Critical Reading: A Guide is a useful site to help you revise for Unfamiliar Texts. The site is a guide to what you might look for in analysing literature, particularly poetry and fiction. You may find the introduction difficult but persevere and have a look at the section on the critical analysis of poetry.
I know some of you are starting to get a bit twitchy about the fast approaching exams and need a little bit of reassurance. In this post I will go over the basics of Achievement Standard 90724 (Unfamiliar Texts).
You will answer questions based on two written texts ‑ one prose and one poetry. Questions will be set on each text and there will also be questions involving the comparison of both texts.
You will be given a resource booklet with all texts to be read and a separate question and an answer booklet with lines for you to write on.
I suggest that you spend at least 40 minutes on completing this standard. You could spend 20 minutes reading and answering each text.
As you know questions in this standard no longer have separate parts. The questions are specific enough to apply to the text, but wide enough to enable all students to attempt a response while better students can reach for Excellence. You are not required to write essay responses in this standard. You do need to have a “toolbox” of well-understood language terms. This applies to the specifics of language, grammar, style etc, as well as to understanding the wording of the questions. Terms such as “identify”, “discuss”, “compare” also need to be understood.
Key skills you need to achieve in this standard are:
To achieve well in this standard you must be able to:
So no problems there … 
If you want to revise Unfamiliar Texts go to BBC Bitesize. Try the section ‘Appreciating the writer’s craft’. I have added an extract below which discusses why writers do not always follow the ‘rules’.
* Writers deliberately leave out things like subjects and verbs for effect. This sometimes helps to focus ideas on the ‘action’ of a sentence if it is the subject which is omitted: the words around such ‘sentences’ – the context – will have already informed the reader who or what the subject is.
* Writers deliberately repeat expressions for effect (e.g. At first, they were happy. At first, they were completely satisfied. At first, everything was perfect. That was at first).
* Writers deliberately repeat words like conjunctions (‘and’ and ‘but’), to suggest a build-up of ideas, or to indicate the number of things which happen at the one time. This means a sentence becomes unusually long.
* Writers deliberately use a technique known as a rhetorical question, where they ask a question not to find an answer, but to provoke thought in the reader; or because it is way of them indicating to the reader that they themselves might be uncertain of something. This shows that they are trying to work out something themselves.
* Writers deliberately open sentences with conjunctions like ‘but’, to emphasise strongly a change of direction in an argument or indicate a distinct point of opposition in a line of thought.
* Writers deliberately use list forms in sentences, whether it be individual words or expressions or phrases, again to indicate a build-up of information, or to stress a particular line of argument.
* There are other possibilities, but hopefully these will give you food for thought for the moment!
Try this link to find a very good website on sentence structure. This site will be useful in revising for Unfamiliar Texts.
Remember a good writer uses different types of sentences in different situations:
* a long complex sentence will show what information depends on what other information;
* a compound sentence will emphasise balance and parallelism;
* a short simple sentence will grab a reader’s attention;
* a loose sentence will tell the reader in advance how to interpret your information;
* a periodic sentence will leave the reader in suspense until the very end;
* a declarative sentence will avoid any special emotional impact;
* an exclamatory sentence, used sparingly, will jolt the reader;
* an interrogative sentence will force the reader to think about what you are writing; and
* an imperative sentence will make it clear that you want the reader to act right away.
In this post I will remind you about how to approach a piece of unfamiliar text and how to avoid common errors.
In order to analyse, interpret and evaluate a text you need to be familiar with the language features and conventions of a range of contrasting texts from a range of genres. You need to be familiar with the structure and function of words, their ordering in sentences; word and sentence choices and the effect of these choices on ideas, meaning and style.
When faced with an unfamiliar text, you need to understand the language, meanings and ideas and the literary qualities and effects of the text, and be able to respond to all of these, considering purpose and audience.
As you read the texts in the exam, underline words and phrases which seem to be significant in terms of language, ideas and meanings, or style (literary qualities and effects) or purpose and audience. Annotate the text, jotting ideas over the extract.
Check out the Glossary of Poetic Terms at the Poetry Archive to help you revise for Unfamiliar Texts. Look here for answers to your questions on the language we use to talk about poetry.
Like art, sport, business, music, and every other complex human activity, poetry has developed its own specialist vocabulary. It can be daunting to come across, for the first time, someone talking about a “bear market”, a “pas de deux”, or the “offside rule”… but these terms are useful tools, and worth acquiring so that you can talk and write about your subject with confidence.
You can use this glossary to check how to pronounce a word or phrase, find out what it means and learn how to use it in a sentence. You can explore some of the ways in which poets use language, the choices they make and the effects those choices create. There are examples to read and listen to, in poems specially chosen from the Poetry Archive.
Some of you may find some useful resources on one of the wikis. On the Year 12 wiki there is useful material on Schindler’s List, The Kite Runner and a few resources for Unfamiliar Texts. Have a look!
Connotation is the emotional and imaginative association surrounding a word.
Denotation is the strict dictionary meaning of a word.
Here’s an example:
“You may live in a house, but we live in a home.”
If you were to look up the words house and home in a dictionary, you would find that both words have approximately the same meaning- “a dwelling place.” However, the speaker in the sentence above suggests that home has an additional meaning. Aside from the strict dictionary definition, or denotation, many people associate such things as comfort, love, security, or privacy with a home but do not necessarily make the same associations with a house. What is the first thing that comes to your mind when you think of a home? of a house? Why do you think that real-estate advertisements use the word home more frequently than house? The various feelings, images, and memories that surround a word make up its connotation. Although both house and home have the same denotation, or dictionary meaning, home also has many connotations.
Achievement Standard 90724 is Read and Respond Critically to Unfamiliar Prose and Poetry Texts and in this post I will give you some pointers for achieving it and achieving it at merit and excellence level. Here are the essentials:
Students who achieved with merit or excellence tended to:
scholarship@cc 