Check the exam board and current paper instructions. AQA 8702 uses two closed-book papers with required extracts or poems supplied: Paper 1 covers Shakespeare and the nineteenth-century novel; Paper 2 covers a modern text, anthology comparison and two unseen tasks. This is not a universal description of every board.
AO1 concerns understanding, personal response and textual references; AO2 analyses language, form and structure. AO3 concerns text/context relationships. AO4 includes vocabulary and sentence structures for clarity and effect, with accurate spelling and punctuation. Tasks do not all assess every AO.
Check the board before revising
In the exam
Read the question and instructions, including any choice, passage scope and required wider-text reference.
Plan a working argument with relevant evidence. There is no compulsory planning duration, point count or paragraph acronym.
Use the available marks and reading demands to organise time, leaving room to check what you have written.
Support interpretation with accurate quotations or precise references. Explain methods and context where relevant; a PEEL paragraph and a context sentence in every response are not requirements.
Preparation serves the task
Revising
Make prompts about themes, development, methods and precise wording. Try answering before turning a card or checking notes; record errors for later practice.
Practise timed essays and self-mark against the mark scheme.
Use mind-maps for characters and themes; retrieval practice (blank page recall).
Look at examiner reports and model answers.
Turn revision into checked recall
Common errors
Avoid neglecting instructions, replacing interpretation with retelling, inventing quotations, listing terms without explanation, or using unrelated context. A missing paragraph acronym or a short quotation bank is not itself an error.
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