LC English cheat sheet

Paper 1 composing is worth 100 marks: one 100-mark essay from a list of seven to eight titles, including a short-story option and a personal-essay option; timing is 170 minutes for the whole paper.

The marking scheme rewards five qualities: relevance to the prompt, coherence and development of ideas, vocabulary and style, accuracy of language (spelling, punctuation, grammar), and paragraph structure.

A discursive essay argues a position: it must state a clear thesis, sustain at least three developed points with evidence or example, and acknowledge a counter-argument before concluding.

A personal essay is judged on reflective honesty and narrative shaping, not on event density: one experience analysed in depth scores higher than a travelogue of unrelated incidents.

Short-story titles require all five elements under control: character, setting, conflict, climax, resolution; a story with no conflict or a twist that negates the narrative loses marks.

Paragraphing is a marked criterion: each paragraph carries one controlling idea, opens with a topic sentence, and is linked to the next by a connective or a repeated key term.

Register must match purpose: a persuasive speech uses direct address and rhetorical patterning, an informative article stays impersonal and factual, a journal entry may be informal.

Length guidance is roughly 750 to 1,000 words; scripts far below this usually lack development, and scripts far above risk losing coherence and accuracy under time pressure.

The comprehension section carries 50 marks and is answered in the same 170-minute paper as the composing task; the passage is unseen and questions follow the order of the text.

Question verbs signal answer type: 'identify' or 'quote' requires lifted wording, 'explain in your own words' forbids copying and requires paraphrase, 'how does the writer' requires comment on technique and effect.

Mark allocation equals required points: a question worth 15 marks typically needs three developed points at roughly five marks each, so count marks before writing.

Context questions on vocabulary require the meaning as used in the passage, not the dictionary's first sense; supply a synonym that fits the surrounding sentence.

Style questions require naming the device (metaphor, hyperbole, repetition, rhetorical question), quoting it, and stating its effect on the reader or the argument.

Functional writing tasks (letters, articles, reports, reviews, speeches) carry their own marks for format: correct salutation and sign-off for a letter, headline and byline for an article, headings for a report.

The functional writing piece has a named audience and purpose stated in the prompt; adopting the wrong register, such as slang in a formal letter to a principal, loses format and style marks.

Answers should be written in continuous prose with the question number, and quotation should be brief and embedded; long unanalysed quotation earns little credit.

Paper 2 is worth 200 marks and is taken in 200 minutes; candidates answer three sections, one of which is the single text studied in depth.

The single text section offers a set of questions on the studied text, and candidates answer one; questions may target a theme, a character, a relationship, a turning point, or the opening and closing of the text.

A strong answer states a clear argument in the introduction, supports it with at least four to five specific textual references, and returns to the question in the conclusion.

Quotation should be short, accurate, and integrated into the candidate's own sentence; paraphrase is acceptable if precise, but invented quotation is penalised.

Character questions require development across the whole text: how the character is introduced, how they change, and what the change reveals about a theme.

Theme questions require the theme to be traced through at least three separate moments in the text, not asserted once and illustrated from a single scene.

Answers must address the exact wording of the question; a prepared essay on the same text but a different angle typically scores in the lower band.

Personal response is marked: candidates should state and justify a view of the text, not merely summarise plot.

The comparative section requires study of three texts, at least one of which must be a film, and candidates answer one comparative question in Paper 2.

Comparison must be sustained throughout: each paragraph typically treats the same idea in two or three texts, rather than treating texts one after another in blocks.

The three modes of comparison are general vision and viewpoint, theme or issue, and cultural context; the question names the mode and the answer must stay inside it.

Key moments for comparison are the opening, a turning point, and the closing; comparing how two texts open or resolve is a high-frequency question shape.

Literary genre comparison treats the conventions of the form: how a novel, a play, and a film each handle narration, dialogue, or point of view.

Film evidence must use film language - camera angle, lighting, sound, editing, mise-en-scène - not plot summary described as if it were prose.

Links between texts should be explicit: use connectives such as 'similarly', 'in contrast', 'whereas', and name both texts in the same sentence.

The comparative essay needs an introduction that frames the mode and a conclusion that states what the comparison reveals, not a restatement of each text's plot.

The poetry section offers a named poet studied in depth, with questions asking about themes, feelings, and the poet's use of language and imagery across several poems.

Answers must range across at least three or four poems by the named poet; a response confined to one poem cannot reach the top band.

Poetic technique vocabulary includes metaphor, simile, personification, alliteration, assonance, sibilance, onomatopoeia, enjambment, caesura, and stanza form.

A technique point requires three parts: name the device, quote it precisely, and explain the effect it creates on meaning or feeling.

Sound devices are analysed by how they slow, speed, or soften a line; sibilance often creates a hushing or sinister effect, plosives a hard or abrupt one.

Rhythm and form matter: note rhyme scheme, line length, and where a line breaks, since enjambment can enact movement, hesitation, or overflow of feeling.

A theme question asks how the poet explores an idea, so the answer should trace the idea from poem to poem rather than summarising each poem in turn.

Personal response to poetry is marked: state which poem or image affected you and analyse the technique that produced that effect.