

My Last Duchess

Some interesting thoughts on 'feminine beauty' here. Worth having for reading around your understanding of My Last Duchess.

Annotation for Storm on the Island by Heaney

Annotations for Remains by Armitage

Annotations for Prelude (extract) by Wordsworth

Edmund Burke on the Sublime

This video was shown today in English to help us to understand some of the ideas behind the section of Wordsworth's Stealing a Boat extract.

Introduction to William Wordsworth

Not all of this will be directly relevant to the poem we are studying but worth a look for some context on Wordsworth.

Simon Armitage - an introduction

Here is a nice interview to get you into the mindset of the brilliant Simon Armitage.

Annotation on London, by William Blake

Some revision videos

These are really helpful videos to walk you through an approach to the exam on Monday. Have a pen and paper at the ready and revise along with the videos.

 

Revising Section B: Writing

For this question, you will be given an image and (more than likely) you will need to write a description using the image as a starting point. This is a description.

A DESCRIPTION!

Not a story.

You will be marked on your ability to describe.

To describe:

add adjectives onto nouns

add adverbs to your verbs

make your verbs more interesting.

example:

The dog bit the man

becomes

The ferocious beast tore at the helpless man's flesh viciously.


You MUST also use similes (he was like a building), metaphors (he was a building), personification (the building stared at the man.)

Then you will be marked on your accuracy: your spelling, punctuation and grammar.

So,

vary your sentence types for effect. Use a one-line paragraph amongst your longer paragraphs to create an impact.

Make sure you use a range of punctuation (at least 4 different types).

Ensure your vocabulary is imaginative and your spelling is accurate.

Good luck!

Some notes on the 'Personal Response' question

This is a long question (20 marks) so leave yourself at least 25 minutes to have a good go at it. The question will be posed to ask you for your own personal thoughts. There is an example question at the bottom.

Remember: even though it is asking for a personal opinion, you need to explain your ideas using language AND structure analysis.

Also, the length of the answer should reflect (roughly) the marks it is worth. I have seen too many question 4 answers that are shorter than questions 2 or 3. This is like having a big lovely three course dinner to eat but only eating the starter...you're going to be left hungry!

...okay, perhaps it is a weak metaphor, but I just wanted to get a metaphor in there.

Here is the example question and afterwards there is a picture of some kittens in a barrel to calm you down. You're welcome.

A student, having read this section of the text said: “The writer brings Tom’s and Atticus’s characters to life for the reader. It is as if you are in that courtroom with them.” To what extent do you agree?

In your response, you should:

•write about your own impressions of the characters

•evaluate how the writer has created these impressions

•support your opinions with quotations from the text

(20 marks)

 

 

 

 

 

 

Revising Language

The language question is worth 8 marks to you. You should spend about 10 minutes on it. Remember: you will be awarded more for the depth of your analysis rather than simply listing all the points you see.

To do well, you should try to include:

• At least 3 separate points explored in detail

• At least 3 separate quotations

• To ‘zoom in’ on some elements of the text (offer layers of interpretation). Pick on individual words. Even pick on punctuation if you think there is something to say.

• Subject terminology

Here is the good example answer we looked at in the lesson:

It says Tom’s skin had ‘begun to shine,’ suggesting the courtroom is a hot place, but later we learn that ‘his discomfort was not from the humidity.” There are two things here that would give a sense of atmosphere, first of all, the acknowledgment that the room humid makes the reader feel discomfort of the room physically. However, Tom, it is implied, is sweating from nerves. The nervousness of Tom helps create an atmosphere because as a reader, we feel what it would be like for Tom, a black man, to be telling the story that he is in court.

His nervousness is also shown through the pauses and repetitions in his speech, “…she says – she was laughin’, sort of – she says…” The hyphens serve to break up Tom's speech and reflect his reluctance to tell the story and therefore helps to build an atmosphere.

Atticus’s demeanour is juxtaposed with Tom’s as he asks his questions with brevity and calmness, “I understand you, Tom. Go on…” This makes Tom’s account feel more pressured and therefore adds to the sense of atmosphere.

The fact that Atticus has to repeat his questions: “What did he say?...What did he say, Tom?” builds a sense of tension because we get the sense that what he is about to say is terrible. Before he says the line, Tom is described as “shut[ting] his eyes tight” showing his reluctance again, for what he needs to say.

Revising Structure

Remember: you will need to talk about how the structure of the text (the building blocks of how it is put together) affects the reader.
For example: Bad weather might create an ominous atmosphere; it may told in a non-linear order to withhold information and keep the reader guessing; it may open with a setting to build a clear image for the reader to know where the action will take place; it may be told in a first person narrative so we get to see the events through the narrator's eyes which may make it more exciting/ terrifying/ melancholy (etc).

To approach this question, think of the famous Bowie song: Let's SCANCE!

SETTING –

How do we know where and when the book is set?

Where does the scene open?

Where does it move to?

How does all this help to tell the story?

 

CHARACTER –

Do we know who the protagonist is? How?

Are they there immediately or later?

How might this affect what we think of these characters?

 

ATMOSPHERE –

What is the tone of the scene?

What is it meant to make the reader think or feel?

Does the atmosphere change during the passage? Why? How?

 

NARRATOR –

1^st 2^nd or 3^rd person?

What is the effect of the choice of narrator?

Who are we encouraged to feel empathy or sympathy for? Why?

 

CHRONOLOGY –

 How does it begin?

What happens by the end?

 Is it linear or non-linear?

What is the effect of releasing the information in this order?

What happens at the end?

Is it cyclical? (Does the narrative go back to the beginning again?)

 

EVENTS –

What happens during the first few lines?

What happens by the end?

How do the events engage the reader?

Are the events plausible? (believable) Can we relate to them ourselves?

 

 

William Blake's radicalism - context on his poem, 'London'

William Blake - London

Nice intro to this poem.

Year 10 homework

As with the homework over the Christmas holiday, your current homework is to revise for your exam next week.

If you want to get yourself ready for next week's homework, I want you to think of a song that you like lyrically. You will be doing an AMAPP analysis of it.

To pre-empt any "but I don't know any songs with good lyrics," excuses, I have picked one for you if you can't pick your own. These lyrics are wide open to interpretation:

Annotation for Ozymandias

Bryan Cranston Reads Ozymandias

Here is the best reading of this poem in the world. I'm not all that big on spoken poetry because I feel that hearing someone else's voice biases you towards their personal reading if it, but I make an exception to this reading because it's awesome.

Ozymandias

We are kicking off this unit with an absolute colossal heavyweight: Ozymandias by Percy Shelley.

Poetry introduction

For those of you who need a little confidence for the prospect of analysing poetry, this short video should sort you out (unless you dislike Rhianna)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ebd-0bjUjZk