The A level course has four parts: three exams and a non-examined coursework assessment.

Edexcel, 9ET0

Paper 1: Drama - 30% of A level

This exam focuses on two seminal dramatic works.

Section A: Twentieth-Century Drama

A Streetcar Named Desire (1947) by Tennessee Williams, a dramatic critique of cultural change in the 20th-century American South.

Section B: Shakespeare

Othello (1603) by William Shakespeare, a complex exploration of the intersection between race and gender in the Renaissance.

Paper 2: Prose - 30% of A level

This exam focuses on the comparison of two influential works of fiction, united by the theme of the supernatural: Oscar Wilde’s influential critique of the fin-de-siécle, The Picture of Dorian Gray (1891) and the highly acclaimed ‘neo-slave narrative’ Beloved (1987) by the black American writer Toni Morrison.

Paper 3: Poetry - 30% of A level

This exam focuses on a range of highly significant poetic works.

Section A: Post-2000 Poetry

A comparative analysis of two poems: one from a selection of 20 in the Forward Anthology, and another that is previously unseen.

Section B: The Romantics

An analysis of two poems from a collection of Romantic poetry, featuring works by the likes of William Blake, Lord Byron, John Keats and William Wordsworth.

Coursework - 20% of A level

The coursework assessment consists of a 2,500-3,000 word comparison of two literary works (prose, poetry and drama) of students’ choosing. The coursework process begins in term 3 of Y12, with final submission in term 1 of Y13.

Previous coursework titles include:

• The female psychological experience in Sylvia Plath’s The Bell Jar and Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s The Yellow Wallpaper

• The control of truth in George Orwell’s 1984 and Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451

• Changing social order in T. S. Eliot’s The Waste Land and Shakespeare’s King Lear

The A level course has four parts: three exams and a non-examined coursework assessment.

Eduqas, A700QS

Component 1: Language Concepts and Issues - 30% of A level

This exam focuses on foundational ideas and frameworks in linguistic study, with a particular emphasis on spoken communication.

Section A: Spoken Language

A comparison of the linguistic presentation of speakers in two spoken transcripts, applying key linguistic concepts and frameworks to understand speakers’ identities and communicative goals.

Section B: Language Issues

An evaluation of perspectives, theories, concepts and frameworks to do with:

• the relationship between language and social class

• how children learn their first language

• the relationship between language and social power

• how people use language to meet the needs of a situation.

Component 2: Language Change Over Time - 30% of A level

This exam challenges students to consider how English and its uses have changed and developed from the early modern period to today.

Section A: Language Change

A comparison of three written texts from three different periods - early modern, late modern and the present day - with a focus on how genres have changed over that time.

Section B: English in the 21st Century

An evaluation of the linguistic choices of participants in online interactions.

Component 3: Creative and Critical Writing - 20% of A level

This exam focuses on students’ ability to produce texts and critique their own writing. It consists of two parts:

• Two creative pieces of fiction and/or non-fiction, inspired by a stimulus

• An evaluation of the linguistic choices in one of these creative pieces

Coursework - 20% of A level

Students conduct a 2,500-3,000 word linguistic investigation into one of the following topics:

• Language and Self-Representation

• Language and Gender

• Language and Diversity

• Language and Culture

Students choose the specific focus of their investigations and collect and analyse their own linguistic data, drawing conclusions about how language is used to construct identities. The coursework process begins in term 3 of Y12, with final submission in term 1 of Y13.

Previous coursework investigations include:

• The linguistic construction of women’s gender identities through their linguistic choices in male- and female-dominated professions

• How David Bowie has utilised language in television interviews over a 20-year period to construct his changing artistic identity

• Female politicians’ use of language in Commons debates

• How the language of London-based football clubs’ chants constructs club identities