The OCR English Literature course is varied, and challenging and offers deep and wide-ranging engagement with the subject area. Students will have the opportunity to engage with literature from Chaucer to the present day, looking at set texts and works that they have selected themselves. There is a focus on studying texts within their historical context and students are encouraged to compare texts by different authors across prose, poetry, and drama.
Grade 7 in English Literature
PAPER 1: Drama and pre-1900 Poetry – 40% of A Level Candidates study three set texts for this paper: one Shakespeare play, one pre-1900 drama text, and one pre-1900 poetry text. Shakespeare's plays available for study are Hamlet, Measure for Measure, Richard III, The Tempest, Twelfth Night, and Coriolanus. Students will study one play written before 1900 by either Marlowe, Webster, Goldsmith, Ibsen, or Wilde. The poets on the syllabus are Chaucer, Milton, Coleridge, Tennyson, and Christina Rossetti. The component is assessed with a two-hour and thirty-minute closed text examination. PAPER 2: Comparative and Contextual Study – 40% of A Level This component encourages the development of close reading and comparative analysis skills by studying at least two novels from a particular historical period or genre. As well as exploring connections between their texts, students will develop an understanding of the influence of the contexts in which their chosen texts were written and received. The nature of this unit encourages students to read widely and develop an understanding of their topic by gaining familiarity with more than the minimum of two novels and also engaging with nonfiction and literary criticism related to their topic. Your teacher will select from the following list (with some of the texts available for the study also noted here). • American Literature 1880–1940 (F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby; John Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath; Edith Wharton’s The Age of Innocence) • The Gothic (Angela Carter’s The Bloody Chamber; Bram Stoker’s Dracula; Iain Banks’ The Wasp Factory) • Dystopia (Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale; George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four; Cormac McCarthy’s The Road) • Women in Literature (Jane Austen’s Sense and Sensibility; Virginia Woolf’s Mrs Dalloway; Thomas Hardy’s Tess of the D’Urbervilles) • The Immigrant Experience (Mohsin Hamid’s The Reluctant Fundamentalist; Henry Roth’s Call it Sleep; Monica Ali’s Brick Lane) This paper will be assessed with a two-hour and thirty minutes closed text examination. PAPER 3: Non-examined Assessment – 20% of A Level This component is designed to encourage individual study and a particular enjoyment of modern literature. Learners will study three texts, which must include one prose text, one poetry text, and one drama text. The chosen texts must have been published or performed in 1900 or later and one of the texts must have been first published or performed in 2000 or later. You will be supported by your teacher when selecting your texts and a proposal form will be submitted to the examination board before you commence your investigation. Topics suggested by the examination board include War Through Time, Youth In Time, Irish Literature, Time, Young Women, Invasion, and The City. Suggested authors include Wilfred Owen, Alan Bennett, W.B. Yeats, Ian McEwan, Sylvia Plath, Seamus Heaney, T.S. Eliot, and Caryl Churchill. Paper 3 will reward those who are independent readers. The basis of the whole course is the encouragement of an active engagement in responding to literature. Developing your enthusiasm for reading is therefore crucial.
About Education Provider
| Region | West Midlands |
| Local Authority | Staffordshire |
| Ofsted Rating | Good |
| Gender Type | Co-Educational |
| Address | Upper St John Street, Lichfield, WS14 9EE |
The OCR English Literature course is varied, and challenging and offers deep and wide-ranging engagement with the subject area. Students will have the opportunity to engage with literature from Chaucer to the present day, looking at set texts and works that they have selected themselves. There is a focus on studying texts within their historical context and students are encouraged to compare texts by different authors across prose, poetry, and drama.
Grade 7 in English Literature
PAPER 1: Drama and pre-1900 Poetry – 40% of A Level Candidates study three set texts for this paper: one Shakespeare play, one pre-1900 drama text, and one pre-1900 poetry text. Shakespeare's plays available for study are Hamlet, Measure for Measure, Richard III, The Tempest, Twelfth Night, and Coriolanus. Students will study one play written before 1900 by either Marlowe, Webster, Goldsmith, Ibsen, or Wilde. The poets on the syllabus are Chaucer, Milton, Coleridge, Tennyson, and Christina Rossetti. The component is assessed with a two-hour and thirty-minute closed text examination. PAPER 2: Comparative and Contextual Study – 40% of A Level This component encourages the development of close reading and comparative analysis skills by studying at least two novels from a particular historical period or genre. As well as exploring connections between their texts, students will develop an understanding of the influence of the contexts in which their chosen texts were written and received. The nature of this unit encourages students to read widely and develop an understanding of their topic by gaining familiarity with more than the minimum of two novels and also engaging with nonfiction and literary criticism related to their topic. Your teacher will select from the following list (with some of the texts available for the study also noted here). • American Literature 1880–1940 (F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby; John Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath; Edith Wharton’s The Age of Innocence) • The Gothic (Angela Carter’s The Bloody Chamber; Bram Stoker’s Dracula; Iain Banks’ The Wasp Factory) • Dystopia (Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale; George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four; Cormac McCarthy’s The Road) • Women in Literature (Jane Austen’s Sense and Sensibility; Virginia Woolf’s Mrs Dalloway; Thomas Hardy’s Tess of the D’Urbervilles) • The Immigrant Experience (Mohsin Hamid’s The Reluctant Fundamentalist; Henry Roth’s Call it Sleep; Monica Ali’s Brick Lane) This paper will be assessed with a two-hour and thirty minutes closed text examination. PAPER 3: Non-examined Assessment – 20% of A Level This component is designed to encourage individual study and a particular enjoyment of modern literature. Learners will study three texts, which must include one prose text, one poetry text, and one drama text. The chosen texts must have been published or performed in 1900 or later and one of the texts must have been first published or performed in 2000 or later. You will be supported by your teacher when selecting your texts and a proposal form will be submitted to the examination board before you commence your investigation. Topics suggested by the examination board include War Through Time, Youth In Time, Irish Literature, Time, Young Women, Invasion, and The City. Suggested authors include Wilfred Owen, Alan Bennett, W.B. Yeats, Ian McEwan, Sylvia Plath, Seamus Heaney, T.S. Eliot, and Caryl Churchill. Paper 3 will reward those who are independent readers. The basis of the whole course is the encouragement of an active engagement in responding to literature. Developing your enthusiasm for reading is therefore crucial.