Saint Roch S Secondary School

Saint Roch’s Secondary School

English Department

Close Reading Skills

Booklet

Questions about Linking sentences.

A linking sentence is one which links two paragraphs together.

Usually this sentence will appear at the start of the second of the two paragraphs which are being linked.

Look carefully at the sentence which is the link. There will be two parts to this sentence. One part will refer to the content of the paragraph before.

The other part of the sentence will introduce the subject of the new paragraph.

You have to say what refers to the previous paragraph.

And then, what refers to the topic of the new paragraph.

Example 2006 Credit paper question 10

Question: How does the first sentence of paragraph 11 act as a link between paragraphs 10 and 11.“But the proclivities of such contestants and their parents in no way represent the general participant.

Answer :”Proclivities” refers to the way the specific contestants in paragraph 10 behavedand “general participant” introduces the main idea of paragraph 11 which is typical(general) contestants.

Contrast question

A contrast is a comparison which shows up the differences between subjects. The writer is deliberately pairing two ideas together to show up the difference which will be important in some way.

For example, in “Romeo and Juliet”, Shakespeare continually compares Juliet to the sun or to a star. The idea he is conveying is that she is above everyone around her. Everyone else is dark by comparison and she brings light into Romeo’s life.

Questions often ask you to state what the contrast actually is. Contrast is the pairing of opposing ideas, for example large & small or dark & light.

Example: 2005 Credit paper question 9

Question: In your own words give two contrasts the writer noticed on his journey from Cairo to the countryside.

“To leave the enormous sprawling dust-blown city of gridlock and gritty buildings was bliss… we were in open country, little settlements of square mud-block houses… a solitary car or truck ,and on one remote road twenty men going home after prayers.”

Answer:lots of traffic in Cairo / but none here (1) and enormous size of city / small settlement.

Sentence structure questions.

How the sentence is put together is often significant. Structure is used to reflect meaning. If you wish to suggest a balance of ideas then the sentence you make up can show this.

Eg. “He is good at Maths; but his English is weak.” The semi – colon marks the point of balance here.

In the same way any imbalance can be reflected in the structure.

Eg. “He is good at Maths: but in English, French, Biology, Chemistry, History, Geography, Art and P.E. he is hopeless.”

In answering these questions you need to look for the feature which makes the structure significant. Thjs could be a minor sentence (no verb), repetition, unusual order of words in sentence, very long or short sentence, a punctuation feature (like lots of questions, commands,etc.) or a rhetorical question. There is a separate page on types of sentence you may read.

There are two things for you to do here.

you must note what it is that has been done, what is unusual about the sentence

and

you must explain what effect this has on a reader, what it makes the reader think.

Example General paper 200

Ken is lucky that Julie can drive one of the trucks, change the 2 feet high tyres, make sure Alex does his school lessons on his laptop, cook, make sandwiches and dish out the £2 tickets.

Question:How does the structure of the whole sentence help to reinforce the idea of how busy Julie is between Easter and October ? 2/1/0

Answer: the sentence is a long list (1) to show the many things she has to do (1).

Some structures Effect they achieve

“Failure!” / Dramatic, attention grabbing.
“Who ? Me ? Why ? How ? “ / Questions show either doubt or mystery
He failed his exam. / A simple statement of an idea.
He failed English, maths, science, art and history / A list suggests quantity
He failed everything; he never paid attention / An explanation usually what comes after the semi-colon qualifies what came before.
He failed English, his maths just didn’t add up, science was a bad experiment for him, art was surreal and he could never remember dates. / A series of sentences join to make one long sentence to suggest quantity.

Word choice questions

These questions are asking you to do two things

First identify words which are being used for effect

Then, explain what their effect is.

The effect is what the word makes you think.

This phrase (“makes us think”) should appear in your answer.

When a question asks you to comment on word choice think of the associations the identified word(s) will conjure up in a reader’s mind.

When you answer you should use the formula:

The word "...... X...... " suggests that ......

"...... X...... " makes us think about ......

Some examples of word choice questions from past papers:

2001 Credit paper " ... divested herself of the travelling rugs. She hazarded a foot out onto the gravel. "

What impression of the aunt do you get from the writer’s choice of the words “hazarded” and “divested” to describe her movements ?

2002 " The transaction seemed to fluster her, as if she might not have enough to pay for the few things she'd bought. A tin of lentil soup. An individual chicken pie. One solitary tomato.". "

How does the writer emphasise that the woman has “bought few things” by word choice ?

2003 "In Mauritius, something as apparently benign as the introduction of the pig proved fatal for the dodo."

What does the writer’s use of the expression “apparently benign” tell you about the introduction of the pigs (to the island)?

2004 He was breathing heavily and the smell was inconceivably foul; it was the reek of rotting flesh, of festering wounds, of ancient perspiration, and of fear.

Explain fully how the writer emphasises the smell through word choice.

Example 2007 credit paper Question 11

Comment on the writer’s use of word choice and sentence structure in her description of the clouds in the final sentence of Paragraph 14.

“offending” (1) suggests clouds are doing something wrong/ blocking the light (1) OR “horizontal bars” (1) suggests image of restricting thelight (1)

Questions which say "write down an expression"

This type of question is asking you to find an expression (or group of words) in the paragraph that you are directed to which tells us something important.

Usually this piece of information is so important that it is worth two marks. So normally you will see 2 / 0 against the question.

This means you write down one thing, but get two marks for it.

The clue is in the question. For example, if a question said “Write down an expression which tells us Jo is angry” then you know to go looking in the paragraph for words which carry the idea of “angry”.

It could be “I was fuming” or “I almost lost the head”, etc.

You just have to find it and write it down.

Do not write down the whole sentence.

Remember, an expression is not a complete sentence.

Example: 2002 Credit paper

There was a stranger seated at the kitchen table, a most horrible and wild stranger who looked worse than the brigands of childhood tales.

Question:Quote the expression that sums up Pelagia's impression of the stranger.

Answer: most horrible and wild

IN YOUR OWN WORDS questions.

Unless you are sure you are being asked to quote, you should always answer in your own words. This is the only way to show that you really understand what the writer is saying

Some advice on tackling any one of these questions:
When you read this you know that the answer is right there in the paragraph you are told to look at.
You can take confidence from this.
You only have to look carefully at the lines or paragraphs you are told to look at, find the answer/line/idea and put it into your own words
These questions are testing your vocabulary.
You must say the same thing, but use other words to do so.

Questions on context

These questions are closely related to word choice as they are concerned with meaning.

The question often asks you to show how the context (the words which appear near to it) helps you to understand the meaning of a word or phrase.

You have to do two things:

a. say what you think the meaning is

and

b. say which words nearby help you to this meaning.

Question: Show how the context helps you to understand the meaning of the character being “disruptive.”

Answer:The context = those words around the word disruptive.

He is disruptive, as he never does his work, disturbs the rest of the class and talks too much.

SO you need to point out the words which help you to understand the meaning.

There is one easy way to deal with this question; take out the word/phrase you have to give the meaning of and read the sentence(s) without it. Then ask yourself "What's missing?"

This will give you an idea of the meaning.

Example 2003 Credit paper.

When the dodo died the animal was stuffed and sold to a museum. Taxidermy not being what it is today the dodo slowly rotted.

Question:Explain how the context helps you to understand the meaning of "taxidermy" in paragraph 9.

Answer:If you follow the advice above you will probably think the word "stuffed" is the big clue. If the animal "rotted" then it would not have been stuffed properly. So, the meaning is stuffed.

Notes on how to approach the questions in general

IMAGERY ask you to explain the image – this means saying what picture the reader gets, perhaps a comparison is made or an image is symbolic of an idea, etc. Think – how appropriate is this image ? The image will convey or illustrate the writer’s purpose in some way.

DEVELOPMENT asks you to explain how the idea is taken further by telling us more, giving an example, an illustration, or going on to use the same kind of language in following sentences.

WORD CHOICE asks about the effect of using a word or phrase – this means the connotations of the word used, what it makes us think of. Your answer must point to the effect of the chosen word(s).

SENTENCE STRUCTURE involves how the sentence is put together. Look to see how the sentence is unusual or different. The structure reflects the meaning or purpose of a writer. Look at the punctuation, repetition, balance in the sentence, word choice and especially syntax.

TONE asks us to think of feelings ( anger ,sarcasm ,excitement, humour, sadness,) and of how formal or informal the language used actually is. – the signs of informality are apostrophes used to indicate words joined (it’s, he’s, etc.), slang or colloquial language used, a “jokey” approach, etc.

SYNTAX is the order of words in the sentence – is the important word left to the end of the sentence ? why ? is the word order unusual ? why ? Is a word or phrase unexpected ?

SOUND – words which actually sound like the action they represent are called onomatopoeic words ( e, g, crash , whoop , thud , etc.) Poets use sound to reflect meaning.

CONTEXT - asks you to look at those words immediately beforeor after the word / phrase identified, usually to find words / phrase of

Formula for answering some of the close reading questions

The linking question
Show how the sentence beginning … acts as a link in the writers argument /
acts as link between paragraphs / Identify what links with previous
And HOW
Identify what is introduced
And HOW
The context question
Show how the context helps you to arrive at the meaning / understand the meaning of …… / Identify words of similar meaning
From elsewhere in text
Or find example / illustration from elsewhere.
The sentence structure question
Show how the writer uses sentence structure to convey his feelings / attitude.
Comment on the writer’s use of sentence structure. / Identify the structure operating
And show how this fits in to purpose
The word choice question
Show how the writer uses word choice to convey his feelings / attitude.
Comment on the writer’s use ofword choice. / Identify operative words.
Comment on what these suggest to us.
Then link with writer’s purpose
The tone question
Identify the tone of lines … and comment on how the writer establishes this tone. / Think of the tone of voice it is delivered in and then HOW this tone is created
Often this is followed by a question asking you how the tone is created. Usually you will find words or phrases which do so. You need to show that these convey the tone.
The conclusion question / You are asked to evaluate the effectiveness of the conclusion. See the sheet on conclusions and how to conclude a passage / essay.
The idea developed question / You are identifying how the writer tells us more about something; he can repeat the same idea in a different way, or explain further, or give an example or illustrate the ideas concerned in some way.
The "expression" question / This is really just another word choice question. You have simply to find the expression according to the directions in the question. You need to remember not to write down a whole sentence. An expression is a word or SMALL GROUP of words - not a sentence.

Notes on how to approach the questions in general

DEVELOPMENT asks you to explain how the idea is taken further by telling us more, giving an example, an illustration, or going on to use the same kind of language in following sentences.

WORD CHOICE asks about the effect of using a word or phrase – this means the connotations of the word used, what it makes us think of. Your answer must point to the effect of the chosen word(s).

SYNTAX is the order of words in the sentence – is the important word left to the end of the sentence ? why ? is the word order unusual ? why ? Is a word or phrase unexpected ?

SOUND – words which actually sound like the action they represent are called onomatopoeic words ( e, g, crash , whoop , thud , etc.) Poets use sound to reflect meaning.

CONTEXT - asks you to look at those words immediately beforeor after the word / phrase identified, usually to find words / phrase of

Punctuation help sheet.

When do we use

commas ?

, /

to separate items in a list.
to introduce a quote.
to introduce direct speech.
to make the reader pause at certain times in a sentence.

When do we use
dashes ?
- /

to give extra information in a sentence.
to make the reader take a pause.
to mark out a word or phrase from the rest of the sentence (Maths is great – not.)

When do we use
Inverted commas ?
“ ” /

to show the words actually spoken
to show that we are talking about the title of a book or film or poem, etc.
to show that we are quoting someone else and these are not the writer’s own words.

When do we use
semi colons ?
; /

to join two (or more) related ideas
to separate items in a list when there are commas in the sentence already.
to join several sentences into one very long one.

When do we use
colons ?
: /

to introduce a list.
to introduce a quote.
to give more information about an idea.
to punctuate a play.

When do we use
ellipsis ?
…. /

Dots used to tail of a sentence
To show gaps in a piece of writing

When do we use capital letters ? /

at the beginning of a sentence.
for names .
for initials.
for the beginning of a section of direct speech.
for titles of books, newspapers, films, etc.

for acronyms (like BBC or STV or CSI)