Welcome to "The Power of Information" (NEA Original Writing)
Hello and welcome! In this guide, we will break down everything you need to know about tackling The Power of Information for your AQA A Level English Language (7702) Non-Exam Assessment (NEA). If you find coursework daunting, don't worry at all—we will take this step-by-step so you feel confident planning, drafting, and analyzing your writing.
Why is this topic important?
The NEA (Component 3: Language in Action) makes up 20% of your total A Level (worth 100 marks overall). Your Original Writing and Commentary make up Section B, which is worth 50 marks (25 marks for your writing and 25 marks for your commentary). Choosing "The Power of Information" allows you to step into the shoes of a real-world journalist, blogger, or historian who informs, educates, and enlightens readers.
Quick Key Takeaway:
Your goal in this task is to produce 750 words of informative writing and a 750-word reflective commentary based on a real-world mentor text called a style model.
1. Understanding the Assessment Requirements
Let us look at how the marks and word counts break down so you know exactly what the examiners expect:
• Original Writing Word Count: Exactly up to 750 words (excluding title and bibliography).
• Commentary Word Count: Exactly up to 750 words (excluding bibliography and your style model).
• Original Writing Marks: 25 marks assessed mainly on your craft, voice, and linguistic control (AO5).
• Commentary Marks: 25 marks assessed on your linguistic analysis, terminology, contextual understanding, and explicit connections to your style model (AO1, AO2, AO3, AO4).
• Annotated Style Model: You must include an annotated copy of your chosen style model in your final folder.
Analogy to keep in mind: Think of your Original Writing like cooking a signature dish from a recipe book, and your Commentary like explaining to a food critic exactly which culinary techniques and ingredients you borrowed from the master chef's original recipe.
Key Takeaway: Keep strictly to the 750-word ceiling for both pieces. Examiners are instructed to stop reading once you exceed 750 words, which means any great conclusions beyond that limit will receive zero credit!
2. What is "The Power of Information"?
The core purpose of this area is to inform or educate an audience. You are sharing knowledge, presenting research, or detailing factual events in an engaging, accessible, and structured way.
AQA specifically suggests three classic genres for this topic:
1. Travel Journalism: A feature article for a newspaper or lifestyle magazine detailing the culture, history, geography, and reality of a specific destination.
2. A Blog on Social Issues: An insightful, well-structured digital article that unpacks a contemporary societal trend, concept, or issue for everyday readers.
3. A Piece of Local History: An archival-style piece, historical overview, or informative pamphlet explaining the heritage, events, or transformation of a specific town or landmark.
Did you know?
Informative writing does not mean boring writing! High-scoring informational texts use creative formatting, captivating headlines, vivid descriptive noun phrases, and tailored registers to make complex facts exciting to read.
Key Takeaway: Ensure your piece is primarily driven by facts, data, or history. Do not slip into pure persuasion (which belongs to "The Power of Persuasion") or pure fictional narrative (which belongs to "The Power of Storytelling").
3. Selecting and Using Your Style Model
Your style model is the authentic, professionally published text that you use as your guide. You do not copy its content; instead, you analyze and borrow its linguistic conventions and structural design.
Step-by-Step Guide to Working with a Style Model:
• Step 1: Find a professional text. Choose a high-quality article from a reputable publication (e.g., a travel piece from a broadsheet newspaper, an essay from a social issues website, or a curated local history guide).
• Step 2: Annotate the language levels. Look closely at graphology (layout/headings), discourse structure (how ideas flow), syntax (sentence structures), lexis and semantics (word choices), and register.
• Step 3: Emulate specific linguistic choices. Plan how your original piece will adopt similar conventions (such as fronted adverbials, statistical integration, or semantic fields).
• Step 4: Annotate and submit. Make sure your annotations are neat and clearly visible on the copy you attach to your coursework folder.
Key Takeaway: Your style model is your blueprint. Without a clear style model, you cannot meet the requirements for AO4 (connecting texts).
4. Master the Assessment Objectives (AOs)
Understanding the Assessment Objectives helps you hit top marks across both tasks:
• AO1 (Terminology & Expression): Apply accurate linguistic methods and terminology when writing your commentary (e.g., calling words evaluative adjectives or low-frequency lexis rather than just "descriptive words").
• AO2 (Concepts & Issues): Show understanding of how language functions in society and media (e.g., how informative registers establish authority, credibility, and accessibility).
• AO3 (Context & Representation): Explore how contextual factors (audience, purpose, genre, mode) shape meaning and how you represent people, places, or issues.
• AO4 (Cross-Textual Connections): Explicitly link your own linguistic choices back to the techniques observed in your style model.
• AO5 (Expertise & Creativity): Demonstrate flair, precision, and craft in your 750-word Original Writing piece.
Memory Trick for Commentary Writing (The "TRACE" Method):
• T - Terminology: Name the specific language feature (e.g., triadic structure, fronted adverbial).
• R - Reference: Quote the evidence from your text.
• A - Aim: Explain your intended effect on the reader.
• C - Connection: Directly link this choice to your style model.
• E - Evaluation: Evaluate how well this conveyed your informative purpose.
Key Takeaway: AO5 belongs to your Original Writing; AO1, AO2, AO3, and AO4 belong to your Commentary. Keep this distinction clear in your planning!
5. How to Write the 750-Word Commentary
Students often wonder how to fit everything into 750 words. A structured approach ensures you cover all requirements without running out of space:
• Introduction (approx. 75-100 words): Define your audience, purpose, genre, and mode (AO3). Introduce your style model and explain why it was selected.
• Section 1: Structure and Discourse (approx. 200 words): Analyze how you structured the flow of information compared to your style model. Discuss your headlines, subheadings, topic sentences, and cohesion.
• Section 2: Lexis and Semantics (approx. 200 words): Analyze word choices, semantic fields, specialist terminology, and tone. Compare these directly to the style model's vocabulary.
• Section 3: Grammar and Syntax (approx. 200 words): Discuss sentence types (simple, compound, complex, minor), clause structures, fronted adverbials, or passive voice used to convey factual authority.
• Conclusion (approx. 50-75 words): Briefly evaluate how successfully your piece fulfilled its informative brief.
Example of upgrading descriptive commentary to linguistic analysis:
• Weak (Descriptive): "I used short sentences to make the facts punchy and keep the reader interested."
• Strong (Linguistic AO1/AO4): "Mirroring the journalistic style model, I utilized minor sentences and fronted adverbials of time to create a dynamic pace, allowing complex historical facts to remain accessible to a non-specialist demographic."
Key Takeaway: Every paragraph in your commentary should contain precise linguistic terminology and a clear connection to your style model.
6. Common Pitfalls to Avoid
Examiner reports highlight several frequent mistakes. Make sure you avoid these traps:
• Pitfall 1: Genre Mismatch. Forgetting that the brief is "The Power of Information" and accidentally writing an argumentative, highly biased opinion piece or a purely fictional short story.
• Pitfall 2: The Style Model Disconnect. Writing the commentary purely as an explanation of what you wrote, without ever citing or analyzing how your style model inspired those decisions.
• Pitfall 3: Informal / Non-Linguistic Commentary. Using vague terms like "flow", "stands out", or "makes you think" instead of precise terminology like syntactic parallelism, pre-modifying adjectives, or declarative mood.
• Pitfall 4: Missing Annotated Model. Forgetting to submit the clean, highlighted, and annotated style model alongside your coursework folder.
• Pitfall 5: Word Count Drift. Going over the 750-word cap for either text. Aim for around 720–740 words to stay safely within the boundary.
Key Takeaway: Treat your commentary as an academic linguistic analysis of your own writing, cross-referenced with your mentor text at every step.
Quick Final Checklist
Before you submit your "Power of Information" NEA folder, double check:
[ ] Is my Original Writing strictly within the 750-word limit?
[ ] Is my Commentary strictly within the 750-word limit?
[ ] Does my writing fit an informative genre (travel journalism, social issue blog, local history)?
[ ] Have I embedded accurate linguistic terminology throughout my commentary (AO1)?
[ ] Have I explicitly linked my stylistic choices back to my style model (AO4)?
[ ] Have I attached the fully annotated style model to my final folder?
You now have a complete, clear roadmap to ace "The Power of Information" in your A Level English Language NEA!