!! English HL 2015 - ALL things HL English, predictions, discussion etc.

Chicharito11

Basically, If I want to get my C in English then I have to get a very good mark in Paper 1 as it's my best area of the course. Need any tips, anything at all!!!

ThatsTheShtuff

English -

poetry - John montague, John Donne, Eilean Ni C, Robert frost

Comparative - theme or issue is a hot topic! And literary genre

Othello - Othello/Iago character question, dramatic techniques

Should be covering at least 5 poets.
We have done
1. John Montague (major focus)
2. John Donne
3. Eilean Ni C
4. Robert Frost
5. Yeats

Wouldn't touch Dickinson or Plath,
The top 3 there are definitely ones to rely on!
Don't only cover 2 or even 3, that doesn't make sense.

P.s. Don't disregard Eilean Ni C, she seems complicated
And no one likes her, but for that reason it will go in your favour
To answer on her!! Nobody will take her, yet the question given will
Be straight forward once you know her poetry! They especially
Won't give too hard a question because they don't want to put us off her!

Gryffindor

Just found a really great resource for all the prescribed material

http://www.connemarafm.com/audiopage.html

If you go to 'West Wind Blows' there's a lecture on all the poets, Othello and the essay paper. They're about an hour long each but it's a really great refresher!

if832uspx4eogt

It's such a pity Dickinson came up last year, she's by far my favourite poet and I always find that I write a better essay if I've something good to say, not just learned off themes. And I've a lot to say on Dickinson!

Jijsaw

Jasmine Magnificent Slugger wrote: »

It's such a pity Dickinson came up last year, she's by far my favourite poet and I always find that I write a better essay if I've something good to say, not just learned off themes. And I've a lot to say on Dickinson!

She could come up again. I think some poet has to come up that was on last year, just to throw off students.

I'm edging more towards Dickinson appearing though, as some students might just learn Yeats because of his 150th birthday anniversary.

Pray for Frost or Montague (preferably Frost but beggars can't be choosers)

DarraghF197

Jasmine Magnificent Slugger wrote: »

It's such a pity Dickinson came up last year, she's by far my favourite poet and I always find that I write a better essay if I've something good to say, not just learned off themes. And I've a lot to say on Dickinson!

She's a bit too complicated to understand, for me. I find some of her poems very interesting, but poems like 'After Great Pain, a Formal Feeling comes' to be very hard to interpret. I feel like she's like Plath, but then they really are completely different.

I find Plath amazing to read though! And she's by far the least likely to come up this year

About predictions, I believe Dickinson has a great chance of coming up this year. If any of the women are coming up, I believe she is the most likely.

if832uspx4eogt

I find Frost so boring. The only remotely interesting one is Provide, Provide. Or maybe my teacher just picked his bad poems.

if832uspx4eogt

DarraghF197 wrote: »

She's a bit too complicated to understand, for me. I find some of her poems very interesting, but poems like 'After Great Pain, a Formal Feeling comes' to be very hard to interpret. I feel like she's like Plath, but then they really are completely different.

I would have loved to have studied Plath but she's extremely unlikely but then again the SEC love a good joke at our expense. My teacher believes ENC isn't coming up cause everyone will bank on her cause she's new.

I love how Dickinson can be read in different ways. For example, for the poem A Narrow Fellow In The Grass I'm comparing it to how people today still don't associate with "otherness" just because it's different to what they know. Her poems are the most relevant today out of the poets I've done anyway.

DarraghF197

Jasmine Magnificent Slugger wrote: »

I would have loved to have studied Plath but she's extremely unlikely but then again the SEC love a good joke at our expense. My teacher believes ENC isn't coming up cause everyone will bank on her cause she's new.

I love how Dickinson can be read in different ways. For example, for the poem A Narrow Fellow In The Grass I'm comparing it to how people today still don't associate with "otherness" just because it's different to what they know. Her poems are the most relevant today out of the poets I've done anyway.

Plath would have had a good chance to come up if she wasn't on for the next couple of years as well. If she comes up this year, then she'd certainly not come up the year after, and thus nobody would study her. ENC is on next year and in a few years, and, like your teacher says, she's way too obvious.

Dickinsons poetry may have different ways of reading it, but I find myself struggling to understand parts of her poetry. I also lost all my notes for her, so I relied on Shmoop for guidance through her poems (who were clueless themselves! They literally just said, 'if you don't understand this, then don't worry, because we don't either'). I find that they would be very interesting if I was able to interpret her lines.

I was thinking about studying 'a Narrow Fellow In the Grass' myself. It looked quite interesting and seemed to be about her relationship with a boy when she was younger, iirc? My favourite one of Dickinson is 'a Bird walked down the... (name escapes me!), talking about how we're detached from nature and explains the vulgarity of it when nobody is watching. Really cool techniques in it such as 'grass' mingled with glass. Probably an easier poem to understand!

if832uspx4eogt

Well to me that poem is about literally meeting a snake in the grass, and the snake is a metaphor for otherness in the world in general.

My favourite has to be After Great Pain, a Formal Feeling Comes and sheer hopelessness of it..

ThatsTheShtuff

Gryffindor wrote: »

Just found a really great resource for all the prescribed material


If you go to 'West Wind Blows' there's a lecture on all the poets, Othello and the essay paper. They're about an hour long each but it's a really great refresher!

Thats my teacher for poetry
He has predicted Eilean Ni C, Frost, Montague, Donne!
Podcasts on Connemarafm are well worth a listen, everybody!

d1234

Listened to the Frost podcast - was really good and 4 of the 5 poems are what I'm actually studying. Good little refresher course! Great find and thanks for sharing

irishlad12345

playing the playstation while listening to the podcast best of both worlds :P

OMGeary

Think Dickinson is far more likely than ENC to come up. Would love if she does.

ThatsTheShtuff

OMGeary wrote: »

Think Dickinson is far more likely than ENC to come up. Would love if she does.

ENC has never come up, i'd be very surprised to not see her on the paper.
Plus, students generally find her hard to study, so for the ones that have studied her and choose her on the day, they will be at an advantage in that nobody will answer on her, giving those who do the added originality, their ideas will stand out, etc etc. just my opinion!:)

Deranged96

ThatsTheShtuff wrote: »

ENC has never come up, i'd be very surprised to not see her on the paper.
Plus, students generally find her hard to study, so for the ones that have studied her and choose her on the day, they will be at an advantage in that nobody will answer on her, giving those who do the added originality, their ideas will stand out, etc etc. just my opinion!:)

To be honest half the country, from what I've seen, is banking on ENC.
If she pops up be assured that she'll be a far cry from the least popular poet on the question

Gryffindor

Jasmine Magnificent Slugger wrote: »

I find Frost so boring. The only remotely interesting one is Provide, Provide. Or maybe my teacher just picked his bad poems.

How dare you I kid, but you obviously haven't done Design or Birches?

ThatsTheShtuff

Deranged96 wrote: »

To be honest half the country, from what I've seen, is banking on ENC.
If she pops up be assured that she'll be a far cry from the least popular poet on the question

Doesn't bother me either way as i don't think i'd pick her,
I'm hoping for the lads, Donne, Montague or Yeats

Peregrine

ThatsTheShtuff wrote: »

ENC has never come up, i'd be very surprised to not see her on the paper.

Yeah but she's new on the syllabus. Well, she wasn't one of the prescribed poets for the past 8 or 9 years anyway.

Kremin

Nim wrote: »

Yeah but she's new on the syllabus. Well, she wasn't one of the prescribed poets for the past 8 or 9 years anyway.

That could be a reason why they don't put her on though? Out of the 4 english classes in my year, my class is the only class who didnt do her because my teacher said she really doesn't like her poetry.

The three other classes are banking on ENC coming up because she's never been on the course before..

Honestly I'm not going to spend too much time on poetry. In the end its only 50/400 marks and the time spent on it in my opinion is far too long.

6Gains

Anyone doing Brooklyn by Colm Toibin for the comparative have any notes?

oktplz

How do people edit down their answers? Not finishing the paper is my biggest fear.

OMGeary

oktplz wrote: »

How do people edit down their answers? Not finishing the paper is my biggest fear.

Know how much time you have for each paragraph.
i.e. I know that comparative =6mins per paragraph
Othello is 7 and poetry is 5 etc.

d1234

Usual debate - how much to write for P2:

Othello - 5pgs
Comp study - 6pgs
Poetry - 5pgs (4 or 5 poems???)

All going well that's how much I hope to write - realise though it's about quality at the same time.
Does this seem ok??

IrishLoriii

Just wondering how you guys study your comparatives?? I know quotes but find it really hard to contrast Juno and the Paycock with How many Miles to Babylon and the Kings Speech..would really appreciate help please

ThatsTheShtuff

Timing-wise, i wouldn't get hung up on paragraph timing, otherwise you're going to keep distracting yourself, looking at the clock! Really and truly, it comes down to roughly an hour each, and 25 minutes (ish) for unseen poetry.

Certainly allocate an hour for Othello, which is advisable to answer first.
Then, one should answer the Comparative question, again 1 hour. (Be aware that the straight forward question usually does better than the question with a part (a) and (b).
It's important to answer unseen poetry BEFORE answering your prescribed poet, it gets it out of the way before the end, yet you're giving yourself enough time to answer it well, as opposed to the tendency of giving too much time to say, Dickinson, and realising the exam is almost over and you still have Unseen to rush through! It requires 5-6 minutes minimum of reading through, over and over, to gain the best understanding you can. Those minutes just for thinking are crucial if you want to get a good score in the Unseen section. Once you have the gist of the poem, its only a matter of quickly answering the questions.

The biggest mistake I made in the mock is leaving Unseen til last, meaning i didn't have enough time.
This was down to giving too much time to answering the Montague question, in which i rambled and wrote too much.
I ended up getting an A2 overall, but I'm aiming for certainly an A, preferably an A1, in the real deal


So answering format is as important than timing:
1. Othello Q
2. Comparative
3. Unseen
4. Prescribed Poetry

DarraghF197

Does anyone think it's a bit ridiculous the way poetry is only 50 marks? I know they try to set up the exam so that how much you write equates to the marks allocated, but we have learned 7 poets. I'll be leaning five, and under 30 pages of notes. I think they should do poetry a bit different and have it worth more relative to others. Maybe I'm a bit biased, as it is my favourite section by far!

Kremin

DarraghF197 wrote: »

Does anyone think it's a bit ridiculous the way poetry is only 50 marks? I know they try to set up the exam so that how much you write equates to the marks allocated, but we have learned 7 poets. I'll be leaning five, and under 30 pages of notes. I think they should do poetry a bit different and have it worth more relative to others. Maybe I'm a bit biased, as it is my favourite section by far!

Honestly I don't see why they don't do poetry like the comparative, have 3 poets, let the students do 2 in depth instead of 5.

Digital Solitude

Kremin wrote: »

Honestly I don't see why they don't do poetry like the comparative, have 3 poets, let the students do 2 in depth instead of 5.

The vacancy would be filled with some other shíte to take up class time

Or not, might have enough time to actually cover the HL maths course in detail of we could pull extra classes from English due to a smaller syllabus

cathal545

story lads new to boards, reckon if i study good owl Monty and Frost i'd be good? might be able to squeeze yeats in there but it wont be anything amazing if i do. So yeah reckon ill be grand with Montague and Frost, still bit of risk but english was something i never concentrated on, which i ultimately regret now of course but ah well. Cheers