French

[Amber]

Ah! Maybe I have not seen the full range yet then.


The essay my DC has experienced so far was, from approximate recollection, "compare the treatment of conflict in Shakespeare and William Golding texts", which I thought was a good question.

Ah now you see, that is precisely the sort of question I hate. I have to teach to it, and DD had something similar too- comparing Victorian love poetry with Shakespeare and conflict (it's always conflict) in a particular scene of Macbeth with a Wilfred Owen poem. My truck with it is this- why on earth compare them? You never would. You would not go and watch Macbeth and say, yes, it was good, but I do prefer that line in Dulce et decorum est...These things are great in their own right and do not in my view benefit from being compared. It's like comparing Beethoven with Coldplay. Oh look, they are both about fighting, let's get the kids to compare them. For me this is so far from what authors would want done with their work and it's not as if there isn't enough depth in either for them to be considered in their own right - they are not even contemporaries of each other...ok, you can see this is a bit of a pet subject of mine.

[Rob Clark]

I’ve got to agree with Amber. While the question comparing Shakespeare and William Golding has merit in pure academic terms, it also nonsensical. If they were from the same era and tackled very specifically the same subject, it may just, just, serve a purpose, but comparing something as broad and ill-defined as ‘conflict’ in a 17th century playwright and a 20th century novelist is pointless and absurd, particularly when the works concerned are so rich and deep that any number of essay questions can be set about them with some spurious cross-comparison. Sorry, my hobbyhorse too

[mike1880]

You're both on thin ice there: when it comes to Eng Lit, pointlessness sets in a LONG time before you start comparing disparate authors/eras/genres...

Mike

[Rob Clark]

I’m sure you’re right, Mike. I just don’t remember doing much in the way of that sort of comparison throughout my English A level or degrees. But then that was in the days when dinosaurs roamed the earth, as my kids keep reminding me…

[wurzel]

I suppose it is a pointless question, Rob and Amber, but isn't that normal in exams? They exist to allow you to demonstrate what you have learnt and understood. I thought it reasonable as a hook on which to hang a discussion. What I like about it is the wide-ranging possibilities that it opens up, e.g. conflict between individuals, groups, nations, overt or hidden, the degree of right or wrong on either side, where one's sympathies lie etc.

I love reading, but I have no qualifications to pontificate about GCSE literature, so I'm on shaky ground here and will withdraw from further comment, especially having dragged this thread totally away from French. Sorry again OP. I'm amused to be involved in a 'conflict' with you Amber, as I usually find I agree with about 90% of your posts!

Will return to lurking, before the forum sucks me in even more.

[Amber]

Wurzel, don't withdraw from comment, please! The forum is at its best when people can debate and disagree. Heck, this isn't conflict...though feel free to compare me with Golding if you wish You just happen to have hit a nerve with this English business as it drives me mad trying to compare a play written in blank verse in the sixteen hundreds and something by a 20th century poet...and it does put a lot of kids off.

[DenDe]

I imagine that kind of comparison question would be for the high ability candidates and would be set to both challenge and showcase skills.

[Amber]

I imagine that kind of comparison question would be for the high ability candidates and would be set to both challenge and showcase skills.

Not so. I have to do these with my Lower ability groups as well as higher achievers. And actually it is the higher achievers who find them more frustrating, often asking why they have to do it and looking deeply into things and finding nothing there! You can teach the 'in this one...whereas in that one' technique very easily, but more able children will often seek to find something deeper which just isn't there. It can be rather demotivating for them. A more suitable line in my view would something like 'discuss the theme of conflict in x', which gives lots of scope and doesn't tie them to meaningless comparisons with y.

[Rob Clark]

Never studied Golding myself, but I’d have thought something like “In what ways does Lord of the Flies show that conflict is a natural consequence of a society without rules?” would do the job quite nicely

wurzel, don’t go please. Qualifications not a prerequisite for pontification…

[wurzel]

Sorry both. I wasn't offended, or scared off - well, only slightly - I just had to go back to work.

I unwittingly raised a hornet's nest here. All I can say is that I thought I would quite have enjoyed having a go at that question, but I bow to Amber's experience with such things. I must admit, my own DC said he wasn't quite sure what they were looking for. At the time, I thought that was a good thing though. It forced him to stir his brain into action and make a judgement. Actually, I wouldn't be surprised if he wrote that it was a pointless question.