Knowledge and understanding is present throughout each component of the course. In each of the assessment tasks, your students will be asked to demonstrate understanding of the various works they will have studied, and in the Written Assignment, the context/s in which they were written. Some tasks (such as the Written Assignment, the Individual Oral Presentation and the Paper 2 examination) are more likely to invite students to respond to elements that pervade the whole work, whereas others (such as Paper 1 and the Individual Oral Commentary) tend to focus attention on the details of particular extracts.

Analysis, Synthesis and Evaluation are terms referred to throughout the syllabus, and it is a good idea to make reference to them in your teaching as often as you can. As indicated by the Subject Guide, their presence is most keenly expected in the external assessment tasks, Paper 1 and Paper 2, as well as the Individual Oral Commentary. In each of these, students are expected to form judgments about the use and impact of elements of literary craft, and in so doing, demonstrate a capacity to think for themselves about the way they literary texts create meaning in different ways.

Presentation and Language skills are also tested in each of the components. Students need to talk and write in an appropriately formal register, as well as organise and present ideas in essays in a meaningful and purposeful way. Furthermore, in the Part 4 Individual Oral Presentation, one third of the marks are awarded for their ability to demonstrate effective oral presentation techniques that take into account task and the audience to whom they are talking.