AQA GCSE English Language Paper 1 Section A practice
This resource is excellent preparation for GCSE students studying the AQA English Language specification, who are working towards an improved knowledge and understanding of Paper 1 Section A.
This supportive exam-style sample paper uses an extract from Chapter 2 of The War of the Worlds by H.G. Wells (published 1898). The question paper guides students through typical exam-style question from Paper 1 Section A and enables them to practise and consolidate their skills and improve their exam confidence.
The Section A questions are similarly structured and use the same language as AQA English Language Paper 1 questions from past papers. Students are encouraged to focus on the whole of the source for some questions and specific sections for others, as is typical of AQA Paper 1.
Students are guided to respond to structural features, considering the writer’s choice of language, sentence forms and literary methods. This resource helps support students in their expanding understanding of the depth of analysis required for Paper 1 Section A.
Browse additional resources in the AQA GCSE English Language Paper 1 section.
Please note: This is a very late 19th-century text, but in the AQA exam only 20th and 21st-century texts will be offered for students to respond to.
A sample extract from the resource:
Q2
Look in detail at this extract from lines 11 to 18 of the source.
How does the writer use language here to describe how Ogilvy feels?
You could include the writer’s choice of:
- words and phrases
- language features and techniques
- sentence forms. [8 marks]
Q3
You now need to think about the whole of the source.
This text is from the opening of a novel.
How has the writer structured the text to interest you as a reader?
You could write about:
- what the writer focuses your attention on at the beginning
- how and why the writer changes this focus as the extract develops
- any other structural features that interest you. [8 marks]
