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Any tips for English A1 at HL?


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Read all the books, but not skim - I mean read, and reread if you don't understand something. Read your texts with an eye on structure, character, key ideas/motifs/tropes and note these down. If any images or narrative details stand out to you, note them too. I feel like I'm repeating what 90% of teachers say, and I used to not do this myself thinking it was unnecessary, but when I actually did it improved my writing incredibly. Plus for the Literature in Translation essay, these notes will save your life. If you have a list of page references and a short description of what is on these pages, your life will be made so much easier when you're writing the essay because let's say, for example, you remember something but can't remember where it is in the book. Instead of flicking through countless pages, you can just look at your list of page refs. I'll send you what I did for mine via PM if you wish.

 

In terms of writing, planning your essays out in advance if you have time can be very helpful. Make sure to not just name the effects that the literary features have but HOW/WHY they have the effect. Avoid listing basic things such as metaphor and simile unless they majorly affect the text, it's too basic. Instead, find a list of literary devices and not only memorise their definitions but use them. If you're too lazy to memorise all, then at least some. The English A Course Companion has a list of these in the back. If you can use words like zeugma and stichomythia in an essay, it sounds more impressive and legitimate even to me as a student, let alone to an IB examiner. However, this doesn't mean you should throw in big words cause it looks pretty bad when not used correctly. Spelling and grammar mistakes should be kept to a minimum - preferably none at all. Avoid contractions (i.e. use do not instead of don't, will not instead of won't, etc). Don't let your sentences drag out too long either - it gets boring and if you talk about more than one thing (which you most likely will in a long sentence) then the reader may be confused about the grammatical subject.

 

For the IOP, PREPARE IN ADVANCE. The ones in my class that got high 6s/7s generally worked weeks, or at least several days, in advance and the ones that did it the night or two before generally got 4s. Have a topic that is deep enough to speaking for 8 minutes about, but not too deep so you don't actually run out of time to make your main points. Make eye contact with your audience and move around - even if it's just your arms - as this engage the audience and consequently whoever is grading you. Practice your presentation to get an idea of how long it'll be and see if you need to add more or take out some things.

 

For the IOC, I'm not doing mine till November so I can't give you any personal experience with that. The advice that was given to me was make careful notes to yourself as you work through the material, focusing especially on those aspects of the texts that speak to you personally. Buy a diary or journal, write in the margins of your books, underline words, phrases, ideas that jump out to you. Doodle, draw, make a scrapbook, be creative. These notes don't have to be long, a word or a scribble is enough to make these texts yours. Make these texts yours.

 

That's all my brain is willing to dump atm, hope it helps :)

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https://www.examtime.com/guide/ib-courses/

This website pretty much completely reiterates what Mr. Bankole said above, and it gives you a place to do all of those things, as well as keep them in the same place. I keep all the notes for all the books I've read in Mind Maps and Notes on that site, and it has saved me numerous times. Definitely read and re-read the books, take notes on page numbers, and stay prepared ahead of time.

 

Good luck!

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  • 2 weeks later...

Get your class to pressure your teacher to make you mostly read poetry and drama or at least short stories. Novels are going to give you bad time, because there really isn't enough time to read and thoroughly analyse 8-10 novels. Also makes revision so much more easy.

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