AQA English Language Paper 2
Two sources, written a century or more apart, on the same broad subject. Three of the four reading questions ask you to hold both in your head at once.
AQA English Language Paper 2 is called Writers' Viewpoints and Perspectives. It lasts 1 hour 45 minutes, carries 80 marks and is worth 50% of the GCSE. Section A gives you two linked non-fiction or literary non-fiction sources - one from the 19th century, one from the 20th or 21st - which arrive as a separate insert. Section B asks you to write presenting your own point of view.
What the paper looks like
| Question | What it asks | AO | Marks |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Choose four true statements from a list of eight, about a numbered section of Source A | AO1 | 4 |
| 2 | Write a summary of the differences or similarities, using details from both sources | AO1 | 8 |
| 3 | How does the writer of one named source use language for a stated purpose? | AO2 | 12 |
| 4 | Compare how the two writers convey their different attitudes | AO3 | 16 |
| 5 | Write to present your point of view, in a stated form | AO5, AO6 | 40 |
Three differences from Paper 1 worth knowing
The sources arrive as a separate insert, so you can lay them side by side. Paper 1's source is printed inside the question paper.
Question 3 is worth 12 marks, not 8. It is the same kind of language question as Paper 1's Question 2, but longer and worth half as much again, so it needs more developed analysis rather than more quotations.
Question 4 is a comparison worth 16 marks, and it is the question students most often answer as two separate summaries. It asks how the writers' attitudes differ and how they convey them.
How to spend the 1 hour 45 minutes
First 15 minutes: read both sources (AQA's advice)
The paper advises about 15 minutes reading the sources and all five questions. With two sources this matters more than on Paper 1. As you read the second, note where it agrees and disagrees with the first - that is Question 4 already half planned.
Next 45 minutes: Section A (AQA's advice)
An RCF suggestion for the split: about 5 minutes on Question 1, 8 on Question 2, 12 on Question 3 and 20 on Question 4. AQA gives the section time and leaves the division to you.
Last 45 minutes: Section B (AQA's advice)
Forty marks. Five minutes planning your argument, thirty-five writing, five checking. Decide your line of argument before you start - a piece that changes its mind halfway loses organisation marks.
The 19th-century source is not the hard one
Students expect the older source to be the obstacle, and it usually is not. Its vocabulary is unfamiliar but its argument is normally direct and its structure formal. The modern source is often the one with irony, understatement or humour in it - and those are harder to describe accurately in an analysis answer.
- Read the older source for its argument first and its vocabulary second. You rarely need to understand every word to see what the writer wants.
- Watch the modern source for tone. A writer who is joking is still expressing an attitude, and Question 4 wants that attitude named.
- The two sources will share a subject, not an opinion. Finding where they part company is the whole of Question 4.
Before you turn over
- Check which source each question refers to. Question 3 names one source only; answering on the wrong one earns nothing.
- For Question 1, shade a maximum of four boxes. Shading more can lose you marks you had already earned.
- Keep the insert open beside the answer book rather than turning back and forth.
- For Question 4, plan two or three points of difference before writing a sentence.
Next
Paper 2 question by question
Questions 1 to 4 with methods, worked examples and practice.
Paper 2 viewpoint writing
Question 5: articles, letters, speeches and essays.
Comparing writers' viewpoints
The method for the 16-mark comparison.