Graduated Identify

Four marks, and the trap is the clock

Question 1 is worth four marks out of the whole of Section A. It is the easiest question on the paper, and it is where a surprising number of candidates quietly lose the exam. Not by getting it wrong. By answering it too well. ⚠️ THE MARK ALLOCATION IS NOT A SCORE. IT IS AN INSTRUCTION ABOUT HOW MUCH TO WRITE. Question 1 comes in three graduated parts. Part (a) is worth one mark. Part (b) is worth one mark. Part (c) is worth two. ⚠️ Graduated by MARK, not by difficulty. Part (a) is not easier than part (c); it simply wants less. One mark means one thing, offered once, and then you stop. A candidate who writes a careful explanatory sentence for part (a) has not written a better answer. They have written the same answer with several minutes of the later questions attached to it, and those later questions are worth many times more. So the check that runs through this whole module is small and mechanical. ⚠️ Count the marks. Count what you are being asked to produce. Make the two match BEFORE you start writing. One more fixed fact worth banking now: on this paper Text 1 is always the 19th-century text, and Question 1 asks about Text 1 only.

Text 1: a visit to the manufacturing town

The following passage is from a traveller's account published in 1849. Read it carefully. Every question in this module refers to it. The town revealed itself first as a smudge upon the horizon, and then as a forest of chimneys, each one labouring to darken a sky that was already grey. We descended into streets so narrow that two carts could not pass, and the noise of the looms came at us from every doorway: a ceaseless clattering which the inhabitants no longer appear to hear. I asked a boy of perhaps nine years how long he had been employed at the mill. He told me, without any air of complaint, that he had begun at six.

Part (a): tap the one word

Question 1(a) is worth ONE MARK and asks for ONE WORD. Identify the single word the writer uses to tell you that the noise of the looms did not stop.

• ceaseless
• narrow
• grey
• employed

Words the question uses

Five terms. The question is written in a precise vocabulary, and reading it loosely is what causes over-answering.

Part (b): tap the one phrase

Question 1(b) is worth ONE MARK and asks for ONE PHRASE. Identify the phrase the writer uses to describe how the town first appeared to him in the distance.

• a smudge upon the horizon
• a forest of chimneys
• streets so narrow that two carts could not pass
• without any air of complaint

How to read a mark allocation

Every question on this paper tells you how long its answer should be, and it does so in the one place candidates read as a score rather than as an instruction: the number of marks. ⚠️ TREAT IT AS A SHOPPING LIST. One mark is one item. Three marks is three items. Before you write anything, do this. Read the mark figure. Decide what ONE unit of credit looks like for this question: a word, a quotation, a point, an explained point. Then produce exactly that many, and stop. Take a three-mark question asking you to give three things a writer says about a place. Three marks means three things. Not two things explained beautifully, and not five things listed in the hope that three of them land. Three. ⚠️ Over-answering is invisible in the marking and expensive on the clock. There is no credit above the ceiling, so a fourth item earns nothing at all, and the minutes it cost were the minutes the long questions needed. Under-answering is worse and easier to spot, because a two-mark answer offering one thing has left half the marks on the table by construction. And check the verb. ⚠️ A question that says IDENTIFY is not asking you to comment. If you have written the word "because" in answer to an identify question, you have almost certainly gone past what was wanted.

A careful sentence for one mark

A candidate answers Question 1(a) with a full sentence: they name the word, then explain in two further clauses why the writer chose it. The examiner awards the mark. What has the candidate actually lost?

• Time, which comes out of the later questions worth far more marks. The explanation earned nothing, because the ceiling for that part is one mark and it was already reached
• Nothing at all, since the answer was correct and showed extra understanding
• The mark, because explaining is not allowed in an identify question
• Credit under AO2, which the explanation should have targeted instead

Build a part (c) answer

Question 1(c) is worth TWO MARKS and asks you to explain TWO things about the boy at the mill. Assemble an answer of the right shape, using the passage.

Match each part to what it asks for

True about Question 1

Select the TWO statements that are true.

• It asks about Text 1 only, which on this paper is always the 19th-century text
• Its parts are graduated by the number of marks, so the amount to write differs between them
• Every part requires you to explain your choice
• The later parts are harder, which is why they carry more marks

Order how to spend the time

Put the stages of answering Question 1 into the order that protects the rest of the paper.

• Check which text the question refers to before reading anything
• Read the mark figure for the part you are on
• Decide what one unit of credit looks like here: a word, a phrase, or an explained point
• Find exactly that many in the text
• Write them down and stop, without adding explanation that was not asked for
• Move on to the next question rather than rereading the answer

Which text does it want

A candidate answering Question 1 finds a perfect single word, writes it down, and loses the mark. The word was taken from the second of the two texts on the paper. What has gone wrong?

• Question 1 asks about Text 1 only, which on this paper is always the 19th-century text. A word from Text 2 cannot earn the mark however apt it is
• The word came from a modern text, and modern vocabulary is not credited
• They should have given a phrase rather than a single word
• They failed to explain why they had chosen the word

Complete the Question 1 rules

Question 1(a) is worth one mark and asks you to identify a single _____. Question 1(b) is worth one mark and asks you to identify a single _____. Question 1(c) is worth two marks and asks you to explain _____ things. All three parts refer to Text 1, which on this paper is always the _____ text.

The Question 1 run

Five quick decisions on the question and the passage. Three lives.

Three answers to mark

Three candidates answer Question 1. Judge each one, and say what it costs.

• Candidate A answers part (b) with the right phrase, then adds three sentences explaining why the writer chose it. How would you advise them?
• Candidate B answers part (c), worth two marks, by explaining a single thing about the boy in careful detail. What is the problem?
• Candidate C gives an excellent word for part (a), taken from the second text on the paper. What should they have done differently, and why does it matter beyond this question?

Explain how to answer Question 1

A classmate answers every part of Question 1 with a full paragraph, gets almost all four marks, and then runs out of time before the last question. Write them the advice that fixes it.

• Explain what the mark allocation of a question is actually telling you to do
• Set out what each of the three parts of Question 1 asks for, and how much each one wants
• Explain the difference between the command words identify and explain, and what that changes about an answer
• Explain why over-answering a one-mark part costs nothing in marks but a great deal overall
• Finish by explaining which text Question 1 refers to on this paper, and why checking that first is worth the seconds it takes