Four-mark prose question: distinguishing retelling from analysis
A revision group of four Std X students is working on the prose section. Their teacher sets a four-mark question on this extract: 'For six months I had looked past him - a grey man in a grey chair, part of the gate. Then came the night the power failed and the whole colony stood at its windows, and it was his voice that counted the seconds and told us where the stairs were. I have not looked past him since.' Question: How does the writer's attitude to the old watchman change, and what brings the change about? The scheme gives 1 mark for the earlier attitude, 1 for the later attitude, 1 for the cause of the change, and 1 for textual support and coherence. The drafts: Meera retells the extract in six sentences and ends, 'so his attitude changed'; Aniket writes, 'The writer first thought the watchman was useless, then realised he was useful,' and quotes nothing; Fatima writes about indifference turning into respect, quotes 'looked past him' and 'grey man in a grey chair', and names the power failure as the cause. Each answer must stay within 60 words.
1. Mark the three drafts out of 4, justifying each mark by descriptor rather than by length or neatness.
Read the worked answer
Mark against the four descriptors and tick each one as it is satisfied; length is irrelevant unless it breaks the 60-word cap.
Fatima - 4/4. Earlier attitude (indifference shading into contempt: he 'looked past' the man), later attitude (attention and respect: 'have not looked past him since'), cause (the night of the power failure, when the watchman's voice counted the seconds and directed people to the stairs), support and coherence (two short quotations woven into the argument, not appended).
Aniket - 2/4. He gets 1 for the later attitude and 1 for the contrast in the earlier one, but 'useless' and 'useful' describe the watchman's function, not the writer's attitude; a candidate who writes 'he thought he was useless' has half-misread 'looked past him', which is about not seeing, not about assessing. He loses the cause mark (he never names the power failure) and the support mark (no quotation). Hard ceiling: a draft with no cause cannot exceed 3, and with no textual support cannot exceed 2 - apply that arithmetic before you start reading generously.
Meera - 1/4. Retelling earns at most a single mark for implicit understanding. Narration with no abstract noun ('attitude', 'indifference', 'respect') anywhere is the classic trap; the answer has shown the change instead of stating it.
2. Rewrite Aniket's answer so that it earns 3 or 4 marks in no more than 55 words, keeping as much of his own wording as you can, and list the changes you made.
Read the worked answer
Model rewrite (48 words): 'At first the writer thought the watchman was useless and looked past him, a grey man who seemed part of the gate. Then, on the night the power failed, the old man's voice counted the seconds and guided the colony to the stairs, and the writer has respected him since.'
Changes made, in order of value:
- Named the cause - the night of the power failure and the guidance to the stairs. This is a whole descriptor Aniket had left empty, and it is the cheapest mark to pick up.
- Kept his contrast but made it about attitude, not function - 'useless' survives, but is now anchored to 'looked past him' and 'part of the gate', so the abstraction sits on the text.
- Added one short quotation plus one paraphrase - 'looked past him' and 'part of the gate' are lifted; the rest is glossed. Two short quotations beat one long block quotation because the coherence mark follows the argument, not the evidence dump.
- Kept his sentence order - earlier attitude, then cause, then later attitude - which is the order the question asks for.
What I did not do: add a theme sentence or a moral comment. Neither earns a descriptor mark here and both push the answer towards the 60-word cap.
3. A separate two-mark item asks what the phrase 'part of the gate' suggests about the writer's earlier view. Write the answer and explain what would cost a candidate the second mark.
Read the worked answer
Model answer: 'It reduces a living man to a fixture of the building - like a gatepost or a grille, something you pass without greeting. The phrase quietly criticises the writer himself, since he is the one who had stopped seeing a person there.'
Where the two marks sit: 1 mark for the dehumanising reduction (person treated as furniture or scenery); 1 mark for recognising that the self-criticism is the point - the phrase rebounds on the observer, and it prepares for 'I have not looked past him since'.
What costs the second mark:
- 'It means he sat at the gate' or 'he was always near the gate' - a literal gloss that ignores the figurative work of the words. This is the commonest single-mark answer.
- 'It shows the watchman was old and grey' - true of the previous clause, not of this phrase.
- Identifying the device ('it is a metaphor') without saying what it does. Naming a device is not an appreciation of it; the mark follows the effect.
- Reading in a theme the extract does not support, e.g. 'it shows how the poor are ignored by society'. The extract is about one man's inattention, and the generalisation has no textual anchor, so examiners cannot credit it even when it is morally appealing.