How do people do so well in english?

Hiccuping

I got my english mock back today and got 59%
The highest in my class was 70% so i did fine comapred to everbody.
any tips?

doolox

Read all the "good" literature that you can find and adopt their writing style. Good literature is defined as any old books written by the likes of Dickens, Shakespeare or articles in the Irish Times....stuff your English Teacher reads.

You have to get yourself into the middle aged mind of a middle class teacher and this takes practice.

I am more interested in History and I am continuously amazed at the very high standard of English in accounts and letters written by people from fairly junior positions on the battlefields of The US civil War, The Crimean War and WW1.

The standard had got more casual by WW2 and certainly by the Vietnam War.

It would appear that a high social premium was placed on being able to express oneself eloquently from the 1830's until the 1920's and this emphasis on a high standard of language expression diminished in modern times.

Also because Marking schemes in languages are not a precise yes/no situation as you find in Maths related subjects it is hard to argue a particular score.

You will always find some genius who can get 95% to 100 % in Maths and can find the exact mistake that cost them the marks, but you cannot do that in English.

spurious

Read the Classics.
Austen, Hardy, Bronte, Dickens, Stevenson, even Agatha Christie.
Words you do not know, look them up.

Many people over 50 (those setting the exams) will have been reading three novels from the library every fortnight at your age, on top of books that had to be read for school.

Read and read some more. Then read again.

There is still a high social premium on being able to express yourself eloquently and clearly. Reading will help for both writing and speaking.

silverharp

I got a B in the LC many moons ago but tended to be a C student on average when it came to class work, I got it into my head to be very aware of the questions being asked coming up to the exams , so for example for a question about a character in a play I made sure to always give both sides of the case in equal measure. I'd wondered since if it was that simple, I was never a good creative writer but Ive a vague memory that there was an essay choice which fitted into my for/against structure so maybe just ticked the boxes for them.
Ive a son in first year and their English teacher has given them some "point analyse something something" to structure their work, I'd look out for these