The power of language is evident in the writing demands of high-stake standardised secondary school exams such as the iGCSE/GCSE/A Level/International Baccalaureate(IB). These exams are extremely challenging for many students and play at crucial gatekeeping role for life, studies and work within and beyond school (Education Endowment Fund, 2021). Building on work in SFL, genre, disciplinary literacy and corpus linguistics, and drawing on initial findings from the BAWESS Project, we discuss the potential genres that are identified in exam questions in three disciplines History, Biology and Geography. The BAWESS Project is the first discipline specific corpus of authentic student exam-practice written texts and aims to provide resources that support disciplinary literacy in schools.

Understanding the role of genres as ‘staged goal-oriented purposeful activity that people engage in as members of their culture’ (Martin, 1984:25) is key in supporting writing across the curriculum (Forey 2020; Forey & Cheng, 2019; Derewianka & Jones, 2022). One area that needs further attention is understanding the exam questions set and the potential genres intended by the questions. As part of the BAWESS Project we have developed a corpus of exam questions, exam specifications, exam mark schemes and model answers shared online by the exam boards to understand the type of questions set for long answers in History, Biology and Geography A-level/GCSE/iGCSE and IB exams. The findings show the range of potential genres that are implied by the questions.

Using automated corpus tagging we can identify the ‘power words’ found in the exam questions to shed light on the ‘power grammar and power composition’ (Martin 2013) required in these three disciplines. We demonstrate how the findings from an analysis of exam questions could provide a clearer understanding of the type of genres associated with different disciplines. Insights into the different genres found in exam questions and their association with disciplines can enhance and raise awareness for teachers, learners and researchers in relation to the disciplinary literacy practices in school exams.

Meet the speaker

Gail Forey is Associate Dean (Education) in the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences and Professor of Applied Linguistics in the Department of Education at the University of Bath. Her research focuses on Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL), language education, teaching development, written and spoken workplace discourse, and co-creative methodology. She is Principal Investigator of the ESRC-funded BAWESS Project (British Academic Written English Secondary School Project), which combines SFL, disciplinary literacy and corpus linguistics. Gail is committed to conducting epistemically just, appliable research that broadens access to knowledge and education, aiming to make a meaningful impact on teachers, learners, and researchers