Bury Church of England
High School
GCSE English Language
OCR Revision Guide
Section A – Writing
All Tiers of Entry
Mrs Brannon-Barnett 2015
 Create a revision poster for Key Stage Three classes which shows them
how to use colons and semi-colons correctly.
 Practise writing simple, compound and complex sentences.
 Practise creating your own techniques.
 Work through the list of past writing questions, creating fishbone plans
and practising writing introductions/conclusions and then working up to
full answers in 50 minutes.
 Go through an example of your own writing – either a practice one you
have done or one from a mock exam - and “highlight & label” the
following writing skills:
o
o
o
o
o
o
o
o
o
Linked paragraphs
TIPTOP paragraphs
Linked intro and conclusion
Short sentence for effect
Personal pronoun
Alliteration
Rhetorical question
Complex sentence (with accurate comma)
All the different connectives you have used.
Commas!
LO: To revise placing commas in sentences correctly.
a) What job do commas do? Create a page explaining how commas should
be used for a pupil in a lower year group.
b) Pick out three sentences from your work/ a practice question/mock
exam where you have made errors with commas. (Place a star in pencil
in the margin.)
c) Copy the first sentence you have just picked out into your book but
make the correction as indicated. Annotate the sentence, explaining
how the punctuation works!
Then, as if it was magic, I felt myself falling.
These commas are separating the subordinate clause from the rest of the
sentence.
d) Repeat with the other two sentences you picked out.
e) Try to write an additional paragraph or a response to your letter but
respond to your EBI targets.
f) Swap your work with a friend or revision partner so they can check you
have responded to my advice.
Techniques!
LO: To develop the range of techniques I can use in my writing.
a)
Create a mini-glossary for the most challenging techniques: metaphors, assonance
and consonance. Give definitions and examples if you can at this point.
b) Read the poem “Anthem For Doomed Youth” by Wilfred Owen.
Anthem for Doomed Youth
What passing-bells for these who die as cattle?
Only the monstrous anger of the guns.
Only the stuttering rifles' rapid rattle
Can patter out their hasty orisons
No mockeries for them from prayers or bells,
Nor any voice of mourning save the choirs,—
The shrill, demented choirs of wailing shells;
And bugles calling for them from sad shires.
What candles may be held to speed them all?
Not in the hands of boys, but in their eyes
Shall shine the holy glimmers of good-byes.
The pallor of girls' brows shall be their pall;
Their flowers the tenderness of patient minds,
And each slow dusk a drawing-down of blinds.
c) Identify at least one example of each on the poem. Try to explain the effect it has –
you can annotate this information on the sheet or cut the poem out of this sheet
and glue it down and annotate around that as an alternative to writing out the
quotes if you prefer.
d) Re-read your mock exam writing response. Identify a section which has the fewest
ticks. Re-draft that section, aiming to include examples of metaphor, assonance
and consonance.
e) Swap your work with a revision partner and see if they can identify, highlight, label
and explore the effects of your choices. (WWW/EBI)
Spelling!
LO: To investigate a range of spelling strategies to help
improve my work.
a) Read through your Controlled Assessment, pausing each time I have
identified a word which is incorrectly spelt.
b) Write down the word as you did originally.
c) Look up the correct spelling in the dictionary.
d) For each word explain what you did wrong i.e. missed out a letter/
forgot to double the consonant etc. – is there a pattern forming here?
stoped
I forgot to double the
consonant at the end of the
word before I added -ed.
It should say stopped.
e) Write out each word five times, using the look-cover-say-write-check
method.
f) Make these sets of words plurals:
1
2
3
4
Bag
Table
Light switch
Lady
Book
sausage
Church
Baby
ruler
horse
box
Monkey
cup
plate
dish
holiday
Can you work out the four rules for converting single nouns into
plurals?
g) Choose two or three of the most challenging words and make up a
mnemonic or an acrostic poem to help you remember it
OR
Draw a visual representation of the word so that the letters create a
picture.
Paragraphing!
LO: To analyse my use of paragraphs and make improvements
in my practice.
a) What does TIPTOP mean?
b) What is the purpose of paragraphs?
c) Read through the story about the space ship. Make a note of the
different “titles” each paragraph could have. How do these “titles” link
in with the idea of TIPTOP paragraphs?
d) Have a close look at a piece of writing you have done. This could be from
a mock exam or a practise you have done as part of your revision. Make
a list of the “titles” you could use in your piece of writing.
e) Where could you have used the rules of TIPTOP to refine your
paragraphing? – Indicate where these breaks should go.
f) Cut up your story/work and glue it into your book however, as all
paragraphs need to be linked, leave room to rewrite some sentences to
ensure that your paragraphs are coherently linked.
eg.
Cut up bit of your work
blah blah blah linking word blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah
blah blah
blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah linking word blah blah
blah blah
Cut up bit of your work
g) Pass your re-written paragraphs, complete with links, to a revision
partner to see if they can spot your recycled words.
These are all examples of
writing questions
which have appeared on exam papers over the last few
years. Work through this list, identifying ’open’ and
‘closed’ questions, creating fishbone plans and practising
writing introductions/conclusions before working up to
full answers in 50 minutes.
1) Do we worry too much about the welfare of animals?
Write your views
[40]
2) A local newspaper is featuring a series of articles called ‘Help!’
Write an account for the newspaper of a time when you, or someone you know,
needed help.
[40]
3) ‘Children nowadays are encouraged to grow up too fast. The pressures to behave like an
adult destroy the enjoyment of being a child’
What do you think? Write the words of a talk to your class giving your views.
[40]
4) Write about a celebration you attended which turned out to be more enjoyable than
expected.
[40]
5) The trouble is there is no deterrent these days.
Write your views
[40]
6) Communication is out of control and so teenagers and criminals can get too organised too
quickly. Facebook is more trouble than it is worth.
Write a personal diary entry or blog about a time when social networking has caused you, or
someone you know, a problem.
[40]
7) Write about a time you travelled at great speed.
8) Speed Kills Campaign
Write a letter to your local council asking for better road safety enforcement
in your area.
9) Do we worry enough about a healthy lifestyle?
Write your views.
[40]
[40]
[40]
10) “Does my bum look big in this?”
[40]
Write a personal diary entry or blog about a time when you have felt under scrutiny by those
around you.
Look at this example response to the exam question. Read through
and find a topic or title for each paragraph and see if you can
highlight the words that have been used to create links between the
paragraphs. Also read through the text and see if you can spot and
annotate a) techniques and b) different kinds of sentences.
1) Write about a time when you have been scared.
[40 marks]
The beacon crackled over the „com and shattered the silence on the bridge.
Captain Sandros was frozen at the helm, partly in shock, partly in awe. We had
finally found her: the HMSS Jubilee. One hundred and thirty-seven souls had
been aboard when we lost contact with them from the out-post on Galaxos,
including none other than Duke Ferdinand who had been the royal guest of
Admiral Blackett when the Queen‟s newest battle-cruiser began her maiden tour
of duty. She had been magnificent in orbit and many vessels, both military and
civilian, had gathered to watch her drift away through the heavens to embark
on her mission. It was a different sight which met our eyes now.
People back home on Earth think there is nothing to see out here. They
describe it as a wasteland, a dark void, space; they couldn‟t be more wrong. On
our search and rescue mission, travelling through the Cisa Delta, we have seen
all sorts of space junk, meteors and anomalies floating amongst the stars in the
black but still nothing could have prepared us for this.
Filling our screen, a dark shape listed to starboard with weak light from a
distant sun highlighting the jagged metal fuselage and fragments of debris
spiralling like tiny metallic comets nearby. Some kind of ignited fuel leak,
maybe? A collision? Surely not an attack? Scans confirmed our worst fears: the
weapons array remained intact but life support was inoperational. Search and
Rescue had just become Search and Recover.
The away team waited nervously as our recovery pod docked at the HMSS
Jubilee. The sound of my own air supply rattled through my helm, reminding me
of my own vulnerability. My suit and boots made movement slow and
exaggerated: a parody of movement. What old footage of the first moon landing
did not prepare any cadet for, was the ice and the claustrophobia. One hundred
and thirty-seven souls had withered behind that docking bay door. I prayed for
the strength to face the demands of my mission: recover data from the ship‟s
computer and find out what had happened on board this craft. “In space no-one
can hear you scream.” Doesn‟t stop every fibre of your being demanding you give
in and let out a primal howl once you realise you are making your way on board a
huge metal coffin.
Finally the huge metal bulkheads gave way to the oxy-acetylene torch of our
engineer. We were through. My crew mates headed to engineering to see if
they could get life support back on-line and maybe salvage CO2 scrubbers or
other useful parts for our own ship. Studying the ship‟s schematics, I turned
towards the bridge to recover what data I could from the ship‟s computer.
Hopefully something in the Captain‟s log would give us a story to tell the grieving
at least. After a short time, following corridor after corridor, lights flickered
above me and a crackly voice through my headset confirmed my colleagues‟
success. I released my visor with a hiss and suppressed the urge to heave as
the first lungful of rancid air hit me; the CO2 scrubbers were surely damaged in
the „event‟. With main power now restored, the hatch doors would now open
easily enough.
The approach to the bridge soon became anything but easy. More than once I
was forced to squeeze under fallen corridor supports or climb over broken
furniture and various panic-strewn detritus. I started to notice the blood fairly
soon. It started out as just a few drops near my feet but soon escalated to
splatter, coating the walls from floor to ceiling. Drips that had once frozen and
hung in the air were now viscous and subject to gravity once again; almost
beautiful in a macabre way. The bridge door was the worst. I stopped in my
tracks. This had been no fuel leak. Blood coated the door and nearby walls with
desperate, shaky finger marks scrawled through it. Here and there words were
legible: “out”, “dead”, “save” and “hel. . . “ were all I could read. Help? Hell? My
palms were sweating inside my gloves despite the temperature. The hair on the
back of my neck stood on end. My stomach churned and my legs burned to carry
me far away from this place but my mission had brought me here and I would
not betray my unit. With every ounce of courage that I could summon up I
pushed forward. Reaching for the door emergency override switch, I checked in
with my team and silently braced myself for Hell.
We float in silence now. My new team, my new crew mates, run ragged fingers
through the torn and tattered fragments of my soul. One hundred and thirtyeight of us are here now, luring more to join our legion of the lost, screaming
silently, watching our own corpses freeze once more in a pantomime of our pain.
The mystery of our deaths is the strength which binds us and increases our
numbers. The mystery, the silence and the black, black, blackness is our fate.
All of this is punctuated only by the hailing beacon crackling away on an open
„com channel.
Typically clauses begin with
the following kinds of
words:
 -ing words (like in the example)
 -ly words (usually placed in
front of an -ing word)
 -ed words (often as a pair of –
ed words to explain the
emotions of the speaker or
character.
 Connectives (now you can start
a sentence with because; you
just have to ensure you hitch the
main part of the sentence on the
end rather than leave a clause
hanging alone.)
 Question words (who, what,
where and which help to explain
more about the character or
speaker)
It is possible to change the place of the clause. Sometimes it can go at the start, sometimes it
can go at the end and sometimes it can be placed (embedded) inside the sentence. You will get
more marks for varying how your sentences are structured.
Freddie the Fishbone Planner
Do a spider
diagram of
ideas FIRST
Helps you to plan your writing tasks.
A colon is used to introduce a list of items or ideas. Make sure that the words
before it make a complete sentence. Replace words like including or such as.
A semi-colon can be used instead of a connective in a compound sentence.
Make sure that either side of the punctuation is a complete sentence.
Spend 10
minutes
planning
Fishbone Planner
Remember
to “Hook”
your reader
with an
attentiongrabbing
first
sentence;
try
rhetorical
questions or
anecdotes.
TIPTOP
paragraphs
must be
linked!
Introduction
Conclusion
Rhetorical Devices:
A complex sentence is made up of a simple sentence and a clause which is separated by a comma. The clause does not
make sense all by itself and usually starts with a –ing, -ly or –ed word and can be placed before, after or within the sentence.
Refer to
your plan as
you write
your essay