Why it is a great idea to write, redraft and memorise your own descriptive paragraphs before the exam. (I don't recommend that you just steal mine, but you can certainly adapt them).
Mr Salles Teaches English Why should you adapt them? Is it because there has to be something on your story/descriptions that links a bit with the photo/question you’re given?
@@idrk1507 basically he means try to turn it into something you could fit into YOUR writing if im writing about winter im not going to throw in some fancy description about the sun. Just sort of twist the words and make it work
I've always struggled with coming up with story plots in general, but in 45 minutes with a prompt it feels impossible. This video is very helpful to me, especially the 'Break the vase' concept and the idea of memorising some description, because both of those take away pressure of following the prompt so closely and of crafting my writing perfectly in such a short timespan. I'm in Yr.11 right now, and was particularly struggling with paper 2 as well, but I managed to get 35/40 on p2 q5, and an overall grade 7 in my mocks (both papers) with the help of your guides! You've also helped me with my love of writing, as English Language GSCE feels so draining but you show me it's not as difficult as it seems. Your videos have also helped me immensely in English Lit (Grade 9 on my last Macbeth essay homework). I can't thank you enough Mr. Salles, keep up the good work!
sir i recently purchased your revision guide and words cant really explain how amazing i think it is my parents are also over joyed with how great it is HIGHLY RECOMMENDED TO EVERYONE
Thanks Mr Salles, I’ve got my mock tomorrow on language paper 1, i used your cheating video for paper 2 back in the November mocks and got 33/40. Absolute class.
Thank Youu I used the old how to do question 5 you posted for 2019s year 11's and it helped me get an 8 in my mocks so I'm definitely going to use thiss. :D
I got 32 in this same question I memorised the description of my character beforehand and I decided that I would integrate a flashback to whatever the picture was about - in this case his childhood snow day
Frd in the beginning I was like he was homeless and then he had a flashback to Christmas playing in snow then he came back to reality and killed himself
hi so I would like to thank you bc In my November mocs I was getting grade 2’s and we just done my feburary mocs & I got a grade 6 in my English literature haven’t got language back but aiming for 9’s in gcse so thank you so much and keep the great content up you are really effective and helpful!! and I’ve been recommending you to everyone thank you to much
I wish I didn't see this the night before 😭😭😭😭. Much better than Mr bruff who doesn't like this technique. It's like he's the superhero and you are the ethical super villain hehe.
Could you do a video on journalism if you know anything about it please as I really want to become a journalist and your videos have really boosted my English knowledge. 👍
If anyone thinks they might need this: 25 Language Devices: Defined & Explained! 1. Pathetic Fallacy Is when the weather or the atmosphere describes the mood. For example, when the weather is rainy people are sad and depressed 2nd example, the dark night could symbolise something supernatural like 3AM Satan etc… 2. Personification Is when a non-human is given human qualities. For example, the tree is waving to John as drives away. 3. Simile When you are comparing two things using ‘like’ or ‘as’ For example, his facial vision looked like a falcon’s eye 4. Metaphor Is when you are comparing two things with is or are Example He is an orc 5. Extended Metaphor Pick a metaphor and explain how --- > turn in to an extended metaphor Metaphor --- > Life is a rollercoaster. Now turning into extended metaphor add explanation so, Life is a rollercoaster you don’t know when you will be at the top or at the bottom, it will all happen in an instance, at the greatest heights you will be at the greatest heights and at times it will crash, but every day is never the same, just like in a turn in a Rolle coaster is never the same. 6. Oxymoron 2 opposite words side-by-side Example, the small giant 7. Juxtaposition You explain an oxymoron. The small giant tip-toing trying to reach the top shelf, however, his small arms and puny fingers prevented him from grabbing the bar of jam. 8. Symbolism Is when objects represent a meaning. For example, moon and the star represent Islam. 2nd Example, if you get a priest you will think someone died. In Macbeth the dagger links to death. 9. Semantic field Is where words are linked to an idea. For example, PPE, 2m and Hand Sanitiser, Head of Year link to COVID. 10. Irony Is when events in the text surprises the characters. Something not expected! Mr Birling offering a 1000. Scrooge changing his nature. 11. Rhetorical Question Question does not require an answer 12. Hyperbole Is when you hype, when over-exaggerating. I am going to eat the whole restaurant. 13. Assonance Is the repetition of the vowel sound. I am too cool for school. Oooooo 14. Alliteration Words in a row begin with the same letter. 15. Sibilance Is when words in a row have the s letter or the s sound Example: the snake was slowly hissing 16. Euphemism Is when you say something in an indirect manner. He is not with us anymore. 17. Emotive Language Is when the writer makes the reader feel emotional. By making them angry. 18. Onomatopoeia Words describe the sound Boom bang skirr pop 19. Ruel of 3 / Power of 3 / Triplets Words or phrases in a row describe something (3) The table is black, hard and wide 20. Facts/ Stats Uses evidence to support their facts. 50 % of the students prefer using email rather than social media . 21. Plosive Reptation of harsh sound Words such as 'P' 'D' 'B' 22. Zoomorphism Is when you give a person animal features. Example John barked at me / John shouted at me. 23. Opinion 24. Repetition Language Device and Structure. Is when the writer uses the words repletely to create an effect. Where is being repeated and why is that important 25. Noun, Verbs, Adjectives, Adverbs Structure Flashback - when you go back in time ,3 days ago etc.. Foreshadowing - when the writer gives clue about future ‘my heart was beating fast’ Zoom in - focus on one thing for example ‘pen’ , ‘specific character ‘ Zoom out - normally used to talk about setting Dialogue - when the character speak ‘hey there !’ New character New setting Change in tone Short sentence - to build up tense Long sentence - add details and slow down the narrative Short /long sentence - may show importance in both Shift in focus - talks about object then talks about another object for example ‘pen’ to ‘table’ Cyclical structure - similar stuff happening with beginning and ending Juxtaposition Extended metaphor Pace List Pov Overall tone Chronogical order Climax Repetition Links Mood , pathetic fallacy
Mr Salles, if I'm trying to repeat GCSe English Language as an adult, it's more difficult, what book of yours would you recommend me? Creative writing is hard and seriously sometimes it's even scary of you dont know the high words(this sucks man!) Wish I did better at school or knew the tools. I have recently started to watch your videos and you explain slowly and nicely. Teacher However recommended Mr Bruff, but after you popped up(Thank God) I think I'll have a chat with him and the rest of the adults to watch your videos.
Thanks! Use a link to Kindle Unlimited in my video description. Get a free trial to read all my guides for free. Then decide if any are useful enough to have as a paperback.
@@MrSallesTeachesEnglish I just use a mobile and not enough data to download more. I dont mind your guide, as long as it helps. Which one would you recommend first? Thank you so much.
Hey Mr Salles if you are using the vase strategy, how would you tweak an idea like this to the question you're answering? For example recently, I had to answer a question which said it had to start off with, " Suddenly, I heard it, it was coming from the other side of the passage."
'blah blah blah. This sound instantly took me back in time, to when I'd first heard it, and the memory burned itself into my consciousness anew. I had been...' And now you can write whatever you want. Although to be fair, you could write whatever you want from the first line you were given anyway.
Hello sir, got a grade 6 for this essay and was really hoping for a better grade. Please can I have some advice on how to improve this essay as I have added alternative interpretations: How does Priestley present selfishness and its effects in An Inspector Calls? In Priestley’s post-war enigmatic morality play “An Inspector Calls”, he uses it as a political diatribe critiquing the selfish behaviour that capitalism bestowed upon society in 1912. The callous nature of the upper classes epitomising unscrupulous virtue is what Priestley attempts to expound to his audiences as he moralises to them the selfless profound positive impact that socialism will have on society. Priestley describes Mr Birling to be a delusional myopic “business man” that perpetuates the patriarchal norm and opposes selfless principles. When Priestley described the Birling home in the stage directions of the exposition of the play to be “heavily comfortable”, this is oxymoronic and foreshadows the tension between Mr Birling and Eric that develops through the play as “heavy” links to Mr Birling’s “hard-head” conveying ideas that he is made up of more bone than brain giving reasons behind why he is so selfish as he is too foolish to realise his actions ;Eric accepts responsibility for his actions rivalling Mr Birling’s selfish principles. Another interpretation of “heavily comfortable” is that it shows a microcosm of dysfunctional families belonging to the upper classes, and as Mr Birling is the head of the family, these complications pivot around Mr Birling due to his selfish behaviour making the upper classes seem “comfortable” but in reality segregated between morality. This is consolidated when Mr Birling aims for “lower costs and higher wages” which not only demonstrates the capitalistic exploitations and monopoly of Mr Birling’s intentions, but also the juxtaposition between “higher” and “lower”convey the disparity between the two classes in one society; this shows how the upper classes neglect their responsibility and live with selfish morality even though they have the money to ‘repair society’. Thus, Priestley uses the construct of Mr Birling to convey a subtle allegorical message to his contemporary audiences showing the salience of not being selfish and to some extent, he is also promoting the principles of the labour party by showing what capitalism can inflict upon society. As the audience are first made to be aware that Sheila accepts responsibility and her selfishness towards Eva Smith through “it was my own fault”, this demonstrates that the absence of other members of her family and her censorship of knowledge has enabled her to develop her own moral guidance, contrasting to the more solemn members of her family. This strays from the more juvenile depiction that Priestley describes her to be in Act 1 as she is very “lively” and “bubbly”. One interpretation of this is that Sheila is more mature than the older generation as her accepting socialistic principles and almost rejecting the social mores of capitalism allows her, in the eyes of the audience, to seem less selfish and fuel Priestley’s hopes for a society where the younger generation of upper class families are less selfish. However, another interpretation of this is that she is rejecting the selfishness of the patriarchy and foreshadows her challenging her father and says that “girls aren’t cheap labour, they’re people”. Here, Priestley shows that Sheila was indoctrinated by the conservative ideals of her parents which made her reject her power as a women and therefore be selfish to a society who are in urgent need of feminist voices. Thus, Priestley uses Sheila to moralise to the women in the audience the selfishness of the patriarchy and therefore, to some extent, suggests that they should take a more keen interest in movements such as the suffragettes. Priestley uses Gerald, as a man who holds the aristocracy of capitalism, as an antithesis to Inspector Goole who stands for the socialistic mouth piece of Priestley himself who idealises upon useless behaviour. As Gerald is not here to hear the Inspector’s last words of “fire, blood and anguish”, by Priestley using this rule of three, he is attempting to moralise how, as Gerald is engulfed in his parents views from the Victorian Era, he has little hope of changing his selfie principles. Another interpretation of this Biblical reference is that it creates a lexical field of hell and doom hinting without socialistic conformity and an increase un moral rider, we as “one body” will face social turmoil in our own capitalistic selfishness. (Priestley truly did believe this as him and 12 million others voted labour for the first time in history.) In addition, as Gerald “holds up the ring” to Sheila, he is attempting to restore her materialism which identifies her capitalistic ‘virtue’ and therefore restore this selfish change in the younger generation back to the selfish views of the Victorian Era. This not only depicts Gerald as a devil like creature through his temptation, but also makes him a foil to Inspector Goole as the “brighter and harder” light in the stage directions of the exposition of the text have angelic connotations making him seem like a Godly being in the eyes of the audience. Thus, Priestley uses Gerald to demonstrate the selfishness of the conservative views that people people still held from the Victorian Era. In conclusion, Priestley portrays the theme of selfishness to epitomise the capitalistic exploitation of the lower classes ad how these ideas have been indoctrinated from the Victorian Era. As the younger generation change their selfish behaviour, Priestley thus uses them to expound his ideas of social equality and how a callous class can change and remove the disparity between the classes due to the selfishness of capitalism.
Hiya! Been having a look at your videos and their absolutely great thank you so much! I’m trying to practise a answer for the past paper which included the question- ‘describe an occasion when you did something you found rewarding’. I have some ideas (thinking of describe giving food to the poor a scenario like that) but I’m just a little weary that my description will turn into a narrative if I go with an idea like that. Do you have any tips? I would like to memorise these two descriptions but just don’t know how I would them in this. Thanks so much 😃
Thank You sir. The more i appreciate the more less it is. Because of your teaching style and with the help of God i got an A* in my gcse english language. Fun fact: i memorized the exact same paragraphs shown in this vid and written it in my exam paper :)
Thank you so much for the help Mr Salles. Although it may be unlikely, do you think that if my teacher/examiner knew that I had copied a description from your video, they would give me a lower grade? Thanks. :)
please could you make some videos on poems from the aqa love and relationships cluster?? cant find any videos that explore higher level interpretations and meanings. thank you
What sort of descriptions do you recommend revising for example in here the person talked about the sun and the wind what if the picture is completely different?
You can write your own for the opposite of good weather in advance. Or, you can use contrast - "I remember being here last summer when..." so you get to use both.
I know u said it’s good use contrast but I’m confused as in one of ur videos u commented on a student Piece of work and you said it took the atmosphere or image built something like tht
@@unaestrella1876 a picture of a old man, I don’t know if my teacher was dumb or everyone can do this but she let us go on our phone for 30 mins and plan before we did it
@@unaestrella1876 instead of copying the highlighted I changed some of the words for synonyms of the word so it wouldn’t be obvious if they had watched the video
I am doing an exam tomorrow online but my teachers warned us that they would be put through some type of software to make sure the writing is our own and not copied from somewhere. Will this happen with these pieces of writing?
@Mr Salles Teaches English Can you look at this, please? ...The entirety of her countenance is encapsulating. Her eyes: glaucous, not the ocean blue we all love. They are faded blue as if her eyes have seen too many nightmares in only one night. Emptiness. Still in search of a dream; in search of an anodyne to her tormentous circumstance. She is falling apart at her seams, somehow managing to hold herself together. The threads that are frail from years of resewing and reusing are hanging onto their last breaths. At any moment, the young girl it seems could come apart. Either erupt, letting her soul flow freely, or, she could crash and burn. This is something I would like to remember for an exam, only if it is good of course.
In the video I show it as a top grade 6 answer, and then show you *small* changes to make it grade 9. In truth, another teacher might give it a grade 7 - that's English for you. Let me know if the video helps.
Because of covid, narration was taken out. But as someone who writes stories for fun, i was so bummed!! Especially because I can definitely work with pictures 😅
Thank you! This is a great thing, but I am a little worried that "breaking the vase" won't always work for me. I am looking at past papers and examples in books and am struggling to work out how to fit in my weather descriptions into them. For example, one is a setting inside a shopping centre... It is inside so how would I be able to include my descriptions?
@Jake Scott wow thank you I wasn’t expecting this much, I really appreciate u typing this it’s super helpful. I have my English paper 1 exam in two weeks so this was really useful in understanding how to place the weather descriptions in the story no matter what it is about, I feel a lot more confident(:
I’m still struggling after watching so many videos that I came to a conclusion what if the source they give for Q1-4 what if I just write out the source for Q5 will that count as cheating
@@chewypiano7194 hi. Ask yourself some questions. Like- Why do you think Stevenson "needed" Lanyon? What does Lanyon represent? What type of "person" do you think he is? What does his existence in the novella tell us about the other characters? What would the novella be like without him? Without Chapter 9? Write a list of facts about Him and his relationships with the other characters Look at his speech patterns. What do they tell you sbou6 him?
Im a student in college and i really struggle with writing my answers in the paper, and i got a mock paper to do that got sent to me because of lockdown and i have to complete it and send it back but i have no help to finish the paper and if i answer it wrong the paper will be used to get my grade :(
hi mr salles i really enjoy using descriptionari for descriptions and ive just used snippets of people descriptions totalling up to 89 words am i allowed to use this chunk in my gcses?
@@MrSallesTeachesEnglish thank you for responding ive been watching your videos a lot lately as i have my year 11 mock on tuesday and your videos go into depth on every aspect i can think of
I’ve memorised a really good description I did on a graveyard for today’s gcse but I’m scared it’s gonna ask me to describe a beautiful sunny place or something😭
@@tomcostello4562 not really, it worked out well for me :) i did aqa we were asked to write a story about a life saving rescue/event and the story i memorised was about me finding my own gravestone in a cemetery so i just added a bit onto the end where this person tells me that i died years ago but they just went back in time and saved my life so yeah i got to do the description i memorised😁
