What VCE English Examiners Actually Want in Crafting Texts (2024 Exam Report Insights)

Over the recent months, you may have had a chance to look at the 2024 VCE English exam report – perhaps out of your own curiosity, or perhaps because you were shown by a teacher or tutor. In this report, VCAA did an interesting new thing and actually provided examples of what they deemed to be high-scoring responses (or at least mid-scoring responses with high-scoring elements) for Part B – Crafting Texts.

These exemplars provide valuable insight into what many students consider to be a highly elusive part of the exam. So let's break down VCAA's 2024 VCE English exam report together and see what tips and tricks we can pick up for VCE Crafting Texts success.

1. Establish a strong authorial voice from the start

A common thread between many of the pieces in the exam report is a strong authorial voice. Lots of the pieces have a distinct persona or character (especially the ones in first person), with the persona's background and context being established within the first few lines.

With your VCE Crafting Texts piece, try to make sure that your character is clear. Are you writing as yourself, memoir-style? Are you writing as a high school student? Or are you writing as a psychologist, writing a letter to a specific person? Experiment with your authorial voice.

Once you've finished drafting, have a teacher, friend, or tutor check through your writing. Particularly, they should be able to discern the key context, ideas, and persona from the first page of your writing. Remember that you only have about 1,000-1,200 words to play around with, so avoid long hooks and slow-burns, your ideas need to be clear from the start!

2. Weave in symbols, extended metaphors and imagery

Many of the pieces in the VCE English exam report feature detailed and rich use of metaphor and imagery. This includes the use of motifs, especially throughout narrative pieces – is there a way that you can include a particular object or symbol at the start of your piece that then demonstrates a certain growth or change in the narrator?

Or can you use a certain metaphor to represent a larger issue? A good example of this is Example 1, which establishes in its very first sentence:

"My country is a land sewn together by connections. A patchwork quilt of fenced-off paddocks, connecting on the edges to make patterns across acres of rural land."

Here, the land is described throughout the metaphor of a patchwork quilt and through the overall imagery of sewing and fabric. Later, throughout the piece, the student will use the imagery of cutting and ripping apart threads to describe the impact of colonisation on the land.

The key is developing your chosen motif or symbol as the piece progresses. This will help you weave together your ideas into a unified, cohesive message that accumulates rather than repeats.

3. Don't be afraid to experiment with form

There are a wide variety of text types in the VCE Crafting Texts exam report. While it's important to note that you are not allowed to write song, poetry or verse, almost anything else goes, from a traditional narrative to a letter, to a speech delivered in a certain place and time.

One of the notable examples from the exam report is Example 2, where the student has used the form of a recipe to describe the steps for ‘cooking’ protest. In doing so, the student has been able to embed an interesting commentary on the predictable nature of protest – if you have the right ingredients and the right steps, protest will inevitably happen.

No matter what text type you choose for your VCE English creative writing, make sure you think about your reason for doing so. Does that particular text type allow you to explore a specific idea? Could you have written it in a different text type instead? While unique text types can net you marks, it's also important to note that you shouldn't do a strange text type just for the sake of it.

4. Integrate the title as your central element

Firstly, it is important that you include both the title and the stimulus in your VCE Crafting Texts response, and that you make natural connections to incorporate both into whatever prepared material you bring into the exam. Students who made extreme stretches to include the title or stimulus in ways that seemed convoluted or forced lost marks.

That being said, it seems that if you were to prioritise one of the two, it should be the title. Mentioning the title frequently, and including it as a core element of your story should be a top priority. In contrast, it seems that including the stimulus once or twice as a less central image in your story will be enough to satisfy the VCE English assessors.

A good way to ensure that you are adequately engaging with the title is to plan carefully and thoroughly. One strategy is to formulate questions from the title, and then use the answers to guide each section of your piece. Here is an example of some questions you could generate for the title "Transformation" (Personal Journeys): 

1. What is being transformed? (begin by defining the key terms - establish this in your first page of writing) 
2. Why is it transforming? (interrogate the causes - is it self-initiated, or imposed by an external force?) 
3. What are the consequences of this transformation? (interrogate the consequences - these can be positive and negative. E.g. a change in values, or identity) 
4. Is the transformation absolute, or is it only partial? (complicate ideas that imply absoluteness)

You can also 'challenge' the implications of a title (although you must be careful not to stray from the central meaning or idea). For instance: 

1. What does a lack of transformation look like? (paralysis / stagnation) 
2. Why is the character resistant to change? 
3. What are the consequences of this stagnation? 

5. Authentic teenage voices resonate with examiners

There were many memoir-style pieces in the VCE English exam report this year. This means realistic pieces that were written from the perspective of high-school students, often reading as being inspired by real events. There were no examples of genre fiction like fantasy or sci-fi stories (which I'm still bummed about!), and many students limited the number of characters in their stories to one or two, meaning that many stories ended up being more reflective, or thought-driven rather than plot-driven. While it might not be that these pieces are the only pieces you can do, these seem to be received well by assessors under exam conditions.

What does this mean for your planning? Well, we recommend using your authentic life experiences and values as a starting point. For Protest, this could mean considering your own experiences with protest (have you ever attended a rally? Have you argued with your family about politics? How does politics manifest in your everyday life, shaping your identity and experience of the world?). For Play, this could involve brainstorming formative childhood experiences, your favourite toys and games (and interrogating how they shaped you), instruments or sports that are important to you, or playful forms of expression that you engage with (such as dressing up, make-up, etc.)

6. There are no rules!

Finally, remember that creative writing is creative for a reason! As long as you're responding to the framework and the prompts, you can choose to write whatever you like, as long as you're feeling like you're creating something that you're passionate about with a strong message and purpose. Passion will always shine through in the VCE English exam, so don't worry too much if you're having trouble with this overly formulaic approach.

Need help mastering VCE English Crafting Texts? Our experienced tutors provide personalised guidance for VCE English, Literature and EAL students across Melbourne.