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Wilmslow High School

AQA GCE A LEVEL ENGLISH LANGUAGE STUDENT GUIDE


English Language A LevelAQA English Language

Student Handbook & Learning Guide

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ENGLISH LANGUAGE Course Outline

AQA GCE English Lang. Unit Weighting Assessment

AS ENGLISH LANGUAGE

Unit 1Language and the Individual 50% of AS Exam – 1 hour 30 mins

Unit 2Language Diversity

50% of AS Exam – 1 hour 30 mins

A Level ENGLISH LANGUAGE

Unit 3Language, the Individual and Society

40% of A Level Exam – 2 hours 30mins

Unit 4Language Diversity and Change

40% of A Level Exam – 2 hours 30mins

Unit 5Non-Examination Assessment: Language in Action

20% of A Level

Internally markedExternally moderated

Assessment Objectives

AQA Assessment Objective 02AO2 UNDERSTANDINGDemonstrate critical understanding of concepts and issues relevant to language use.

AQA Assessment Objective 03AO3 CONTEXTAnalyse and evaluate how contextual factors and language features are associated with the construction of meaning.

AQA Assessment Objective 04AO4 CONNECTIONSExplore connections across texts, informed by linguistic concepts and methods.

AQA Assessment Objective 05

AO5 CREATIVITYDemonstrate expertise and creativity in the use of English to communicate in different ways.

AQA Assessment Objective 01AO1 APPLYApply appropriate methods of language analysis, using associated terminology and coherent written expression.




Specification at a glanceThese qualifications are linear. Linear means that students will sit all the AS exams at the end of their AS course and all

the A-level exams at the end of their A-level course.

As




A Level

Welcome to English Language at Wilmslow High School

Like many A Level subjects, English Language is quite different from its GCSE counterpart. It is challenging at




times, and requires a sound knowledge of linguistic terminology. Analysis is a main element of the course and you will encounter a wide variety of texts.

During this course you will gain a much clearer knowledge and understanding of language as a dynamic and vital form of communication. You can also expect to be inspired by language and have the opportunity to create and investigate areas of your interest.

Where can English Language take me?

English Language is a subject very well regarded by Higher Education institutions, and because you are studying the thing that you will probably use the most whatever you do in life – your language – it easily complements any course that you might follow.

At university, there is a considerable range of English-related course available from creative writing to speech therapy.

Expectations: Be organised. You will have 2 teachers and must ensure that your folders are kept up to date with all of the relevant work. If you miss sessions then it is your responsibility to collect the work of the class teacher or from the VLE. Your file will be checked. Bring this booklet with you to each of your lessons as it contains vital information. If you lose this booklet then you need to print another copy from the VLE. File checks by your tutors will ensure that you are keeping the folders as requested.

Be committed. It is your responsibility to be punctual to lessons and seek additional support on topic areas that you

do not understand. A reading list is provided in this booklet to aid you in extending your studies.

Standards of behaviour. You enter sixth form voluntarily and we expect you to act accordingly. If behaviour is not satisfactory then you will be asked to leave the lesson immediately.

Homework. You will never have no homework. If nothing has explicitly set, this is an opportunity for wider reading

and expanding your notes. See the independent study tracker for ideas. Independent Study. Independent study is a vital skill in English Language and you expected to do approximately 4

hours of study outside of lessons per subject.

Learning Buddy. If you are absent from lessons you will be allocated a ‘learning buddy’ who will collect hand-outs for you and lend you notes to copy up.

Booklet. Bring this booklet to every lesson as it contains important information about the course and a handy glossary of key terms.

Organising Notes and Resources

All students must purchase an A4 ring-bound folder in which to keep:

1. All lesson notes (with clear dates and titles)




2. Any additional resources given out by your teacher3. Marked essays4. Wider reader notes5. Your copy of the course handbook

At least once a term, your folder will be monitored to ensure that you are managing your resources effectively. The dates for the folder checks are marked on the course outline and on the table below.

It is your responsibility to ensure that your folders are available for checking during these weeks: if you fail to produce your folder, then you will be referred for further monitoring.

Date of monitoring

Notes (organised with dates and titles)

Marked essays

Course handbook (attainment tracker completed to date)

Evidence of wider reading

WWW/EBI

w/c 3rd October 2016

w/c 14th December 2016

w/c 1st February 2017

w/c 24th April 2017

Independent Study Tracker

As an A Level student you must be self-motivated. In addition to lessons you should be spending 4 hours per week working on homework or independent study. Use this tracker to help you structure




your independent learning.

Activity Unit Date Time spent

Wider reading: the LRC has a wide range of texts to aid you in further reading. You can tick of the texts that you have used on your reading list. Additionally, you can read EMag and English Review magazines.Blog: alevelenglish.infoTwitter: @whigh_KS5eng

Writing up class notes: Add to them, check them, look up unfamiliar terms/references, check spellings, highlight, colour-code AOs, add supporting quotes etc.

Practice essays: Do a new question and/or have another go at a previous attempt. You have your booklets with past exam paper texts in them to annotate. Look at target(s) and relevant mark scheme(s) to see how you can improve/hit target. Practise planning, writing and checking answers/or partial answers to sample questions under pressure.Timed responses. Remove yourself from any distractions and set the clock to develop exam techniques

Peer study session: get together with classmates/friends from the other Language class. (Pairs/small groups are likely to be most productive). Discuss past papers, share notes, practise essay technique, peer assess work; advise each other on areas you find difficult etc.TV/Film//Audio/Web: There are endless texts about the English Language available in these media.

Learning by rote: make sure that you are familiar with all of the key terminology by learning them using the glossary.

English Language AS Course OutlinePaper 1: Language & the Individual




Paper 2: Language Varieties

*You will have two teachers for the course—each taking 3 sessions per week.*You are expected to do approximately 4 hours per week per subject outside of sessions.

English Language AS Course Outline (Year 12)

Summer task - data collection/ introduction to linguistic studyTeacher 1 Teacher 2

Autumn 1 Introduction to linguistic methods – spoken language

Introduction to linguistic methods – written language

Folder scrutiny week w/c 3rd OctoberAssessment week w/c Monday 10th October (Linguistic Test & Text Analysis)

Autumn 2 Paper 2 – Language varieties

Language and Gender

Paper 1 – Language and the Individual

Analysing and comparing texts

Assessment week w/c Monday 28th NovemberTimed essay 1: Gender Question

Timed essay 2: comparison of texts – Paper 1

Folder scrutiny week w/c 14th DecemberMock Examination

Spring 1 Paper 2 – Language varieties

Language and GenderLanguage and Social Groups

Paper 1 – Language and the Individual

Paper 2 – Language varietiesLanguage and Occupational groups

Folder scrutiny week w/c 1st FebruaryAssessment week w/c Monday 13th February

Paper 2 Section ASpring 2 Preparation for

Paper 2, section BWriting for a non-specialist audience /

attitude to language

Language and Region

Assessment week w/c Monday 20th MarchFull internal mock (through lessons)

Paper 1: Language and the Individual Paper 2: Language VarietiesQuestion 1: 30 minutes Question 1: 40 minutesQuestion 2: 30 minutes Question 2: 50 minutesQuestion 3: 30 minutes

Summer 1 Feedback and revision Feedback and revisionFolder scrutiny week w/c 24th April

AS ExaminationsSummer 2 Introduction to Year 13

English Language A Level Course Outline

Year 13 Course OutlinePaper 1: Language, the Individual and the Society




Paper 2: Language Diversity and ChangeNon-examination assessment: Language in Action

Summer task Collecting data and researching language theories and concepts for the investigation section of the Non-examination

assessmentTeacher 1 Teacher 2

Autumn 1 Language Investigation Original writing and commentary

Folder scrutiny week / Coursework progress checkAssessment week

Autumn 2Children’s Language Development: Paper 1

Section BLanguage Change

Assessment weekMock Examination January

Folder scrutiny week

Spring 1 Children’s Language Development: Paper 1 Section B

Language ChangeWorld Englishes

Folder scrutiny weekAssessment week

Spring 2 GenderOccupation

Region / Language and EthnicitySocial Groups

Assessment weekFull internal mock (through lessons)

Paper 1: Language, the induvial and society Paper 2: Language diversity and change2 hours 30mins 2 hours 30 mins

Summer 1 Feedback and revision Feedback and revision







Methods of Language Analysis

Framework Explained Aspects

Lexis The vocabulary system; meaning at word and phrase level

Collocation – hypernyms / hyponymsSemantic fieldFormal/informal lexical choicesColloquial choicesSlangDenotation/connotationSynonymsEuphemism/dysphemism / Taboo – levels of formalityLiteral/figurative language – metaphorIdiomNeology

Grammar The structural relationships within and betweensentences and utterances

Word classesSentence construction – including minor sentencesSentences typesCoordination / subordinationPhrase / head wordPronoun choiceEllipsisTenseStandard and non-standard EnglishMorphology – word function1st, 2nd, 3rd personModifier / modificationSyntax

Phonetics/ Phonology

The sounds of English, how they are producedand how they are described; including aspects ofProsody

Accent variationPhoneme / phonemic alphabet (IPA)DipthongVoicing / place or articulation / manner of articulationSyllableAccommodationSound iconicityAlliteration / onomatopoeia / assonance /sibilanceAccent/dialect features

Pragmatics The ways in which social conventions and impliedmeanings are encoded in spoken and written language

Sub-text – the implied meanings conveyed by contextual factorsImplicatureInferenceIronyDeixisSpeech actsPoliteness / Face / Cooperative principles

Discourse (i) longer stretches of text, looking particularly at aspects of cohesion(ii) the way texts create identities for particular individuals, groups or institutions e.g. thediscourse of law, politics, the media

Spoken discourse structures – adjacency pairs, IFRAdjuncts / disjunctsAnaphoric / cataphoric / exophoric referenceListsProblem/solution structuresDesire/fulfilment structuresNarrative structuresCritical discourse analysisInterdiscursivity (intertextuality)

Graphology Language as a semiotic system creating meaning through textual design, signs and images.

LayoutTypographical featuresOrthographical featuresMultimodal texts




Attainment Tracker

ALPs

AS English Language Assessment Week Feedback/Grade/MarkLinguistic Test

Text Analysis

Paper 1

Gender

Paper 2 Section A

Full Mock

Mark GradePaper 1Paper 2Total

A Level English Language

Assessment Feedback/Grade/MarkExamination response: Children’s Language Development

Examination response:Language DiscoursesMock Examination: Children’s Language Development

Mock Examination: Language Discourses

Examination response: Children’s Language Development

Examination response:Language DiscoursesMock Examination Paper 1

Mock ExmainationPaper2




Reading List This list is not exhaustive— most of the texts are in the LRC Other Research Options Wilmslow LibraryStockport LibraryManchester City Library InternetOwn language study - writing own transcripts /gathering data

Author Title Description Utilised / x

David Crystal The CambridgeEncyclopaedia of Language

Indispensablefor all areas of the course

David Crystal ‘You Say Potato’ Good for English Accents

John Shuttleworth Living Language Good for all areas of the course - focused activities

Marcello Giovanelli & Gary Ives

A/AS Level English Language for AQA Student Book

A great textbook with guidance on most areas of the course and activities

Dan Clayton AQA A Level English Language: Student Book

A great textbook with guidance on most areas of the course and activities

Adrian Beard How Texts Work Good data for classroom use

Danuta Reah The Language of Newspapers Useful data and activities

Jean Sitilwell Peccei Pragmatics Useful data and activities

Francesca Pridham The Language of Conversation Useful data and activities

Sandra Cornbleet & Ronald Carter

The Language of Sports Writing

Amanda Coultas Language and Social Contexts Very helpful introductions to speech, formality issues and representation.

David Crystal Discover GrammarMaking Sense of GrammarRediscover Grammar

A great range of texts to strengthen your writing skills

Deborah Cameron The Myth of Mars and Venus: Do Men and Women Really speak different languages ?

Deborah Tannen You just Don’t Understand: women and men in conversation

Accessible lively texts.

Norman Fairclough Language and Power Comprehensive overview.

Angela Goddard The Language of Advertising Clear, accessible and comprehensive.




David Crystal The Language Revolution Interesting on the role of the Internet and themes of language in the 21st Century

Tim Shortis The Language of ICT Good overview of topic

John Shuttleworth Living Language Good for data and activities

John O’Connor The Pocket Guide to English Language Very helpful for grammar and key concepts

Stephen Fry (Foreword), J. P. Davidson

Planet Word Very interesting—covers some wider issues in language

S Russell Grammar, Structure and Style Clearly illustrates important language factors with helpful examples

Mark Forsyth Etymologicon A enriching read full of fascinating facts about the English Language

David Crystal Words, Words, Words Explores language variety through words

David Crystal Txting the Gr8 Db8 A comprehensive look at texting / technology

Lynne Truss Eats Shoots and Leaves: A Zero Tolerance approach to punctuation

A great fun guide to punctuation

T Thorne Dictionary of Contemporary Slang

Geraldine Woods English Grammar for Dummies

Year 13 Texts Author Title Description Utilised

/ x

David Crystal Listen to Your ChildClear, accessible text

Frank Myszor Language AcquisitionHelpful as an introduction to the topic

William O’Grady How Children Learn Language

Lise Elliot Pink Brain, Blue Brain: How Small Differences Grow into Troublesome Gaps - And What We Can Do About it

Good for gender and acquisition

Naomi S Baron From Alphabet to Email: How written English Evolved and Where It’s Heading

Detailed and academic

Albert Baugh & Thomas Cable

A History of the English Language Detailed social and historical context

Adrian Beard Language Change Useful data and accompanying activities.

Melvyn Bragg The Adventure of English: the biography of a Language

Interesting & readable

David Crystal The Disappearing Dictionary Lost English Dialect words




Webpage / publication Description Utilised / x

emagaizne

www.facebook.com/emc.emagazie

Accessible articles on various language topics. A good read.

Keep updated with a range of language topics

Mslexia Quarterly journal focused on creative writing. Some useful style models and tips for writers.

www.bbc.co.uk/voices A range of data, articles and links related to regional and social dialects. Useful style models for media texts.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/features/the-listening-project

A corpus of spoken data

http://www.oed.com/ The Oxford English Dictionary site

www.bbc.co.uk/archive/writers/ A fantastic collection of interviews with writers

www.bbc.co.uk/blast Range of pages focused on writing and creativity with useful tips and ideas.

www.theguardian.co.ukWww.thetimes.co.ukwww.bbc.co.uk/news

Media sites such as these will contain interesting and current language issues.

http://www.bl.uk/ A large resource of texts – very useful for language change

Transcribing Spoken Language Data

The most basic transcripts simply provide a record of the words spoken by the speakers with pauses and turn-taking clearly shown.

If you intend to analyse a range of phonological features (such as the significance of prosodic features, or the distinctive pronunciation of some speakers), a more sophisticated transcription is required.

If you wish to comment on specific pronunciation/accent features, you should make selective use of the International Phonetic Alphabet to transcribe just the individual words concerned, or just make use of phonetic spelling to reproduce non-standard pronunciations.

How to Transcribe Spoken Data – An example

You can also keep up to date with deadlines and current issues by following us on Twitter @whigh_KS5eng

Blog: alevelenglish.info




K: HEYA (.) you coming out tonightG: yeah (1.0) have you seen ↑Tommo↑K: ↑mm↑ (.) what happened (coughs) toYou | th.G: | went to football| | (laughs) |K: |?? |K: any good (2.) did you WIN=G: =yeah (.) four nil (1.) it was GO:::::D stuff

Key:

HEYA using capital letters to show an emphasis of louder volume

Heya phonetic spelling of the pronunciation of the word

(.) a micropause of half a second or less

(1) a longer pause, with the amount of seconds given as a number

↑mm↑ raised pitch

(coughs) paralinguistic features like laughing, coughing etc.

| went | vertical lines show simultaneous speech

th. A full stop showing a word clipped short

?? inaudible speech

= running on from one speaker to another without pause

GO:::::::D elongation of a sound

SpeechAccent: the specific way words are pronounced according to geographical region.Dialect: the language variety of a geographical region or social background, revealed by a variation in lexical and grammatical terms.Discourse community: a group with shared values and approaches to reading.Idiolect: an individual’s style of speaking or ‘linguistic fingerprint’.Register: a variety of language appropriate to a particular purpose and context.Representation: the projection of a certain way of thinking about a particular individual, group or institution through the use of language.Sociolect: a defined use of language as a result of a membership of a social group.Specialist register: a set of lexical items and grammatical constructions particular to an institution or occupational group.

Glossary of Key Terms




Standard English: a universally accepted dialect of English that carries a degree of prestige.

CAMPG

Actual reader: any reader who actually engages with the text.Actual writer: the ‘real’ person behind the text.Context: the temporal and spatial situations in which a text is produced or received.Context of reception: the situations in which a text is read and those factors that might influence a reader’s interpretations.Context of production: the situation in which a text is produced and those factors that factors that might influence its writing.Genre: the category or type of a text, such as comedy, tragedy and horror.Implied reader: the kind of reader a text producer has in mind when writing and who might be expected to ‘follow’ the author’s point of view.Implied writer: a constructed image of the writer a reader may have in mind.Mode: the medium of communication, for example speech or writing.Sub-mode: a sub-division of mode, such as poetry, drama and conversation.Multimodal texts: texts that combine word, image and sound to produce meaning.Oppositional view: a broad way of defining modes, which suggests that their qualities are strictly opposites, for example writing is formal, speech is informal.Prototype: a ‘best-fit’ example of a particular category. For example, for many people, an apple is a prototypical fruit.Type: a form of text such as a play, short story and recipe.

Purpose

Purpose: the reason a text is produced.Multi-purpose: a text with more than one purpose.Dual-purpose: a text with two clear and defined purposes.Primary purpose: the main reason a text has been produced.Secondary purpose: a secondary (and sometimes more subtle) reason.

Lexis & SemanticsAntonymy: words with opposite semantic value.Cohesion: a measure of how well a text fits together as a whole, its internal logic and construction.Comparative: the form for comparing two items; adjectives inflected with –er or combined with ‘more’.Connotation: an associated, symbolic meaning relying on culturally shared conventions.Content words: words that carry explicit meanings.Denotation: a strict ‘dictionary’ meaning of a lexical term.Dysphemism: a harsh, ‘to-the-point’ and perhaps taboo term.Euphemism: a socially acceptable word or phrase used to avoid talking about something potentially distasteful.Ellipsis: the missing out of a word or words in a sentence.Functional words: words that have less explicit meanings and serve to highlight relationships




between other words.Hyponymy: the term for the hierarchical structure that exists between lexical items.Levels of Formality: vocabulary styles including slang, colloquialisms, taboo, formal and fixed levels.Occupational register: a technical vocabulary associated with a particular occupation or activity.Neology: the process of new word formation, including the following: blends, compounds, acronyms, initialisms, eponyms.Semantic or lexical field: lexical items that are similar in range of meaning and properties.Superlative: adjectives inflected with –est or combined with ‘most’.Synonymy: words with very similar semantic value.Textual cohesion: the term used to describe how a text is logically structured to create a coherent sense of meaning.

Grammar and Syntax

Stative verbs: verbs that describe a state of affairs rather than an action, e.g. ‘know’.Subject pronouns: a pronoun that usually occurs as the actor in a verbal process (I, you).Object pronoun: a pronoun that usually appears as being affected by a verb process(Me, you).Possessive pronoun: a pronoun that demonstrates ownership (my, your).

Adjectival phrase: a phrase with an adjective as its head, for example ‘very big’.Adverbial phrase: a phrase with an adverb as its head, for example ‘very quickly’.Auxiliary verb: a verb that supports or ‘helps’ another, it shows tense or modality.Clause: a group of lexical items centred round a verb phrase.Compound sentence: a sentence containing two or more main clauses, connected by coordinating conjunctions, or sometimes just separated by punctuation (semi-colon).Complex sentence: a sentence containing a main clause with one or more subordinate or dependent clauses, often connected with a subordinating conjunction.Coordinating conjunctions: words such as and, but and or that link clauses to form compound sentences.Descriptive approach: focuses on actual language use.Dynamic verbs: verbs where the situation described by the verb process changes over time, for example, ‘he ate the cake’.Intransitive verb: a verb process such as ‘yawned’ or ‘slept’ that has no object.Main clause: a clause that can stand independently and make sense on its own.Main verb: the verb that details the main process in a verb phrase.Modal auxiliary verb: a verb that never appears on is own and is used to express possibility, probability, certainty, necessity or obligation: will; would; can; could; shall; should;, may; might; must.Modifier: a word, usually an adjective or a noun used attributively, that qualifies the sense of a noun.Morphology: the area of language study that deals with the formation of words from smaller units called morphemes.Morpheme: the smallest unit of grammatical meaning.Negating particle: a small item used to form a negative construction, for example not.Noun phrase: a group of words centred around a head noun.Prescriptive approach: focuses on how language ought to be structured (written or spoken) and sees alternative patterns as inferior.Pre-modification: modifying that occurs before a head noun.




Primary auxiliary: used to denote tense changes: ‘do’; ‘be’;’have’.Sentence structures: the kind of sentence(s) used by a writer for impact and effect.Simple sentence: a sentence consisting of a single main clause.Subordinate clause: a clause that is dependent on another to complete the full meaning of a sentence.Subordinating conjunctions: words such as because, although and whilst that link a main clause to a number of subordinate clauses in complex sentences.Utterance: a group of spoken words, roughly equivalent to the sentence in written terms.

Phonetics and Phonology

Alliteration: a sequence of words beginning with the same sound.Assonance: the repetition of vowel sounds for effect.Consonance: the repetition of consonant sounds for effect.Homophone: a word that sounds the same as another word or words.Lexical onomatopoeia: actual lexical items that rely on a similarity between sound and meaning.Phonological manipulation: the ways in which text producers play with sounds and their effects.Phonemic substitution: the replacing of one phoneme by another for a desired effect.Non-lexical onomatopoeia: ‘non-words’ that working the same way as lexical onomatopoeia.

PragmaticsCooperative principles: the principle that suggests that all communication is essentially a cooperative act.Deixis: lexical items that ‘point’ towards something and place words in context.Face: the concept of how all communication relies on presenting a ‘face’ to listeners and audiences, and how the management of positive and negative face needs to contribute to interaction.Implicature: an implied meaning that has to be inferred as a result of a conversation maxim being broken.Inference: the process of deriving meanings. Politeness: the awareness of others’ needs to be approved of and liked (positive politeness) and/or given freedom to express their own identity and choices (negative politeness).Irony: using language to signal an attitude other than what has been literally expressed.Speech acts: communicative acts that carry meaning beyond the words and phrases used within them, for example, apologies and promises

GraphologyCultural model: an organisational structure based on shared and agreed criteria by groups of people within a society.Convention: an agreed or shared feature.Typography: font type, size, colour, emboldening, italicising, underlining and any other modification to font types.Orthographical features: the features of the writing system such as spelling, capitalisation and punctuation.

Discourse




Adjacency pair: two utterances by different speakers which have a natural and logical link, and complete an idea together, a simple structure of two turns. Adjuncts: non-essential elements of clauses (usually adverbials) that can be omitted (eg. I’ll see you in the morning)Disjuncts: sentence adverbs that work to express an attitude or stance towards material that follows (e.g. Frankly, I’m appalled at what she said.)Anaphoric referencing: referencing back to an already stated lexical item.Cataphoric referencing: referencing forward to an as yet undisclosed lexical item.Exophoric referencing: making reference to things beyond the language of a text itself (as opposed to endophoric, which is within the language of a text), perhaps within a speaker’s immediate physical contact e.g. ‘Look at that’.Interdiscursivity (or intertextuality): the use of discourses from one field as part of another (e.g. the use of science discourses in the selling of beauty products).Critical discourse analysis: the use of linguistic analysis to explore and challenge the ideologies, positions and values of texts and their producers.Conversational analysis: the analysis of the structure and features of conversation.Exchange structure: a series of turns between speakers.Narrative categories: Six key categories developed by Labov which appear in a narrative – generally in a set order.Powerful participants: those who hold some degree of status in a conversation and can to some extent control its direction and the potential of speakers to contribute.Topic management: the control of the conversation in terms of speaking and topic.Transition relevance point: a point at which it is natural for another speaker to take a turn.Turn-taking: the sharing of speaking roles, usually cooperatively.

Language Acquisition

Allusions: a subtle reference to a story or factual aspect outside of the text.Ascender: the typographical feature where a portion of the letter goes above the usual height for the letters in any font.Assimilation: the influence exercised by one sound upon the articulation of another, so that the sounds become more alike.Behaviourists: those who believe that language is acquired through imitation and reinforcementCare giver: the term used to refer to the main adult who looks after a child.Central Vowel: a vowel pronounced roughly in the ‘middle’ of the mouth cavityChild directed speech: a distinctive form of language use employed by adults when interacting with young children.Cognitive theorists: those who believe that language acquisition is part of a wider development of understanding. Decender: where part of a letter goes below the baseline of a fontDiagraph: a graphic unit in which two symbols combine, or any sequence of two letters produced as a single sound, eg. ‘sch’Dipthong: a vowel in which there is a perceptible change in quality during a syllableEgocentric speech: the running discourse style of speech used by children where no listener is directly addressed and the talk is focused on the child’s activitiesEmergent writing: children’s early scribble writing, a stage of their literacy developmentExpansion: the development of a child’s utterance into a longer, more meaningful formLanguage Acquisition Device (LAD): the human brain’s inbuilt capacity to acquire language




Language Acquisition Support System (LASS): this refers to the child’s interaction with the adults around them and how this interaction supports language development Miscue: errors made by children when readingNativists: those who believe that humans have an inbuilt capacity to acquire languageNegative reinforcement: when an undesirable behaviour is unrewarded with the intention that it will not be repeatedObject permanence: the awareness that objects continue to exist even when they are no longer visibleOverextension: a feature of a child’s language where the word used to label something is ‘stretched’ to include things that aren’t normally part of that word’s meaningParalinguisictics: aspects of speech in addition to the actual words and word-sounds saidPhonics: a system of teaching reading and spelling that stresses basic symbol-sound relationships and their use in decoding words; a system used especially in the early stages of readingPositive reinforcement: when behaviour is rewarded, including verbal praise to encourage this behaviour to be repeated.Proto-word: an invented word that has a consistent meaningRecast: the commenting on, extending and rephrasing of a child’s utteranceScaffolding: the process of transferring a skill from adult to child and then withdrawing support once the skill has become masteredSocial interactionists: those who believe that child language develops through interaction with carersUnderextension: a feature of a child’s language where the word used to label is ‘reduced’ to include only part of its normal meaningVirtuous error: syntactic errors made by young children in which the non-standard utterance reveals some understanding, though incomplete, or standard syntax

Language Investigation

Anomalies: strange, one-off or unexpected result in your dataCorpus: a large, text-based collection of data, usually stored electronically so that it can be quickly analysed and searched.Empirical: work that comes from observation an experience, rather than pure theoryEthically sounds: this refers to the methods of gathering data and conducting an investigation that makes sure it won’t mislead or offend anyoneEthnographic study: a research method involves observing the ‘real life’ behaviour of the people being studiedExtrapolate: to draw conclusions based on a sample of data which might apply more widelyLinguistic variables: specific linguistic features identified as markers for possible variation in an investigationLongitudinal study: a data-gathering exercise for investigation that takes place over a significant period of time, for example recording the same child’s language use over several weeks or monthsMethodology: the design of an investigation and the changes it goes throughObserver’s paradox: the difficulty of gaining examples of real language data, when the presence of an observer or contrived situation might change the way people would normally use languagePrimary data: spoken or written data collected by a researcherQualitative: data analysis that focuses on individual instances of language use and analyses them closely in context




Quantitive: data analysis that summarises findings in larger sets of data and presents statistical findings.Secondary data: data that has already been collected by another researcher, which is made use of in a new investigation Social variables: the ways in which the context of data differs by social factors like age, gender, ethnicity and social classReliable: used to refer to data tat is an accurate reflection of real language useTrend: patterns in data that seem to show something in particular tending to happen

Language Change

Archaic: a word from earlier period of English usage that is rarely used in the modern contemporary language Creole: a language variety created by contact between one or more language forms and becoming established over several generations of users. Derivational morphology: the creation of new words by adding prefixes and suffixes. Descriptivism: an attitude to language use that seeks to describe it without making value judgements.Diachronic change: refers to the study of historical language change.Drift: a process of linguistic change over a period of timeInflectional morphology: the alteration of words to make new grammatical formsInformalisation: the way in which language is becoming increasingly informal in all areas of societyPrescriptivism: an attitude to language use that makes judgements about what is right and wrong and holds language up to an ideal standard that should be maintained.Standardisation: making all variations of language conform to the standard languageSemantic change: the process of words changing meaning, including the following: narrowing, broadening, amelioration, pejoration, semantic reclamation. Synchronic change: refers to an approach that studies language at the theoretical point in time without considering the historical context Vocative: a form (especially a noun) used to address a person





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· Web viewWilmslow High School. AQA GCE A LEVEL ENGLISH LANGUAGE . STUDENT GUIDE