BlogStudyYear 11 Advanced English: The Ultimate Guide to Getting That Band 6!

Year 11 Advanced English: The Ultimate Guide to Getting That Band 6!

Just started Year 11 Advanced English, or maybe halfway through and need a bit of guidance?

The leap between Year 10 and Year 11 English can be pretty big, so you’re not alone if you’re feeling a bit confused or even nervous!

But don’t worry, that’s why we’re here!

We’ll break down the Year 11 English syllabus for you, walking you through each module so that you’re at the top of your game.

So, what are you waiting for? Let’s dive in!

Part 1: Developing Essential English Skills
Part 2: Guide to the Common Module
Part 3: Guide to Module A
Part 4: Guide to Module B

Part 1: Developing Essential English Skills

Before we can dive into the Year 11 Advanced English modules, it’s important you have a strong foundation when it comes to writing an essay and analysing your texts.

How to Write a Band 6 HSC English Essay

When writing an essay, it’s important you know how to develop a strong argument that is supported by the best possible pieces of evidence with great analysis, all organised in a great structure.

Obviously, this is much easier said than done! Although, that’s why we’ve created a guide to writing a Band 6 essay in HSC English that you can find below:

Your Guide to Writing the Ultimate Band 6 Essay

If you want to brush up on your thesis writing skills, that is, crafting a unique argument to any question, you may want to check out the article below!

How to Construct a Strong Thesis Statement in Your HSC English Essay

How to Analyse Your Text

The next key step is developing your analytical skills! This is pivotal as analysis will underpin anything and everything you write in English, from short answer responses in Paper 1 to your essays in Paper 2.

To have strong analytical skills, you need to be able to identify key ideas in a text and elaborate upon these, whilst finding literary techniques that will add meaning to your analysis.

For a recap on how to achieve this, you can check out our article to analysing literary texts like a pro below:

How to Quickly and Flawlessly Analyse English Texts

We’ve also got a great article specifically on how to analyse poems if you need a hand below:

How to Analyse your English Poem

If you’re analysing a visual text, be sure to look over our guide to analysing them!

How to Analyse a Visual Text

Knowing Your Literary and Visual Techniques

The last step to building up your set of English skills is being able to identify literary and visual techniques.

You’ll find these in any text you study, including novels, poems, films, prose and even art!

For a quick brush-up on these devices, you can take a look at our master list of literary techniques below:

The Literary Techniques Master List 

We’ve also got a definitive list of visual techniques to know!

The Visual Techniques Master List

Now that you’ve nailed those essential English skills, we can dive into breaking down each of the Year 11 Advanced English modules!

Part 2: Guide to the Common Module – Reading to Write

As this is a Common Module, both Advanced AND Standard English students will be tested on ‘Reading to Write’!

This module is all about learning the basics of writing, in particular, developing your reading and writing skills.

Let’s take a look at the syllabus!

In short, you’ll be studying a few texts closely to understand how and why they may convey certain ideas, relationships and scenarios.

The goal of this module is that you learn how to use language confidently and skilfully!

For a more in-depth look into the common module, you can read our guide on it below:

Guide to Year 11 Common Module: Reading to Write

Common Module Practice Questions

Once you’ve nailed the concepts and topics you explore in the module, you’re ready for some writing!

Get some essay writing practice under your belt with this practice questions we’ve specifically created for the Year 11 English Common Module below!

20 Practice Essay Questions for Year 11 English Common Module: Reading to Write 

Creative Writing

You’ll find that you’ll also be assessed on your creative writing skills in this module.

It’s more than likely that you’ll write a creative that borrows some literary features, style, themes or genre from a text you’ve studied.

If it’s not your favourite thing in the world, there’s no need to worry! We’ve got an extensive list of resources to help you get writing like a pro!

First thing’s first, before you start writing you’ll need to decide on a narrative type i.e. monologue, letter, diary entry etc see what best suits your stimulus – you can read more about all of that below!

How to Pick a Narrative Type for Your Creative Writing Piece

Next, you’ll need to choose a setting, but where do you even begin? To help you answer that question, we’ve got a great article on developing your setting.

How to Develop A Setting for Your Creative Writing Piece

Okay, so you’ve got a setting, but what about your characters? Fear not, we haven’t forgotten! Read up on how to develop complex and interesting characters!

How to Develop A Kickass Character

Now that you’ve got your character, you can probably decide whose perspective to write the story from – will it be a narrator, or your protagonist? To help you make a decision, you can have a read over this article below!

How to Choose a Point of View For Your Creative Writing Piece

You’ve got all the basics now – but what about the story line? If you need some help building up your story, check out this great article we’ve got on how to do so!

How to Develop Your Creative Writing Idea

Okay you’re nearly there now! Proofreading and editing – it’s essential, so don’t skip it! Learn how to edit like a pro below:

How to Edit and Proofread Your Creative Writing Piece

And now you’re all set!

Reflective Statement

It’s more than likely that after you’ve written your creative, you’ll be required to write a reflective statement.

If you’ve never heard of a reflective statement, don’t freak out! It’s actually much simpler than you think.

A reflective statement simply asks you to reflect upon the creative decisions you made in your creative writing piece.

Your creative writing task may have asked you to borrow some stylistic features, genre or themes from a text you’ve studied in Reading to Write.

Now what the reflective statement is asking you to do, is explain how you’ve incorporated those features, genre or theme.

You can read up more about it in our guide to writing reflective statements below!

How to Write an Effective Year 11 English Reflection Statement

Our expert English tutors can support you with all areas of the English syllabus. Reach out today to our English tutoring Castle Hill Team.

Part 3: Module A: Narratives that Shape Our World

In Module A: Narratives that Shape our World, you’ll study the role of storytelling!

Let’s take a look at the syllabus for a more detailed understanding:

What this all basically means is you’ll study texts from past and contemporary times to analyse how storytelling can convey certain ideas, attitudes and values of their context.

For an in-depth guide to Year 11 Advanced English Module A, check out our guide on how to get a Band 6 in it below!

Guide to Year 11 English Module A: Narratives That Shape Our World

Module A Practice Questions

The best way you can test your knowledge in English is by writing practice essays.

This way, you’ll be able to figure out if you need to flesh out more of your analysis, need to study a wider variety of themes of even if you need more practice writing a thesis.

Luckily for you, we’ve got 30 Year 11 Advanced English Module A practice questions for you to check out below!

30 Practice Questions for Year 11 Advanced Module A: Narratives that Shape Our World

Multimodal Texts and Presentations

You may find that you have to study a multimodal text in Year 11 Advanced English Module A.

You may be thinking “what on earth is that?!” But don’t fret!

We’re here to give you the low-down on multimodal texts, which are essentially

For an extensive guide to learning how to respond to a multimodal text, check out our article below!

How to Respond to a Multimodal Text for Year 11 English 

You may also find that you have to give a multimodal presentation in this module or one of your other modules.

Multimodal presentations are a completely new form of assessment that NESA added with the new syllabus changes.

It mainly involves giving a digital presentation i.e. something to the likes of a PowerPoint or iMovie presentation with a voice over.

To find out how to nail these, check out our article on multimodal presentations!

How to Ace Your Multimodal Presentation for HSC English

Part 4: Module B: Critical Study of Literature

In Year 11 Advanced English, you’ll undertake a critical study of a literary text, which you’ll also do in Year 12 for Module B!

Critical studies involve developing a critical knowledge and understanding of your text and being able to form a personal opinion on it.

Let’s read more about it in the syllabus:

This module is fairly straightforward, although you’ll need to know the text like the back of your hand.

As well as analysing the language in the text, you’ll need to have knowledge about its construction, context and content, and how these contribute to its textual integrity.

If you need a quick recap on these, you can find our Band 6 guide to Year 11 Advanced English Module B below!

Guide to Year 11 Advanced English Module B: ‘Critical Study of Literature’

Module B Practice Questions

Once you’ve grasped the concepts from Mod B and have a handle on the content from your prescribed text, it’s time to get writing!

You can brush up on your essay writing skills with 20 of our practice questions for Year 11 Advanced English Module B below!

20 Practice Essay Questions for Year 11 Advanced English Module B

And there we have it, that’s a wrap up of the Year 11 Advanced English course – good luck!

Looking for some extra help with Year 11 English?

We pride ourselves on our inspirational English coaches and mentors!

We offer tutoring and mentoring for Years K-12 in a variety of subjects, with personalised lessons conducted one-on-one in your home or at one of our state of the art campuses in Hornsby or the Hills!

To find out more and get started with an inspirational tutor and mentor get in touch today! 

Give us a ring on 1300 267 888, email us at [email protected] or check us out on TikTok!

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