If the passage comes from a newspaper you might be asked ...



Features of a newspaper

If the passage comes from a newspaper you might be asked to identify features which help you to recognise that it is from a newspaper. Look out for:

headline, sub-headings, columns, a picture/ photograph, short paragraphs, caption, use of interviews, large initial letter

How does the writer ‘develop this idea’?

When you are asked to show how a writer ‘develops an idea further’ he/she may give more examples to back up his original point.

“There was a time when almost every seaside resort had an outdoor pool…”

Q. Explain how the writer continues this idea in Paragraph 6.

Anstruther, Arbroath, Buckhaven, Macduff, Prestwick, Saltcoats; they all had their own pools. There must have been dozens of them once.

A. He gives a list/examples/ towns/names 1

Alphabetical order/ a geographical spread of towns / towns from all over Scotland

He says there ‘must have been dozens of them’.

All the junk in Scotland meets your befuddled gaze: thousands of unwanted gifts, the “wee something” for Christmas and the “I saw this and thought of you” for your birthday (how you wish they hadn’t); then there are the holiday souvenirs. In short, all the stuff with which we tend to clutter our lives and our cupboards has somehow ended up in one place, awkwardly arranged on a vast number of folding tables.

Q. How does the writer continue the idea of “junk” in the rest of the paragraph.

A. Use of the colon to introduce the list / a list of examples / examples / unwanted

gifts / wee something for Christmas/ birthday gift not wanted / holiday souvenirs /

stuff / clutter our lives

The detective found the sight of his cubby-hole “depressing”.

Q. Explain how the writer continues this idea.

It was depressing to unlock the door of his cubby-hole, switch the light on and see the table barely big enough to hold his kettle and his tea things, the one upright chair, the barred window looking out on a fire-escape and the wall-mounted telephone.

A. Very small table/ only one chair/ upright chair/ the window is barred / looks out

onto a fire escape / wall mounted telephone.

Questions about the end of a passage

How effective is the final sentence/paragraph as a way of finishing the passage?

Look to see whether or not it links with the opening of the passage. If it does explain what the link is. Does it sum up the points made in the passage? If it does, say so and explain how. Perhaps it is a pun or play on words – relevant to the content of the passage. What you are looking for is its relation to the rest of the passage.

True, False, Cannot tell?

Remember that in TRUE, FALSE and CANNOT TELL questions, CANNOT TELL is a genuine option where there is not enough information in the passage to tell you whether it is true or not.

Your opinion

When you are asked to give your opinion of a character or events, or idea you must always refer to evidence from the passage.

Explain fully / Explain clearly

Explain fully/clearly means you must answer in your own words.

Awareness of meaning

Words/phrases which suggest doubt – It is probable, probably, It is likely, perhaps, maybe, It is possible, if

Contrast = opposites

It always looked like the same bow but the colours were different, red and yellow and blue, bright and vivid colours in contrast with her pale, white face…

Q. Write down the two separate words which best convey the contrast between

Doris’s face and her bows.

A. Bright or vivid v pale or white

Context question (What does a word mean and how do you know?)

When the London dodo died, the animal was stuffed and sold to the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford. Taxidermy not being what it is today, over the next few decades the dodo slowly rotted until it was thrown out in 1755. All, that is, except the moth-eaten head and one leg.

Q. Explain how the context helps you to understand the meaning of ‘taxidermy’ .

A. Means stuffed =1; reference to unsuccessful attempt to preserve the dodo = 1

Figures of speech

You need to be able to recognise simile, metaphor, personification, alliteration, and onomatopoeia.

She slopped through the slush

Q. How is the writer’s choice of words effective in describing Asya walking across

the river?

A. He uses alliteration / onomatopoeia or an appropriate description of the figure of

speech = 1 To convey the sound / the conditions underfoot (e.g. it was slippery,

wet, unpleasant) =1

~~~~~~~~

Q. The writer describes the river as if it were a living thing. Give an example of this

and comment on the effectiveness of your chosen example.

Whenever she stopped pushing her boots through the slushy ice, she could hear the river roaring beneath her feet. Soon the ice would begin to heave and crack and the air would fill with a groaning sound as if the whole earth were in pain. Then the river would throw off its mantle and jagged chunks would begin to shift and then bob past the dock.

She could hear his breathing now; his body at full stretch, his blades slicing into the river’s skin… She subsided into a dark hole of water, clutching at the jagged rim, while the river seized hold of her and tore her boots from her feet. The river roared in her ears …

Examples in blue.

A. It makes the river seem human / like an animal. It is coming to life and is

dangerous to her.

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“ … a grey rat squirted out of a bag of potatoes …”

Q. What is unusual about the writer’s use of the word “squirted” in this sentence?

A. It is usually associated with liquids

Q. Why is it a particularly suitable word to use here?

A. It conveys speed/small size/ nastiness/ suddenness of movement/ it is

onomatopoeic/ there is alliteration with “scurrying”

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Her eyes were like the windows of a haunted house.

Q. Identify the figure of speech.

A. Simile

With his free hand he pushed a blue-black lick of hair out of his eyes. His eyes batted from side to side as if they were on elastic.

‘Don’t know,’ said the boy. ‘Sorry. Don’t know.’ His panicky vowels rolled the empty station like skittles.

Q. Identify the figure of speech being used here.

A. Simile

They will surround your table at this early hour like wild dogs around a carcase.

Q. Identify the figure of speech. Explain what is appropriate it about this comparison.

A. Simile. It conveys how they fight / compete =1 over their share/ for the best bits =1

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Q. The expression “furry friend” is an example of what technique? Find other

examples of this technique in this paragraph.

Cats – pah, old hat. Dogs – ha, they’ve had their day. Roll over Rover and pack that catnip, Cuddles – cats and dogs are yesterday’s pets. There’s a hot new furry friend on the block – the house rabbit. Forget hutches and gardens, foxes and fields, today’s rabbit is all about having a place in your home as well as your heart.

A. Alliteration; examples in blue.

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It ripped out of her like something wild kept prisoner for years.

Q. Identify the figure of speech.

A. Simile

Q. Identify the figure of speech in “his hand shot forward like the tongue of a

snake”. What does the expression tell us about how he moved?

A. Simile; he moved very = 1 quickly = 1

Understanding punctuation - Look at how it is being used

Ellipsis …

“We’re interested in the cottage, Mrs …”

“We thought we’d like to try it for a week …” said Rose. “To see if the children like it. Then perhaps…”

Here the ellipsis indicates the character’s hesitation and her doubts about how the other woman will react to her wish to rent the cottage. Also she does not know the woman’s name.

After all there’s a little collection of pressed glass over there that is so irresistible, and the old hand-knitted Shetland shawl that nobody seems to have spotted, and isn’t that a genuine stone hot-water bottle lurking among the rubbish …?

Q. Why does the writer use ellipsis (…) at the end of the sentence?

A. To show that the list could continue / be endless OR that there could be more

Examples

“There’s a lot more to rabbits than carrots and breeding like, er …”

Q. How can you tell the writer is hesitating here?

A. Use of comma, use of “er” / sentence is incomplete / ellipsis or …

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An exclamation mark (!) may be used to show someone is shouting, or to show surprise, shock, excitement, anger etc.

~~~~~~~~~~~

‘ … on board the Australian frigate, HMAS Adelaide …’

Q. Why is the word ‘Adelaide’ written in italics?

A. It is the name of the ship

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Double dashes - - and brackets ( ) are parenthesis. They are used to add extra information.

The driver opened the back door of the taxi and my “aunt”, as we referred to her – really my aunt’s daughter – divested herself of the travelling rugs. She hazarded a foot out on to the gravel – in a pointy crocodile shoe – as if she were testing the atmosphere.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

It was now well into the rush hour: traffic gushed by or fretted at red lights and urgent pedestrians commanded the pavements and crossings.

Q. What is the correct reason for the use of the colon?

A. To introduce a quotation

To elaborate on an idea (

To introduce an explanation

She didn’t mind the ritual but not outside the gates: her pals might see and that would be too embarrassing.

A. To introduce a quotation

To elaborate on an idea

To introduce an explanation (

The use of question marks

But why did the bird come to be called the dodo? It has been argued that the name reflects the bird’s nonsensical appearance. Or that it sounds like the noise the bird may have made.

Q. Explain the writer’s use of the question at the beginning of the paragraph.

A. Allows him to explore / suggest / consider / offer / introduce = 1

Possible explanations / reasons = 1 To involve the reader = 1

There are many other mysteries to solve. Why was it flightless? Why did it live on Mauritius and nowhere else? How did it get there? Finding out takes us right back to the 17th century.

Q. Why does the writer use a series of questions in this paragraph?

A. To show / illustrate / emphasise = 1 there are lots of things to be answered OR how

little we know = 1

Sentence structure

A comment on the length of the sentence may be appropriate whether it is short or long.

There was shouting through a loudspeaker, increased roaring of the engines, throbbing of planes, a movement of the crowd to get the best places on the rails, people running in their fashionable clothes.

Q. What impression does the writer wish to convey in the first sentence?

A. A build up / increase = 1 Of noise / activity / excitement = 1

Q. Explain two ways in which the sentence structure contributes to this impression.

A. List (of noises/activities) lack of ‘and’ / use of verbs (participles)

She stood still and listened. A faint sound. A scythe being drawn against a sharpening-stone. A blade being honed on something hard.

Q. What two features of structure does the writer use to convey the sound Asya

hears?

A. Short sentences / non-sentences (words omitted) / repetition of sentences beginning

with ‘A …’

“The customer’s always right,” he proclaimed one day, as if he could read Henry’s mind. “But only in the store. When buying. Otherwise, they’re only people. Stupid, most of them. Don’t even know a bargain when they see one. So, why give them a bargain?”

Q. What is unusual about the writer’s sentence construction in Paragraph 11?

A. They are short / incomplete / grammatically incomplete.

The road ahead tapered to infinity, in stages. Hill led to hill led to hill, and at each summit the road abruptly shrank to half its width, then half its width again, until it became a hairline crack in the land, then a faint wobble in the haze, then nothing.

Q. Explain how the CONTENT and STRUCTURE of the second sentence in the

paragraph help to make the meaning of this expression clear.

A. CONTENT - The idea of the road halving at each summit; The idea of ‘crack’ to

‘wobble’ to ‘nothing’; The idea of narrowing (tapered) and of distance (infinity)

STRUCTURE – repetition – ‘led to hill’ or ‘hill’ or ‘half its width’; ‘and’

followed by ‘then and ‘then’; Long sentence

All suggesting the road stretching out into the distance.

From out of the nothing now came a speck. It disappeared. It resurfaced as a smudge, then as a fist-sized cloud. A while passed. Finally, on the nearest of the hilltops, a full-scale dust-storm burst into view. The storm enveloped a low-slung pick-up truck, which slowed and came to a standstill beside the car, open window to open window.

Q. Explain how you are made to ‘see’ the approach of the pick-up truck as the writer

saw it.

A. It starts as a ‘speck’ and grows to a dust storm / the idea of it changing / increasing

in size; It disappears and reappears because of the hills; It is difficult to identify

until the last minute

I found him in the garage on a Sunday afternoon. It was the day after we moved into Falconer Road. The winter was ending. Mum had said we’d be moving just in time for the spring. Nobody else was there. Just me.

Q. Why do you think the writer finishes the first paragraph with such a short

sentence?

A. To emphasise / show just how =1 Alone/lonely/ brave / frightened he was =1

Builds to a climax = 2

Gingerly, he tried to reopen the envelope but it was stuck fast and the flap ripped jaggedly.

Q. How does the structure of this sentence emphasise the man’s care in reopening the

envelope?

A. The word gingerly is placed = 1 at the start of the sentence = 1

The Public was all over the shop: poking its nose into everything; trying on the clean new underwear; squirting the testers on its chin, on its wrists, behind its ears; wriggling its fingers into the gloves; squeezing its warm, damp feet into stiff, new shoes; tinkering with the computers; thumbing the avocados.

Q. Identify any technique used by the writer which helps create the impression that

“The Public was all over the shop”.

A. Long sentence/ a list – showing that there was a lot of activity; Use of verbs – lots

of actions taking place

The Public described as a single being – it – as if the same thing was everywhere

The transaction seemed to fluster her, as if she might not have enough money to pay for the few things she’d bought. A tin of lentil soup. An individual chicken pie. One solitary tomato.

Q. How does the writer emphasise that the woman had bought “few things”

By word choice?

A. A/an/one/individual/solitary

By sentence structure?

A. Each item = 1 is in a sentence on its own = 1

Quoting from the passage

Quote/write down - lift/copy from the passage. An expression = a few words or a phrase – do not copy out the whole sentence unless you are told to do so or the sentence itself is one word or only a few words long.

Links

Nothing else to do but look at the clock, the Arrivals and Departures board – on which nothing was imminent – and the people.

Apart from a bag lady who was curled round one of the ring seats like a seal, asleep – or trying to be – the only people using the seats were a young couple….

Q. How does the writer establish the link between Paragraph 4 and Paragraph 5?

A. Paragraph 4 ends with ‘and the people’ and Paragraph 5 then describes the people

there.

Word Choice

The fun had been finding the coins.

Q. Why is the word “finding” in italics?

A. To show / emphasise / stress = 1 how important that the finding of the coin was

(rather than its worth, perhaps) = 1

DODO. The very word conjures up an image – fat, stupid, ridiculous.

Q. Explain why the writer opens the passage with the single word “DODO”.

A. Introduces the topic/ subject of the passage = 1

Makes an impact / catches the reader’s attention

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