Exam Smart Tips for Secondary English Paper 1 and Paper 2

Secondary school English exams could be intimidating to a student seeing it for the first time. It tests your logic and ideas, challenges your comprehension skills and pushes the limits of your vocabulary.

However, the aim of secondary school English is, in essence, the same as primary school English. By the time you graduate, you should be able to express mature and developed ideas fluently and accurately.

Combined, Paper 1 and Paper 2 is worth 70% of your English grade. The exam may seem intimidating at times but don’t worry, here are some tips to help you navigate through it.

For a complete strategy across both papers, our Essay Writing Master Class has your child covered.

Before you carry on, you might want to download this really long article in PDF format first so you can refer to it later, or to use it for revision purposes…

Click here to Download

Breakdown of Paper 1

Paper 1 has a total of 70 marks and is made up of 3 parts: Editing, Situational Writing and Continuous Writing.

Section A – Editing (Express English)

Students will be given a passage made of 12 lines. Out of the 12 lines, 8 lines will contain a grammatical error while 2 will not. You will need to circle the grammatical errors and write the correct word in the space beside the passage. For lines that do not have an error, put a tick. 1 mark will be given for each correct answer. Students can get a total of 10 marks.

• Read the entire sentence

You will feel tempted to study the passage line-by-line. However, the line may not contain the full sentence. A sentence can start halfway in line 1 and end only in line 2.

Reference from Ang Mo Kio Secondary School Mid-Year Examination 2016 Secondary One Express English Language Paper 1

Sometimes, the error jumps out at you once you see it, but you won’t know for sure it is an error unless you read the whole sentence and understand the context.

This section is designed to camouflage grammatical errors. Read the passage meticulously to spot the errors.

Know the technical grammar rules

Going by what ‘sounds right’ won’t work. You will doubt yourself because the errors may ‘look’ or ‘sound’ correct, and lines that don’t contain errors may ‘look’ or ‘sound’ incorrect.

You must be very clear on technical terms. You will need to know how to use the different tenses, singular vs plural, prepositions, articles, adverbs, conjunctions and spot Subject-Verb Agreement errors. These are the common grammatical errors in the Editing section, so be sure to read up about them.

Section B – Situational Writing

Made up of 30 marks, this section will be marked according to task fulfilment (15 marks) and use of language (15 marks). The writing has to be between 250 to 350 words.

Students will be given a visual stimulus. The question will contain the context and tasks for the situational writing. The ‘situations’ include writing recommendations, proposals, formal letters of complaint, blog posts, notices, announcements, speeches, and so on. Students are required to use either a formal or informal tone for their writing, depending on the audience and context.

The question will provide 4 key points that the writing must include. Information for some of the key points cannot be found in the visual stimulus, so students will have to make up hypothetical scenarios or plans.

Purpose, Audience, Context (PAC)

PAC determines the tone and language you should use and the appropriate direction for your writing.

The question will provide a detailed context to guide students. Study the context to sieve out appropriate information for your situational writing. Highlight key words and note down ideas you get while reading it.

The context also tells you to whom you are writing to and whose point of view you should be adopting.

Knowing what the reader is looking for will give ideas on what kind of information should be included. Try to ‘embody’ the perspective you are writing from.

Use your own words

Students are strongly encouraged to use their own words when extracting information from the visual. If you are able to adapt the information to fit your writing, it shows your strong writing skills.

Besides, the text in the visual tend to be phrased factually or in tones unsuitable for your context. Consider what the context is and paraphrase the text into the appropriate.

Highlight the information that you need

The information in the visual will not be so straight-forward. There will be information that you do not need to include in your writing. Be perceptive to identify the relevant information.

As you plan out your situational writing, highlight or mark out the details that you need from the visual. This will help you stay focused on what is required and remove distractions.

Section C – Continuous Writing

Section C is made up of 30 marks. Students will choose 1 out of 4 topics to write a 350 to 500-word essay on and no pictures will be provided.

Each topic tests a different writing style. The options include discursive, argumentative, personal recount or a hybrid that combines two styles – for example, a hybrid of personal recount and discursive writing.

Play to your strengths

If you are more confident in writing factual, non-descriptive text, then choose one of the discursive or argumentative topics. If you are more familiar with writing descriptive or recount essays, then you may choose a hybrid essay.

Highlight the keywords

After choosing which topic you would like to write, highlight the keywords in the question.

Make sure you understand every word in the topic so you know exactly what you should write about. If you misunderstand even one word, you may end up with an essay that is entirely out of point. Always go with the topic that you have fewer doubts about.

Dive deeper

Secondary school students are expected to display writing that is more mature in thought and skills.

Avoid “childish” language. Similes like “as fast as a cheetah” and “as quiet as a mouse” are acceptable in primary school compos, but they are no longer recommended in secondary school. Your language use should reflect sophistication in ideas and creativity. You can, for example, try coming up with your own similes and metaphors.

As far as possible, draw from personal experience. Writing about an experience or idea that is not your own will come off as stiff, generic and undeveloped. You have more personal insights to write about than you think.

On top of that, possessing general knowledge on a myriad of topics such as history, geography, science, etc, will give you the content necessary for to write secondary school essays.  Keeping up to date with current affairs will help greatly too.

Breakdown of Paper 2

With a total of 50 marks, each section of Paper 2 consists of 1 Visual Text segment and 2 Comprehension segments.

Section A

Section A is made up of 5 marks and a maximum of 5 questions. Students will be given a visual text, such as an advertisement, a poster, or a brochure.

This section tests your ability to explain the thought process behind creating the piece of advertisement. You will have to identify the purpose of the advert, explain how or why certain phrases or headlines are effective and show that you understand the underlying meaning of the text and/or visuals.

Look at the visuals and text as a whole

The visuals and words work together to form meaning. Study everything in context and understand how the visuals give meaning to the text and vice versa.

Put yourself in the shoes of the relevant party

When you are asked what the purpose of the text is, you need to see it from the point of view of the creator of the advert. What are the pictures and text trying to sell or promote? Who is the target audience of the advert?

When asked why or how a certain part of the advertisement is effective, try seeing yourself as the audience. If you were the target audience, what would catch your eye and why? What would you think when you see that certain headline, sentence or picture? You must be able to express and explain your thoughts concisely.

Section B & Section C

Section B is worth 20 marks, and the text you are tested on is narrative in nature. Section C is worth 25 marks, and the text is factual. Besides the few straight-forward questions you can get directly from the passage, you will mostly be tested on challenging questions that require higher order skills such as inferential skills or analytical skills to answer.

Read the title, author and the questions before reading the passage so you get an idea of what the text will be about. This orientates and prepares your mind to take in the information while reading later. Remember to annotate the text as you are reading in order to internalise the information given.

Answer in full sentences

Make sure you answer in complete sentences, but do not repeat the stem of the question. Your answer should be precise without additional details. You can take note of the number of marks for the question (usually in brackets). It will give you an idea of how many points your answer should include.

Build a strong vocabulary

‘Use your own words’ questions will explicitly state that students must use their own words to explain a phrase, word or expression from the passage. The easy part is finding the answer from the text. The tough part is rephrasing it in your own words.

Identify the keywords that you must include in your answer, then use antonyms or synonyms to replace them. You will need some basic vocabulary knowledge, so build up on your vocabulary for common words.

There will also be Flowchart questions that ask you to summarise parts of the text into one word or phrase, or to state the change in emotions that the character goes through in each paragraph. The question will prompt you to refer to certain paragraphs in the passage, and you must pick the word or phrase that best summarises or emphasises the focus of each paragraph.

The options may seem similar to one another. You must be aware of the slight difference in meaning and whether the words are suitable in the context of the passage. Although you don’t need to use your own words, a strong vocabulary is needed for this type of question as well to be able to grasp the subtle meanings of each option.

Exercise your inferential skills

Questions that require inference are the most common in English Paper 2.

You must be able to understand the point of view of the characters in the text or even the author of the text. Train yourself to ask “why” and “how”. Ensure that you can express your thoughts clearly and effectively in one or two sentences.

There will be questions that ask students to explain why certain creative or figurative expressions were used in the text. It can also be the other way around, where the question asks which figurative expression was used to create a certain effect on the reader and explain how effective it is.

Refer back to the text for the paragraph that the word, phrase or sentence can be found. The context of that sentence or paragraph will give you clues. After you have a good grasp of the context, analyse the effect of the expression. You will need to put yourself in the shoes of the reader or author identify its intended impact and then explain it in your own words.

Of course, this is easier said than done, and that is why honing your inferential and answering skills requires years of practice.

Summary question

One of the most challenging segments is the summary question in Section C. This question is worth 15 marks, which are broken down into 8 for content and 7 for style. You can only write a maximum of 80 words. Anything past that word limit will not be counted as part of your answer.

You will be asked to give a summary of the topic raised in the passage. This could be a summary of reasons, ideas, and advantages or disadvantages, just to name a few examples.

‘Style’ refers to sentence structure, grammar, phrasing, punctuation, and spelling. Students are encouraged to refrain from lifting text from the passage. You have to use your own words or paraphrase sentences without changing its original meaning.

Content refers to the 8-10 key points that your summary must include Feel free to include as many points as you can but remember that 1 mark will be given for 1 key point and the maximum score for content is 8.

The question will tell you exactly what you need to look for. Scan the passage and highlight the points that you need to include. A good rule of thumb to make sure you have at least 8 points.

Some information may seem relevant to the question, but it is up to you to decide whether to include it while writing your summary or not. One general guideline is to exclude the listing of examples that are usually stated to back up a main point.

Conclusion

You have probably figured out by now that both English Paper 1 and Paper 2 require you to flex your vocabulary and inferential skills a lot.

If you have just started secondary school, English will be more difficult than you anticipated, but it is a natural progression that takes some getting used to.

Don’t be disheartened. Keep building your vocabulary. Keep honing your writing skills. Learn from your mistakes… and sooner or later, your hard work will pay off.

All the best!

See more related articles and information on Writing Samurai:

Download this article in PDF format so you can refer to it later, or to use it for revision purposes…

Click here to Download