- Name: end of year mock
- Total length: 80 minutes
- W/ Xtra time : 100 minutes
Collapsed timetable
You will have a different timetable, with three hour rather than two hour blocks. Check out your timetable (which has been emailed to you) to find out when your exam is
- P block: Monday 09:00 - 12:00
- T block: Monday 13:00 -16:00
- R block: Tuesday 13:00 - 16:00
There are three questions
1 - unseen question - textual analysis of a film poster - 40 minutes
Media language questions will ask you about how meaning is made. You will need to refer extensively to the toolkit for textual analysis (media language). Revising for this question is simple: simply look at as many film posters online as possible! Get familiar with their form and structure...
2 - Newspaper industry - industry question - Daily Mirror - 20 minutes
Industry questions are mainly about facts, figures, and the financial success of the product. Therefore, contextual knowledge is really important for industry questions. Therefore, you will NEED to know at least the following:
- What kind of newspaper is The Daily Mirror?
- What audience is is targeting?
- Who publishes it?
- What kind of company are they?
- Are they vertically or horizontally integrated?
- What is The Mirror's brand identity?
- Why is this stuff important?
3 - Advertising - audience - WaterAid - 20 minutes
There are only two types of audience question:
How does the producer use media language to target the audience?
or
How can audiences respond to this media product?
Of course, the wording can vary wildly, but this is audience in a nutshell. The most important theory to understand is Stuart Hall's reception theory, AKA the encoding/decoding model. Producers will encode (or 'put in') an ideology in to a media product using media language. But rather than just accepting this, the audience will decode (or 'take out') what they choose. They may agree, disagree, or partially agree with the messages and values of the media product.
So ask yourself the following:
- What is the preferred reading (intended message) of the WaterAid advert?
- Who is the target audience (be specific)?
- What does the producer want to happen?
- How do they use techniques like positioning to make this happen?
Structuring your answer
We'll go over paragraph structure a little during the 3 hour session. But basically, no matter what structure you want to use, it's fine. Just be consistent. Here's a few examples you may have used already, and ALL of them work for media:
- PEA
- PEE
- PEE
- PEEL
- PEETL...
Example questions
Every single last possible question can be found in the checklist section of the revision guide. If you're not familiar with this yet, it's time to get very familiar with it! You will find the revision guide under the key resources heading (and if you don't know where this is, please spend some time getting used to the blog). Luckily for you guys, you know what industries and types of questions are coming up, which means you can use the revision guide more efficiently.
Under the key resources subheading, you will also find the past papers repository, which contains... every past paper for A-level media studies, both official, unofficial and most mocks too. Since the same kind of questions come up again and again, it is a very good idea to scan through, find the industries and topics which are being covered, and get prepared.
Hints and tips
- A mock is just a mock. It's not the end of the world if things go wrong. But if you don't try, you're wasting an excellent opportunity to work out how and where you should improve. Please don't waste your time.
- I've given you the industries and general topics, though I haven't given you the questions, natch. This is more information than you'll get for the final exam. However, it means that I will be marking these to a slightly higher standard. I expect you to revise. You cannot wing this!
- Since you don't know the exact questions, you can't plan exactly what you're going to write. But you pretty much can. Make sure you know what theories you're including, make sure you watch and re-watch the WaterAid advert to familiarise yourself with editing and mise-en-scene, make sure you know everything there is to know about the Daily Mirror
- Make sure to do a plan, and to write your plan on your question paper. You wouldn't believe how many marks I can give to a good plan!
- The only way to absolutely fail the exam is by not using media language. Yet it's surprising how many students don't use enough. Go to the textual analysis toolkit, and make sure you're confident with EVERY term on the list!
- There's no specific representation question. But don't worry: you can and should use representational theories to answer an audience question, say.