English Paper 2 How to maximise my grade

Eddyburn95

I am worried about aspects of Paper 2. I achieved 110/200 on paper 2 in the mocks. I am unsure of how to study poetry properly i find my notes get too extensive and i have no way of learning them off. I now have a good understanding of dickinson and larkin, though in reality i need to learn more poets, i got 24/50 on a quoteless dickinson answer, in the mocks so maybe i should learn more quotes. As for Macbeth, it really bores me, I have no idea at all about it, in the mocks i knew what was coming up so i learned notes on lady macbeth and got 36/60 in the question, but that wont be an option in the leaving, i have 2 weeks to go and i know nothing about macbeth. For comparitive study im fine if theme or issue comes up, but i dont really understand cultural context or general vision and viewpoint, due to my weaknesses with paper 2 I will struggle to achieve over a C1, i got 63 percent in the mocks, paper 1 is no problem, i would like to maximise my grade, how does one achieve a solid B grade.

dee_mc

I'd recommend forming 'character profiles' to help develop your Macbeth answers. Choose quotes to back up aspects of each character's personality/profile.
Condense your poetry notes: bullet points are really helpful. Again, link key quotes to bullet points as relevant. Remember that one-word quotes and references to the poem are every bit as valuable as 'chunks' of quotes: as long as you have the essence of the poem, and refer to it in a worthwhile manner, you don't need to quote extensively.
leavingcertenglish.ie has really helpful advice on how to approach the 3 areas of the comparative study.
Value quality over quantity: if you've made and backed up your points, stop. Examiners aren't bothered about word counts, they just want you to answer the question you were asked.
I'm a firm believer that writing is more valuable than reading when it comes to preparing for English exams, so practice, practice, practice!

Lara_15

Ok, this is hard to explain so bear with me...

Mindmaps are my main method of studying english, they work for all aspects of paper 2. Particularly poetry and comparative. Theyre basically essay plans put into mind map form, they summarise everything onto one page so its easy to learn.

For comparative I divide it up topic by topic, so lets say its a Cultural Context one... I will have 5 bubbles, each of which is a topic e.g. role of women, attitude towards religon, social class etc. Then out of each bubble I have 3 other bubbles one for each text. Then I have at least 1 quote (usually in a different colour to make it stand out) that backs up the comparison

Then for poetry I have one mindmap per poet, lets use dickinson for an example, I take all the aspects of her poetry (like dashes, capitalisation, fascination with death etc) and give them each a bubble with a few bullet points written about it and at least 2 quotes (again in a different colour)

I got a B1 in the pre overall.

I hope you understand how I explained that hahaha, if you have any questions let me know, or I could PM you a picture

Janeh9

I find your ability to write coherently and express yourself is as important as learning things off. I got a B1 in my paper 2 mock and I hadn't gone over anything in detail. I only vaguely knew Dickonson because we'd gone over her in class. Try to focus on your style of writing as much as learning your quotes