Daily Practice · A Level
April 1981 5-a-day
Printing for a group?
The batch download puts all 5 tiers' April 1981 sheets in a single PDF, each tier behind its own divider page - 150 sheets in one file.
Every sheet in April 1981
The same date always regenerates the same five questions, so a sheet you print today is the sheet a classmate prints tomorrow.
- 1st April 1981Explain why comparing subject matter alone rarely reaches the higher bands.
- 2nd April 1981What is meant by a 'structural shift' in an unseen text?
- 3rd April 1981Name the linguist associated with the 'damp spoon', 'crumbling castle' and 'infectious disease' images of prescriptivist attitudes.
- 4th April 1981Identify one way this stage direction creates foreboding: 'Thunder, distant. The lamp flickers and does not right itself.'
- 5th April 1981What term describes a variety of language used in a specific social setting or for a specific purpose?
- 6th April 1981Identify the narrative structure technique where the story jumps back in time to an earlier event.
- 7th April 1981Define a virtuous error and explain why it matters theoretically.
- 8th April 1981A student writes: 'The sibilance creates a soft, sinister mood.' What is missing?
- 9th April 1981Explain in one sentence why comparing structure, not just content, matters when comparing two poems.
- 10th April 1981A child calls all four-legged animals 'doggie'. What is this process called?
- 11th April 1981A poem has four-line stanzas. What is this stanza form called?
- 12th April 1981Give two spoken features that typically mark a less powerful participant.
- 13th April 1981A poem in regular iambic pentameter breaks the metre in one line only. Suggest how to analyse it.
- 14th April 1981What should you do first when reading an unseen extract in an exam?
- 15th April 1981The word 'dog' once referred to one specific breed but now refers to the whole species. Name this type of semantic change.
- 16th April 1981In the line 'I have kept this light for twenty-six years, and the sea has never once told me my business,' identify the tone.
- 17th April 1981Give one example of a linguistic feature typical of unplanned spoken discourse.
- 18th April 1981What is the effect of a very short, simple sentence placed after a long, complex one?
- 19th April 1981Distinguish a recast from an expansion in caregiver speech.
- 20th April 1981Why is an unseen essay that works through the extract chronologically usually limited to the middle bands?
- 21st April 1981In 'I sold the lamp for scrap and kept the key,' identify the contrast being set up.
- 22nd April 1981Calculate the MLU in morphemes for these three utterances: 'I want juice' (3 morphemes), 'the dog barked' (4 morphemes, counting -ed as one), 'mummy gone now' (3 morphemes).
- 23rd April 1981Identify the technique in 'the silence screamed.'
- 24th April 1981Distinguish instrumental from influential power with one example each.
- 25th April 1981Explain the effect of enjambment that runs across a stanza break.
- 26th April 1981Give one reason subject terminology should be used carefully in unseen analysis.
- 27th April 1981The word 'nice' once meant 'foolish or fussy' but now means 'pleasant'. Name this type of semantic change.
- 28th April 1981A tragic hero's downfall is usually explained by two competing forces. Name them.
- 29th April 1981Identify which is more likely to use nominalisation and passive voice: a casual spoken chat or a formal council report.
- 30th April 1981Identify the technique in this phrase: 'the silence pressed against the windows like a living thing.'