1. WJEC Success at SY 3

2. Format of the paper One compulsory question in each option testing AO 1 Two additional questions from which a choice may be made. These assess AO1 and AO2

3. Reasoning Many candidates find 60 minute questions challenging It gives candidates of all levels of ability a chance to gain marks The compulsory question tests knowledge.

4. Skills required: Essay structuring and planning Time skills (15 minutes and 45 minutes) Ability to respond to different command words flexibly

5. AO 1 skills Candidates will be able to make specific, explicit and detailed reference to a range of writers, research and theory. Much of this material will have explicit sociological content Answers will be expressed in appropriate sociological language showing knowledge and understanding. The quality of written communication is very good, with few, if any, errors of spelling, punctuation or grammar.

6. Specification contentThis focuses on: The appropriate and accurate use of concepts and terms relating to crime Definitions: Key concepts and terms which could include: crime, deviance, anomie, social control, underclass, delinquency, sub-culture, moral panic, and surveillance, hidden figure of crime, white collar crimes, recorded crime, reported crime, victim study, news values, and amplification of deviance. Contemporary debates, issues, patterns and trends in relation to social profile including gender, ethnicity, class, age and locality Debates: Debates, patterns and trends with reference to control, crime rates and patterns of crime and victimisation Structures, organisations and forms of social control including formal and informal control, patterns of sentencing and conviction rates Patterns of crime including notions of the ‘typical’ criminal and perceptions of crime, corporate and white collar crime Social control including patterns of conviction and sentencing, the measurement of crime, the reliability of official statistics and hidden figures of crime. Changing understanding of crime and criminal behaviour and recent initiatives in crime control e.g. policing Understanding theories of crimeExplanations: This will include theoretical views about the usefulness, existence and definition of crime such as functionalism, Marxism, the social construction of crime with reference to structural, sub cultural, interactionist, Marxist and Neo Marxist, realist, feminist and postmodernist

7. AO 2 skills Candidates will relate answers directly to the question under consideration and this link will be explicit. Essays will be formally constructed with a clear and logical argument. Evaluation and analysis will be explicit throughout the answers Candidates will be able to make regular and explicit use of the correct analytical and/or evaluative language showing knowledge and understanding of its meaning. Candidates will be able to make explicit reference to the wording of the question under consideration The candidate may challenge the terms of the question.

8. Language of evaluation Thus … On the other hand … In contrast … By comparison … However … An alternative argument … A strong argument … Similarly …

9. Style Most wrote well in whichever language was used. However … Use of personalisation – ‘I think…’ Use of rhetorical questioning – ‘Marxists believe that … but is this correct? Is it true? Do we believe it?’

10. Encourage Reference to recent debates, examples, evidence, research and news events Good grammar and spelling Use of technical language Proper paragraphing Leaving enough space to add after- thoughts to paragraphs Reference to the wording and terms of the question

11. Discourage … Learning answers off pat Personal commentaries Rhetorical questions and exaggerated styles of writing

12. For further information, please contact the subject officer at the WJEC Joanna Lewis 245 Western Avenue Cardiff CF5 2YX joanna.lewis@wjec.co.uk