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What are your tips for reading task time management Paper 1 Advanced English? (1 Viewer)

Momentazeus

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Should I read the passages until i find all of my evidence and then move on or is it better to read the whole passage? I wanna have time to spare.
 

okkk

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Certain markers search for certain points to be made regarding the text (our school got a senior marker to mark our reading section and she would write things like "perhaps you missed the ultimate irony that...") so I'd say read THE WHOLE TEXT. However, the way to save time is to not write too much on the earlier questions. Keep the rule in mind, one mark = one quote + technique +effect. So for the 3-4 markers, 3-4 short sharp sentences that directly answer the question should do it and that only takes about 3 minutes to write.
 

notme123

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Certain markers search for certain points to be made regarding the text (our school got a senior marker to mark our reading section and she would write things like "perhaps you missed the ultimate irony that...") so I'd say read THE WHOLE TEXT. However, the way to save time is to not write too much on the earlier questions. Keep the rule in mind, one mark = one quote + technique +effect. So for the 3-4 markers, 3-4 short sharp sentences that directly answer the question should do it and that only takes about 3 minutes to write.
i agree with the one-to-one quote-to-mark ratio but ill provide an actual anecdote regarding reading the whole text.
personally i spent 55mins on short answer and 35mins on the essay (cuz thats basically the amount of essay time youre given for paper 2). for the last saq stimulus i was running low on time so i had to skim the text which was about this daughter talking about her actress mother. i didnt know this fact at the time because it was revealed in the last line of the text which i didnt read so i was blindly analysing this text and somehow got through (got 4/5). im not saying you should read every line because thats unrealistic but start, middle and end should suffice. theres not really one solid way to approach this section but if you dont get the meaning straight away, thats ok just answer the question with the quotes youve found.

also, this is advice for everyone and i know this is a bit too late, but when finding quotes dont go looking for techniques cuz you wont find them quick. rather, look for relevent quotes and find techniques afterwards inside your chosen quotes.
 

okkk

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i agree with the one-to-one quote-to-mark ratio but ill provide an actual anecdote regarding reading the whole text.
personally i spent 55mins on short answer and 35mins on the essay (cuz thats basically the amount of essay time youre given for paper 2). for the last saq stimulus i was running low on time so i had to skim the text which was about this daughter talking about her actress mother. i didnt know this fact at the time because it was revealed in the last line of the text which i didnt read so i was blindly analysing this text and somehow got through (got 4/5). im not saying you should read every line because thats unrealistic but start, middle and end should suffice. theres not really one solid way to approach this section but if you dont get the meaning straight away, thats ok just answer the question with the quotes youve found.

also, this is advice for everyone and i know this is a bit too late, but when finding quotes dont go looking for techniques cuz you wont find them quick. rather, look for relevent quotes and find techniques afterwards inside your chosen quotes.
Interesting cos I normally have it the other way, I try to shave off 5 minutes for my essay. To be fair, the common mod essay is probably the easiest one to get 20 on (your texts and questions are the same as standard) so I've found that as long as my essay is long (1100+ words) and I address the question with scope, I sit pretty comfortably in the 20 range.
 

jackmccowan

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Interesting cos I normally have it the other way, I try to shave off 5 minutes for my essay. To be fair, the common mod essay is probably the easiest one to get 20 on (your texts and questions are the same as standard) so I've found that as long as my essay is long (1100+ words) and I address the question with scope, I sit pretty comfortably in the 20 range.
Your writing 1100+ words in 45 mins??
 

d1zzyohs

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Your writing 1100+ words in 45 mins??
that's not too much. if you go in with an essay memorised or even half-memorised, and you have fast writing, you can write 1200+. now, a lot of the students who would write 1200+ dont write anything of substance though.
 

Life'sHard

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that's not too much. if you go in with an essay memorised or even half-memorised, and you have fast writing, you can write 1200+. now, a lot of the students who would write 1200+ dont write anything of substance though.
Kind of contradictory. Memorised essays have a lot of substance. It’s the way you tailor it to the question that makes the difference.
 

d1zzyohs

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Kind of contradictory. Memorised essays have a lot of substance. It’s the way you tailor it to the question that makes the difference.
i wouldn't say so... why do memorised essays immediately have substance? people across the whole academic range in english memorise essays... strange.
 

ExtremelyBoredUser

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i wouldn't say so... why do memorised essays immediately have substance? people across the whole academic range in english memorise essays... strange.
I'm kinda doing a hybrid approach, I'm not fully memorising but I'm not rocking up purely blind. I've kinda done many practice essays to the point where I know where to use certain techniques so I have like an innate structure which allows me to have that speed you get from memorisation but I'm not like imprisoned by structure or arguments so I can be flexible in my analysis. Same with Mod A, I just pick out two arguments and I have a certain list of techniques that is just easily adaptable and I just put that in.

For Mod B I kinda memorised the analysis for each poem lol and if I have to because of the question I can just switch out some quotes and analysis. For Mod C I have a draft essay which has a core idea but I can adapt it on the day depending on the stimulus so I'm fine there, I just know what I'm going to talk abt in reflection and my piece is based off that.

Not sure how everyone else is doing but it worked nice for me.
 

d1zzyohs

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I'm kinda doing a hybrid approach, I'm not fully memorising but I'm not rocking up purely blind. I've kinda done many practice essays to the point where I know where to use certain techniques so I have like an innate structure which allows me to have that speed you get from memorisation but I'm not like imprisoned by structure or arguments so I can be flexible in my analysis. Same with Mod A, I just pick out two arguments and I have a certain list of techniques that is just easily adaptable and I just put that in.

For Mod B I kinda memorised the analysis for each poem lol and if I have to because of the question I can just switch out some quotes and analysis. For Mod C I have a draft essay which has a core idea but I can adapt it on the day depending on the stimulus so I'm fine there, I just know what I'm going to talk abt in reflection and my piece is based off that.

Not sure how everyone else is doing but it worked nice for me.
yep, exactly what i'm doing. have done so many papers that there is a distinct structure to my essays, but i haven't rote memorised anything.

so many different structures for mod b depending on the emphasis of the question.
 

Life'sHard

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i wouldn't say so... why do memorised essays immediately have substance? people across the whole academic range in english memorise essays... strange.
“It’s the way you tailor it to the question that makes the difference” nice straw man argument btw. I should also clarify that I’m assuming that the essay is of decent quality and has been marked and reviewed multiple times by teachers, tutors etc.
 

pikachu975

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Should I read the passages until i find all of my evidence and then move on or is it better to read the whole passage? I wanna have time to spare.
When I did paper 1 I just found most of (or all, I forgot) my techniques during reading time so that was helpful as I could only write like 800-900 words in 40 min for my essay.
 

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