One question, two jobs

The last question on this paper is worth eighteen marks, which is more than any other question in the section. It also asks for two different things in the same sentence, and that is what makes it hard. It gives you a statement about the two texts and asks how far you agree with it. And it asks you to compare the ways both texts present the thing the statement is about. ⚠️⚠️ SO THERE IS AN OBVIOUS WAY TO ORGANISE AN ANSWER, AND IT IS THE WRONG ONE. Three paragraphs about the first text. Three about the second. A closing sentence saying how far you agree. It feels thorough, it fills the space, and it is the single commonest structure in the weaker half of the marking pile. ⭐⭐ HERE IS WHY IT COSTS SO MUCH: IT UNDER-SCORES ON BOTH JOBS AT THE SAME TIME. A marker reading it meets six paragraphs that compare nothing at all, because each one is about one text only. And then one sentence that delivers a judgement with no evidence attached, because all the evidence was used up above without ever being pointed at the statement. ⚠️ THE ANSWER IS NOT SHORT AND IT IS NOT WRONG. IT IS TWO SEPARATE ESSAYS AND AN OPINION, AND THE QUESTION ASKED FOR NEITHER OF THOSE THINGS. ⭐⭐ THE REPAIR IS STRUCTURAL RATHER THAN STYLISTIC. EVERY PARAGRAPH HAS TO CARRY BOTH JOBS. One point of comparison, which also moves your judgement along. Then the next. The comparison and the judgement are not two halves of the answer; they are two things each paragraph is doing at once. ⭐ AND THAT IS WHY THE LINKING WORDS MATTER MORE THAN THEY LOOK AS THOUGH THEY SHOULD. Whereas. Similarly. In contrast. By comparison. They are not decoration and they are not there to sound formal. ⭐⭐ THEY ARE THE VISIBLE SIGN THAT A PARAGRAPH IS DOING BOTH JOBS, WHICH MAKES THEM A TEST YOU CAN RUN ON YOUR OWN WRITING. If a paragraph will not take one, it is almost always a paragraph about a single text, and it needs rebuilding rather than rewording. One question to carry through everything that follows: does this paragraph move the judgement, and does it touch both texts? If it only does one of those, it is doing half a job and it will be marked as half.

The two texts and the statement

Both passages below were written for this module and describe nowhere real. Read them once now; every question after this quotes from them, so you will not have to hold them in your head.

Tap the two doing both jobs

Tap the TWO paragraph openings that move the judgement AND touch both texts.

Both writers spend more words on the bathers than on the water, though the older writer reaches them by way of his own expectations
Where Text 1 measures the place by its civility, Text 2 measures it by its talk, which supports the statement in each case for a different reason
Text 1 describes the water as cold beyond description, which shows the writer noticed the conditions
Text 2 mentions lifeguards, lockers and a board listing the rules

Why the two-halves answer loses

A candidate writes three paragraphs on Text 1, three on Text 2, then a final sentence agreeing with the statement. The content is accurate throughout. Why does it still score poorly?

Because it fails both jobs at once: six paragraphs compare nothing, since each is about one text only, and the judgement arrives in a single sentence with no evidence attached to it
Because the final sentence is too short to count as a conclusion
Because Text 2 should have been discussed before Text 1
Because it does not include enough quotations

The words this question is marked on

Five terms, each defined by what it is. The first two are the two jobs; the third is how a marker can see you doing both.

Match each opening to what it is doing

Text 1 describes the bathing place as much resorted to in the warmer months.
Both writers give more room to the bathers than to the water.
Whereas Text 1 notes the absence of any rule, Text 2 lists a board of them, and both use that to show us the people.
Overall I agree with the statement.
Text 2 says the queue is mostly regulars, which is interesting.

Touches one text and takes no position, so it does neither job and is really just retelling
Moves the judgement and touches both texts, but offers nothing from either to support it yet
Does both jobs and supports them from each text, which is the shape the whole answer should be in
Delivers a position with nothing attached, which is what happens when the judgement is saved until the end
Quotes one text and then comments on the quotation rather than on the statement, so the focus has slipped

Two that follow from both jobs

Select the TWO statements that follow from treating every paragraph as carrying both jobs.

Linking words become a test rather than a flourish: a paragraph that will not take one is usually a paragraph about a single text
The closing paragraph becomes a summing-up rather than the only place a judgement appears
Each text must be given exactly the same number of words for the comparison to count
Agreeing with the statement scores more highly than disagreeing with it

Planning an answer that does both

Planning this question is not making a list of quotations. It is deciding what your points of comparison are, because those are the paragraphs. ⭐⭐ START WITH THE STATEMENT AND DECIDE WHERE YOU STAND BEFORE YOU WRITE ANYTHING. Not because the position is worth marks on its own, but because you cannot move a judgement along if you have not got one yet, and answers that decide at the end always show it. THEN FIND THREE OR FOUR POINTS OF COMPARISON, NOT THREE OR FOUR FEATURES. ⭐ A POINT OF COMPARISON IS SOMETHING BOTH TEXTS DO, OR SOMETHING ONE DOES AND THE OTHER POINTEDLY DOES NOT. THAT IS ALREADY A PARAGRAPH. CHECK EACH ONE AGAINST THE STATEMENT BEFORE YOU KEEP IT. If a point of comparison is true but says nothing about the statement, it will pull the answer off the focus, and a marker cannot credit it. ⭐ THEN, FOR EACH POINT, LINE UP ONE SHORT PIECE OF EVIDENCE FROM EACH TEXT. One from each, not several from one, because a paragraph with evidence from only one text is the two-halves problem happening inside a single paragraph. AND WRITE EACH PARAGRAPH SO IT SAYS: HERE IS HOW THEY COMPARE, HERE IS THE EVIDENCE FROM EACH, AND HERE IS WHAT THAT DOES TO MY POSITION ON THE STATEMENT. ⚠️ THREE HABITS THAT COST MARKS HERE. ⚠️ THE FIRST IS SAVING THE JUDGEMENT FOR THE END. ⭐ A POSITION THAT ARRIVES ONLY IN THE LAST SENTENCE HAS NO EVIDENCE UNDER IT, BECAUSE ALL THE EVIDENCE WAS SPENT BEFORE IT APPEARED. ⚠️ THE SECOND IS COMPARING THE SUBJECTS INSTEAD OF THE TEXTS. Saying that one place had rules and the other did not is a fact about two places. The question is about how the two writers present them, and the difference between those two sentences is most of the mark scheme. ⚠️ AND THE THIRD IS LOSING TRACK OF WHICH TEXT IS WHICH. The two are a century apart on purpose, and an answer that attributes an older text's phrasing to the modern one has undermined everything built on it. One last thing. Either position on the statement can earn full marks. Nobody is marking whether you agreed; they are marking whether you supported it and whether you were comparing all the way through.

The older text, and the trap in it

One of the two texts on this paper is always from the nineteenth century, and it is reliably the one that gets misread. Not because it is difficult, but because of what unfamiliar prose does to a reader in a hurry. ⚠️⚠️ HERE IS THE PATTERN. A CANDIDATE READS THE OLDER TEXT, NOTICES THAT IT SOUNDS FORMAL, WRITES THAT IT SOUNDS FORMAL, AND STOPS THERE. ⭐ FORMAL IS NOT AN OBSERVATION. IT IS A DESCRIPTION OF THE WHOLE CENTURY, AND IT IS TRUE OF ALMOST EVERY TEXT THE PAPER COULD HAVE PRINTED. Anything that would be equally true of a different passage cannot tell a marker what this writer is doing. Look at the older passage on this module again and ask a narrower question: what has this writer actually told us about himself? ⭐⭐ HE SAYS HE HAD EXPECTED DISORDER. THAT IS NOT A FACT ABOUT THE PLACE, IT IS A CONFESSION ABOUT HIM, and once you have seen it the passage changes shape. He is not describing a bathing place. He is describing being wrong about one. Then notice he says the cold is beyond description, and immediately describes the men entering it anyway with a determination he could not share. ⭐ HE HAS PUT HIMSELF OUTSIDE THE GROUP HE IS WATCHING, TWICE IN TWO SENTENCES. A visitor, reporting on people he admires and does not join. ⚠️ NONE OF THAT IS AVAILABLE TO SOMEBODY WHO STOPPED AT FORMAL. ⭐ AND THE SECOND HALF OF THE TRAP IS ATTRIBUTION. WHEN TWO TEXTS SIT SIDE BY SIDE AND ONE SOUNDS OLDER, IT IS EASY TO REACH FOR A PHRASE AND PUT IT IN THE WRONG WRITER'S MOUTH. ⚠️⚠️ THAT IS AN EXPENSIVE SLIP, BECAUSE EVERYTHING BUILT ON IT FALLS WITH IT. A point that rests on the modern writer having said something the older writer said is not a small error of detail; it is a point that is not about the text at all. ⭐ A CHEAP GUARD: EVERY TIME YOU TAKE SOMETHING FROM A TEXT, WRITE DOWN WHICH ONE IT CAME FROM BEFORE YOU WRITE ANYTHING ABOUT IT. It costs two words and it protects the whole paragraph.

Order the way to plan this answer

Put these six planning moves into the order that produces an answer doing both jobs.

Read the statement and work out exactly what it is claiming about the texts
Decide where you stand on it, before writing anything
Find three or four points of comparison, each being something both texts do or pointedly do not
Drop any point that is true but says nothing about the statement
Line up one short piece of evidence from each text for every point you kept
Write each paragraph so it compares, supports, and moves your position along

Assemble a paragraph opening that works

This is the shape a Question 4 paragraph opens in. Assemble it.

When a linking word will not fit

A candidate tries to put the word whereas at the start of each paragraph and finds that it does not fit two of them. What has that told them?

That those two paragraphs are almost certainly about a single text, so they need rebuilding around a point of comparison rather than rewording
That a different linking word should be used in those two paragraphs
Nothing: linking words are optional and only affect style
That those two paragraphs should be deleted

The Question 4 run

Five questions on doing both jobs at once. Three lives.

Complete the Question 4 rules

Your position on the given statement, and how far you agree with it, is your _____. Setting the two texts against each other so that each tells you something about the other is _____. Words such as whereas, similarly and in contrast, which join two texts inside a single point, are _____. A short piece of a text copied exactly and used as evidence is a _____.

judgement comparison linking language quotation focus summary analysis synthesis

Three paragraphs on the desk

Three candidates have written the opening body paragraph of the same Question 4 answer. All three are accurate about the texts. Decide what each one needs.

Paragraph A: "Text 1 tells us the bathing place is much resorted to in the warmer months, and that the water is cold beyond description. This shows the writer is describing the conditions carefully." What does it need?
Paragraph B: "Both writers are clearly more interested in people than in water, and I agree with the statement completely." What does it need?
Paragraph C: "Whereas Text 1 admits he had expected disorder, Text 2 notices that half the queue knows the other half. Both look past the water to the people, which is why the statement holds for both, though Text 1 arrives there through his own surprise." Is anything wrong with it?

Write one paragraph that does both

Write ONE body paragraph answering this Question 4 statement on the two texts in this module: "Both writers are more interested in the people at the water than in the water itself." Either agreeing or disagreeing can earn full marks.

Open with a point of comparison, using a linking word such as whereas, similarly or in contrast
Say what each text does, naming which text each time so nothing is attributed to the wrong writer
Support it with one short quotation from Text 1, copied exactly
Support it with one short quotation from Text 2, copied exactly
Explain what the difference or similarity between them shows about how each writer presents the people
Finish the paragraph by saying what this has done to your position on the statement
Before you stop, check the paragraph against both tests: does it move the judgement, and does it touch both texts?

Judge and Compare

Use it, the way the marks are given

What you'll cover