How to Answer Question 1 (Edexcel GCSE English Language)

Question 1 on Paper 1 of your Edexcel GCSE English Language exam is a quick search and find question.

The following guide on how to answer Question 1 includes:

• Question 1 overview

• How to answer Question 1

• Exam tips

Question 1 overview

Question 1 will be about the first few lines of the reading extract printed in your separate source insert. You will be asked to identify a word or phrase from the lines of the extract that means, shows, explains or describes something. This tests your ability to quickly scan a piece of text and identify implied meanings.

It is important that you do not use anything outside of the lines specified in the question, as you will not receive the mark if you do. Any information about the reading extract given to you in italics at the top are not part of these lines. You must also ensure that you choose a word or phrase that correctly answers the question, rather than just copying out whole lines of the text.

This question is designed to ease you into the exam. It is only worth 1 mark, and you should spend no more than 5 minutes on it (including reading time).

How to answer Question 1

Let’s look at Question 1 from the June 2023 exam:

Remember, the style of this question is always the same, so the most important things to highlight are which lines from the extract you should take your answer from, and what the focus of the question is.

In order to achieve 1 mark for this question, you should:

1. Read the question carefully and highlight its focus (what you are being asked to find a word or phrase about)

2. Mark on the reading extract which lines you should use

3. Scan the lines and highlight the exact word or phrase that answers the question

For example:

The question asks you to identify the word or phrase that shows the inn is very old. Here, the only word in the extract which means “very old” is “ancient”.

You can just write the word “ancient” as your answer. There is no need to copy out the whole line or include the words “stone building”.

Here is another example:

After highlighting the focus of this question — why Oliver was feeling stupefied — we can now look at lines 3–4 of the text to find the answer:

Here we can see that the “unwonted exercise” and “the air” both caused Oliver to feel stupefied, so the examiner would award 1 mark for either of those answers. A mark would also have been awarded just for the word “exercise”.

Exam tips

• This is designed to be a question that can be answered quickly — it is therefore not necessary to write out the whole of the sentence for your answer, as this is not a good use of your time:

  • Try to keep your answer to just the word(s) or phrase itself

• It is essential that you only take your answer from the lines specified in the question

• Read the question carefully to avoid any misunderstanding of what you are being asked to find in the lines:

  • Make sure that your selection answers the question that has been asked