How did you revise for English exams?
Hi there,
Great question. My studying strategy depended on the section, so here's a breakdown (does not matter what the text is, however). Just a quick note, my way of studying is by no means perfect, and not the only way, treat recommendations as a grain of salt, the best method of revising is always the one that suits you the best.
Section A/B Text Response:
Contrary to what some may believe, I did not do too many essays compared to others- only about 5 completely new and different essays for each section. I spent the majority of my time completing plans, because this exposed me to a wide variety of exam topics, and using this method (i did close to 100 plans for both sections), I actually got an essay topic that I did before on the exam
Just note, that this does not mean you should try and 'guess' the topic, but as a result of widening your knowledge of essay prompts, there is a greater likelihood that you may come across something similar on the exam.
What did I do for each plan? Well, I had a 'generic essay' that I understood very well and nearly memorised the key parts (key evidence points and good sentences), and so I practised adapting my 'generic essay' to new essay prompts. So from my experience a lot of essay topics are quite similar so try and be efficient and rather than writing 10 essays on very similar topics, perhaps do 1 essay, and then 9 plans if they all focus on the same ideas.
For example, look at these topics, I used the same basic plan for all three (again the texts doesn't matter):
1) Despite the circumstances in The Longest Memory and The 7 Stages of Grieving there is still hope. Discuss.
2) ‘Neither text offers any hope for the future.’ Compare how the texts portray the idea of hope for the future.
3) To what extent do the two texts suggest that racial discrimination may be overcome?
4) ‘The oppressed characters in both texts are never fully defeated by the brutality they experience.’
(Quick side point, always be careful memorising essays, you should never just copy and paste a previous essay or try to intentionally memorise one, but if you have a series of talking points that you seem to be able to use in a lot of essays, then hold on to them and try and use them again - because for every sentence you don't have to think in the exam, that is going to save you a lot of time. I can elaborate more on this if you want because this is something my fellow peers are worked on and it worked well for us in the exam.)
Here is a sample of what areas I would memorise (again text does not matter) - bolded parts are the parts I would 'memorise'
As a microcosm for corrupt capitalism, the plantations in D’Aguiar’s Text expose the economic impetus for despicable abuses of power that were justified upon the erroneous assumption that “Africans [were their] inferiors.”
Such horrors are crystallised through the overseers use of the whip that “ate” into victims and “chewed without swallowing,” as the sole purpose of these “public display of savagery” was to assert the hegemony of master and slave.
Equally nefarious is the buying and selling of slaves who were viewed as merely “chattel”, further exposing the callous prioritisation of profit that eroded individual identity, and in turn, inflicted psychological oppression."
And so when I do plans, first I plan out topic sentences, then I try to fill in the unbolded parts (refer to above)
But just to summarise, don't feel like you need to churn out an essay every day to do well, you need to balance breadth and depth - so I personally did plans first, and then closer to the exam period, I would practice turning plans into essays. Remember writing full essays under timed conditions doesn't always improve your writing (since it's a summative task), it definitely will improve your time management if that's what you're aiming for. But if you want to improve how well your essay answers the prompt, detailed plans are the way to start.
Section C:
- Slightly different to Section A and B since you can't pre-prepare much. However, this DOES NOT mean you cannot do some of the writing at home. Here is what I prepared for the argument analysis:
- Intro Structure
- Topic Sentence Stems
- How + What + Why sentence stems
Also, slightly different from A and B, I would actually recommend practising more essays and plans here, since it's important to finish these essays quickly
Hope these help, I will update this post if there is anything I need to clarify / expand on