EXTERNAL Unfamiliar Text (5c)

Section 1: What is the Unfamiliar Text Paper?

Unfamiliar text is an external examination that asks you to close read THREE texts - one narrative (a short story), a non fiction (like a news article type thing) and a poem. It is worth FOUR credits and these also count towards NCEA Level One Literacy.

For this external, you will be given a resource booklet and an answer booklet. The resource booklet will have three unfamiliar texts (*unfamiliar means that you won't have seen them before or studied them in class).

You need to do two things with each text - firstly, you need to read the texts, then identify at least ONE language feature and then explain (give reasons why) how the language features help get the writer's point across.

Have a look at The Studyit website to see what the achievement criteria is and get access to other resources.

Section 2: Watch these videos to help you to understand what to do

As you watch these videos, be able to write down and then tell your teacher what the main bits of information

Section 3: Let's get learning those language techniques

Before you can do anything else, you really need to get to know your language techniques. **Remember, a language technique is just a tool that an author uses to help them build their story. So here is a whole bunch of resources to holp you memorise them

Digital Flashcards to help you memorise the language terms

• Use this quizlet to help you learn the techniques - sure they're for Year 12; but the Year 12 ones are useful for Level One as well. 

• And here is a Year 11 version

Vocab Lists

If you're more into vocab lists, try this one or the NCEA page or this one

Tips on how to learn this vocab

The more active you can make your language technique learning, the better you will learn it - so try making a mind map of it, a big poster to put on the back of the toilet door (we all spend a LOT of time staring at that), ask the people at home to quiz you on them or make flashcards. Anything that you can do to mix it up instead of just reading is really important.

Section 4: Let's narrow down that process

Unfamiliar text always seems daunting, but if you follow this clear process, then it will be simple and easy. For this paper, process is everything.

Step One: READ FOR THE FIRST TIME, the first text. When you have finished reading it, write down FIVE words that describe how it made you feel. For example, happy, sad, shocked, etc. This is the author's tone and mood that you have described - these words that you have written down will be really useful in your written answers

Step Two: Now read the questions. What clues about the can you pick up from the question to help you narrow down on what you need to be reading for?

Step Three: Now that you have figured out what the author wants you to feel, READ FOR THE SECOND TIME, and pick up on what they want you to think about (their message, theme, lesson *all of these words mean the same thing). During this reading, use a highlighter / pen to IDENTIFY any language techniques - highlight them, then draw an arrow out to the side explaining what the technique is (this is what we mean by annotating a text)

Note: your text should be covered in circles and underlines and highlights and annotations.

Step Four: READ FOR THE THIRD TIME. This reading is about figuring out the language features that the author has used to put the text together. Add to your notes about how the language techniques make the reader feel things.

Step Five: Put together a little plan for your writing, using all of your notes from step 1-4- remember, each point you make should be backed up by a link to the theme and at least one specific named example, such as, 'the author uses the hyperbole "freeze your Rastafarian nenes off" to highlight how cold it is for the reader.' You also need to talk about at least THREE language features (they might call these aspects, language conventions etc but it all means the same thing)

Step Six: Repeat steps 1-5 for the second and then third text.

Section 6: Practice makes perfect

Use the past papers below to practice until you feel confident.

2020 NCEA Paper

2016 BBA Practice Exam

2015 Practice Exam

2014 BBA Practice Exam

2013 BBA Practice Exam

2012 BBA Practice Exam

2011 BBA Practice Exam