Comparing texts: GCSE English Language
Viewpoints, synthesis and comparative paragraphs for Paper 2
The short version
Compare ideas and methods with connectives; synthesise rather than write two separate mini-essays.
Key idea
Last Tuesday, the council’s new “smart” bins arrived on Hartley Road like uninvited relatives: large, shiny, and already arguing with the pavement. Each bin, we are told, will email the depot when it is full. Each bin cost more than a teacher’s weekly pay. I watched a fox treat one as a climbing frame before the sensors had even been switched on, which tells you everything about who was consulted. If this is the future of local government, the future has a plastic lid and a very optimistic app. We did not ask for emails from rubbish. We asked for the recycling lorry to come in the week it is promised, for the cracked paving slab outside number fourteen to be replaced, and for the pavement to be wide enough for a buggy. Hartley Road is not a laboratory. It is a street where people live, and they can tell, with embarrassing speed, when they are being sold a gadget instead of a service.
Dear Headteacher, I am writing as a Year 11 student who uses the 8:10 bus, not as a campaign and not as a complaint about teachers. Since the timetable changed in March, the bus arrives at 8:27 if it arrives at all. Assembly begins at 8:30. That is not a mathematical puzzle; it is a daily choice between being shouted at for lateness or standing in the rain watching the bus that would have made us on time disappear around the corner because it was “too full”. We have tried the earlier bus. It does not exist on this route, and the app that claims to track it is a work of fiction. I am asking you to delay morning registration by ten minutes, or to speak to the operator about an extra service before mocks begin. I am not asking for a medal. I am asking not to start every exam-year morning already behind. Yours faithfully, A. Rahman
Go a bit deeper
Grade 2–3: A does not like bins. B does not like the bus.
Grade 5–6: A mocks the council for buying sensors instead of fixing the street; B asks the headteacher to change the start time because the 8:10 is late.
Grade 9: Both reject “the future” as an app: A’s optimistic lid, B’s tracking app as “a work of fiction”. Viewpoint is anti-gadget, pro-lived time — but A shames in public and B negotiates in private.
Worked example
Worked example
Last Tuesday, the council’s new “smart” bins arrived on Hartley Road like uninvited relatives: large, shiny, and already arguing with the pavement. Each bin, we are told, will email the depot when it is full. Each bin cost more than a teacher’s weekly pay. I watched a fox treat one as a climbing frame before the sensors had even been switched on, which tells you everything about who was consulted. If this is the future of local government, the future has a plastic lid and a very optimistic app. We did not ask for emails from rubbish. We asked for the recycling lorry to come in the week it is promised, for the cracked paving slab outside number fourteen to be replaced, and for the pavement to be wide enough for a buggy. Hartley Road is not a laboratory. It is a street where people live, and they can tell, with embarrassing speed, when they are being sold a gadget instead of a service.
Lessons in this topic
- Finding viewpoints
- Synthesis vs summary
- Comparative connectives
- Methods across two texts
- Paper 2 comparison plan
In the app each lesson is video (when we have a real YouTube id) then intro, learn and summary steps.
What the examiner wants
Point about both texts in one paragraph, with paired evidence and comparative vocabulary (whereas, similarly, unlike).
Try these questions
Cover the answers and have a go first. Worked solutions are underneath.
Viewpoint means
Sarcasm often
A weak comparison structure is
Synthesis here means
Common mistakes
- “Both writers feel strongly” is not a viewpoint. Strongly about what?
- Two mini-essays stapled together is not comparison. The marker should see both titles in most paragraphs.
- Starting every sentence with “Also” and staying in Source A for a page is not a comparison essay.
- Writing all of A, then all of B, is the most common cap on this question.
Answers and working
Frequently asked questions
Does this cover English Literature?
Literature is a separate course. Open GCSE English Literature on ReviseEasy for Shakespeare, the novel, modern texts and poetry.
Which exam board is this Comparing texts page for?
The ideas are board-agnostic for AQA, Edexcel, OCR, WJEC and CCEA. Paper lengths and question numbers differ — check your specification.
Is English Language tiered?
No. GCSE English Language is untiered. Everyone sits the same papers; AO5 and AO6 writing marks reward ambitious, accurate writing.
Learn, try, get feedback, fix the mistake
Open the lesson, try the quiz, then use a timed writing prompt with an AO5/AO6 checklist. Nothing is AI-marked — you mark yourself against the bullets.
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