ATAR Notes: Forum

VCE Stuff => VCE English Studies => VCE Subjects + Help => VCE English Work Submission and Marking => Topic started by: StupidProdigy on June 05, 2015, 03:55:26 pm

Title: Language Analysis-please mark anyone! :)
Post by: StupidProdigy on June 05, 2015, 03:55:26 pm
article-->http://www.smh.com.au/national/since-when-has-naplan-been-a-house-price-guide-20150602-ghel47.html
analysis is attached. Thanks :))
Title: Re: Language Analysis-please mark anyone! :)
Post by: StupidProdigy on June 09, 2015, 07:23:07 pm
bump! anyone please? :)
Title: Re: Language Analysis-please mark anyone! :)
Post by: heids on June 10, 2015, 03:37:22 pm
Concern over the reflection of academic achievement of children in NAPLAN testing has recently evoked the uncertainty of parents and the worth of their children’s schooling.  The context/stimulus is actually more Zyngier's piece. Michelle Green’s opinion article “Since when has NAPLAN been a house price guide?” for The Age critically examines the “misleading” correlation between the results of children and their real estate area. It's actually more related to selection of schools, I think – note of course that she's CEO of Independent Schools Victoria - always pay attention to someone with a vested interest like this, she's subtly supporting independent schools throughout; the reason why she wrote this article is probably because Zyngier's article suggested public schools were better.  I think you've missed this point. Her article comes as a response to an editorial piece by education lecturer David Zyngier. Green contends in an emphatic and critical tone that national tests should not be the only basis for parents selecting the best school for their children and location for their family. It is proposed by Green avoid passive voice, 'it is proposed BY Green' – active ('Green proposes', the person doing something is the subject) is much snappier and nicer that there are more suitable methods for parents to select an appropriate school, specifically rejecting aptitude testing scores of a school as a significant factor. Accompanying this article is a visual of three young primary school children working in unison. By highlighting the relevance of testing on young children, it follows that always cut out unnecessary words, especially in the intro the article is targeted to a parental or guardian audience.

Green introduces her stance on the issue with the rhetorical title, clearly elucidating the contention and seriousness of her article, instilling her beliefs onto the reader immediately. The title captures the attention of matured reader’s due to its relevance to house owners with families, and subsequently stimulates such an audience to question the relevance between NAPLAN testing and real estate. Notably, Green attempts to attract this audience early in her piece by imposing herself as inclusive with its members, referencing her belonging by utilising the personal pronoun “we”. This establishes a feeling of responsibility for the readers in regard to the issue, however it also infers that the author may share similar conditions to the reader, that is, the author may have children of her own which go to school.Nice point! - so the author is then credible/relatable/more believable.  But, I think you've drawn this too far – I can only see this word used once. (?) Unless you see it being a major thing, where one of the author's major ways of arguing is to align themselves with the audience, DON'T talk about it.  Examiners get sick of 'inclusive language', you can say nearly the same thing for every article, and if it isn't major, it looks like minor technique identification rather than actually understanding the overall picture of the article. Opposing this quickly established community of the author and parents is lecturer David Zyngier, who Green evidently excludes by labelling him singularly as “he”, creating a sense of inferiority and minority of his character and support base. Combining these elements enables Green to later develop a strong attack against Zyngier, claiming “he’s encouraging parents to make potentially risky property investments”, though this may seem exaggerated. This further distances Zyngier from the parent-based audience and simultaneously promotes the adhesion between parents and Green. However there is also a transition from “we” to the more personalized pronouns “I” and “I’m”. This does not signify a split between the author and parent factions, but rather it allows Green to demonstrate that she is inclusive to her audience and aims to not alienate them. Avoid a) negatives, what the author doesn't do (sometimes it's effective, but normally stick to what the author does do), and b) making too fine a point on one little insignificant thing, like the usage of 'I' in one sentence By employing the phrase “I’m not an expert”, it permits Green to prove that her qualifications are no greater than her audience’s, promoting a relationship based on similarity of characteristics and family conditions (as aforementioned). Furthermore this phrase attacks Zyngier’s credibility, by implying that an education lecturer cannot evaluate real estate, discouraging the reader to accept his perspective on NAPLAN testing and its suggested positive effect on house pricing. You are clearly thinking deeply – I really like a lot of this. :)  You could also say that she presents herself as humble/realistic/honest as she's admitting her inability to judge, but portraying Zyngier as arrogant or a liar to take it on himself. 'I won't presume to...' implies that it's presumption (i.e. arrogance).

Maintaining her stance, Green belittles Zyngier’s perspective by further exaggerating his knowledge of education measures as “simplistic”, which carries the connotation of naivety/ignorance a naïve insight. This word appears several more times in the article due to its applicability to negatively connote the basicness of an opposing argument which influences the reader to associate the argument as weak.Too long and wordy – try 'presents the opposing argument as weak and ill-founded/ignorant' or something. As Green progresses through the article, the appearance of imagery increases. Created by phrases including “the atmosphere parents and their children absorb when they attend [school]”, is this imagery? Atmosphere is a normal word to use about a place/community, it's not exactly figurative the imagery develops a more vivid picture for the readers of the article. In particular, the imagery of this example aids the argument that the most appealing school is the one which has the right environment. By employing the figurative wording “atmosphere” and “absorb”, Green enables the easy visualisation of a child happily enjoying school, which is well received by the mature audience. Your link between imagery and effect is a bit tenuous – partly because I don't think it actually is imagery...

Furthermore, there is a change to a more reasoned and logical tone, supported by the citation of expert resources such as a report from Colmar Brunton of the ACARA. Green attempts to add reinforcement try 'to reinforce' – it's no problem, but your writing is nicer/snappier if you use one verb rather than verb + noun to her argument by quoting this source, positioning the reader to believe that the she has a current and applicable knowledge of the issue of academic testing and schooling within Australia. Green presents an alternative to school selection based on NAPLAN testing, applying the results of the Brunton report to propose that My School is a more useful tool for such a scenario. no... the article doesn't say this… My School is where naplan results are posted; she's saying to actually go to the school in person! Prior to incorporating expert evidence, Green applies several alliterated phrases, the first of which again belittles the insight of Zyngier. Green makes reference to his article as a "curious contribution", drawing the readers attention to his opposing insight. Cleverly, never judge an author's level of skill/effectiveness etc. - just state how something impacts the audience Green intentionally utilizes the word "curious" as it not only alliterates the phrase unless you draw what it does in terms of impacting audience, skip it, but also connotes Zyngier's perspective as unusual and peculiar. As a result, readers are encouraged to retain the simple phrase throughout the article, which in turn keeps a sustained perspective in favor of Green.

Complementing the article is a visual which depicts three young children doing primary school level mathematics on a blackboard in harmony. There is an  appeal to parents and educational values within this picture since it features children and a school environment (as confirmed by the uniforms worn by the children). By having three subjects in the image as opposed to only one, the image generates the idea that a collective group (I don't know what to say here.… not surprised… this is a horrible image and I personally can't see the links (remember of course that often images are just stuck in because you 'need' an image, not because they add anything)… hence I don't think it's worth giving it a whole separate paragraph).  Anyway, my suggestion: this image focuses solely on the mathematics, i.e. their basic academic skills (like NAPLAN testing) – and the audience can't see their face.  So because their face is hidden, the audience can't connect with them or see that they're enjoying it.  This implies that looking purely at tests is one-dimensional and simplistic, it doesn't develop the kids' character as people.  And there's no positive social interaction going on between them because their arms are straight up.  Yeah, dunno, this is verrrryyy stretched, but only thing I could think of.

The article and accompanying image complement one another well actually you just discovered the image doesn't support the contention much at all! ;) to debase the belief that NAPLAN testing should strongly influences the school selection process. Green exposes her viewpoint in regard to this issue by placing fervent attacks on Zyngier's published article waffling a bit – this boils down to 'Green fervently attacks Zyngier'. Aided with connotative language, such attacks are easily understood by the reader since analogous words are associated with the connotations. Huh??  This sentence makes no sense. Additionally, by manipulating these connotations into alliterated phrases, Green further reinforces her argument. Avoid noting down specific techniques – the conclusion, like the intro, should be 'zoomed out' a bit more into her overall arguments or overall style of arguing. Ultimately the language and visual of the article are intended to present a critical and powerful insight into the relationship between aptitude testing within Australian schools and how they should not be used as a factor to determine school selection for parents.
The conclusion is your weak point in this essay.  Could have been made briefer, less wordy, but more impacting.





To improve:
> avoid picking on little things and drawing half a paragraph out of them; sure, it's important to take analysis deep, but picking on really minor things can make it look like you've missed the overall point

> be a bit more concise (no, you're not too verbose - it's just that most people can improve on this and your writing is good enough that I'm picking on smaller things!)

> conclusion – more concise and powerful summation of how the author leaves the audience feeling due to their major ways (e.g. attacking Zyngier's credibility - this is the major method she uses; support of the credible report)

> structure.  Now, I think you've done a perfectly good job - and you can still get good marks for a chronological approach - but you could try another method: either the 'approaches' method, where you pick out the major methods of arguing/major arguments of the author, and group paragraphs by these approaches; or the 'key players' method.

> you could have (but definitely don't have to) analyse the words/tone/voice more - i.e. analysing connotations, but without having to state the word 'connotation'. e.g. 'tired ideological attack', 'arid ideological point', 'rich range of experiences'

Good already :)
> overall grasp of contention

> good analysis of how the audience will feel or think! you're thinking deeply and drawing this to a good level

> clear expression and good vocab

Oh dear, I'm bad at picking out the good already - even though I got to the end and thought, wow, that was a good essay, I still can't think of specific things!  Definitely, a pretty good essay! (especially because you're clearly thinking deeply about how the audience is positioned, what they're made to think and feel, and your writing is clear and good).

Anyway, hope this helps somewhat, I've picked up on random things and not edited my feedback - hope you still get something from it. :)  Let me know if you have any questions.