§
Engage
Education
Foundation
Units 3 and 4 English
Practice Exam Question Booklet
Duration: 15 minutes reading time, 3 hours writing time
Structure of book:
Section

Number of questions

A
B
C

21
4
1





Number of questions to be answered
1
1
1
Total

Number of marks
20
20
20
60

Students are permitted to bring into the examination room: pens, pencils, highlighters, erasers and rulers. Students are not permitted to bring into the examination room: blank sheets of paper and/or white out liquid/tape.
No calculator is allowed in this examination.

Materials supplied:
 This question and answer booklet of 11 pages.
Instructions:
 You must complete all three sections of the examination.
 All answers must be written in English.
 You must not write on two film texts in the examination.

Units 3 and 4 English

The Engage Education Foundation

Section A – Text Response (Reading and Responding)
Instructions
Section A requires students to complete one analytical/expository piece of writing in response to one topic (either i. or ii.) on one selected text.
Indicate in the box on the first line of the script book whether you are answering i. or ii.
In your response you must develop a sustained discussion of one selected text from the text list below.
Your response must be supported by close reference to and analysis of the selected text.
For collections of poetry or short stories, you may choose to write on several poems or short stories, or on one or two in very close detail, depending on what you think is appropriate.
Section A is worth one-third of the total assessment for the examination.
If you write on a film text in Section A, you must not write on a film text in Section B.

Text List
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
20.
21.

A Christmas Carol
All About Eve
Brooklyn
Cat’s Eye
Cloudstreet
Henry IV: Part I
In the Country of Men
Mabo
No Sugar
Ransom
Selected Poems
Stasiland
The Complete Maus
The Reluctant Fundamentalist
The Thing Around Your Neck
The War Poems
Things We Didn’t See Coming
This Boy’s Life
Twelve Angry Men
Will You Please Be Quiet, Please?
Wuthering Heights

Page 1

Charles Dickens
Directed by Joseph Mankiewicz
Colm Tóibín
Margaret Atwood
Tim Winton
William Shakespeare
Hisham Matar
Directed by Rachel Perkins
Jack Davis
David Malouf
Gwen Harwood
Anna Funder
Art Spiegelman
Mohsin Hamid
Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
Wilfred Owen
Steven Amsterdam
Tobias Wolff
Reginald Rose
Raymond Carver
Emily Bronte

6.5 hour revision seminars for just $56 – visit www.ee.org.au for more info.

The Engage Education Foundation

Units 3 and 4 English

A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens

1.
i.

“I hope to live to be another man from what I was.”
Who or what enables Scrooge’s transformation in A Christmas Carol?
OR

ii.

‘Despite the name of the novella, A Christmas Carol is about charity no matter the season.’
Do you agree?

All About Eve directed by Joseph Mankiewicz

2.

i. “Funny business, a woman’s career – the things you drop on your way up the ladder so you can move faster.”
‘The lives of the central female characters in All About Eve, even those who are successful, are limited by their gender.’
Discuss.
OR ii. The capacity to deceive and betray is at the heart of All About Eve.’
Discuss.

Brooklyn by Colm Toibin

3.
i.

‘Secrets are both important and difficult to keep in the communities that Eilis inhabits.’
Discuss.
OR

ii.

‘Eilis lives and works in two different places, but neither is really her home.’
Do you agree?

4. Cat’s Eye by Margaret Atwood
i.

“We have been shark to one another, but also lifeboat.”
‘Cat’s Eye explores the contradictions and tensions within any relationship.’
Discuss.
OR

ii.

‘The timespan of the novel means that the reader follows not only Elaine’s life, but the changing landscape of Toronto.’
Discuss.

5. Cloudstreet by Tim Winton
i. ‘Despite World War I taking place in the background of Cloudstreet, it contributes to the more immediate conflicts by each of the