A Voice in the Hall
Text 1: The Programme, by Priya Nair
An original short story extract.
Asha’s name was third on the programme.
She had stood in the assembly hall hundreds of times, but this morning it seemed to have changed its face. The stage was higher than she remembered. The lights were painfully bright. Beyond them, the pupils’ chairs stretched back in rows of watching eyes.
The headteacher welcomed everyone and introduced the first speaker. Asha tried to listen, but the words reached her as broken pieces: community, courage, future. Her speech rested on her knees. The paper trembled whenever she breathed.
Two speeches. Then hers.
The clock above the doors clicked its tongue at her. Not yet, Asha thought as the first speaker finished. Not yet. Applause filled the hall, then faded, leaving a silence in which her heartbeat seemed to bump against her ribs.
The second speaker reached the final paragraph. Asha found the first line of her own speech and read it again. Then again. The words were ordinary words, but they would not stay still on the page.
More applause. The headteacher returned to the microphone.
“Asha Patel.”
Her name fell into the hall like a stone into deep water. She stood, walked past the end of the row, climbed the steps and crossed the stage, all while her mind shouted that she had forgotten every sentence she had ever known. At the microphone, she looked down at the paper. She took one breath.
“Good morning,” she began.
How does the writing build a sense of Asha’s nervousness in this extract?
In your answer, you should:
146 exam-style questions on OCR GCSE English Language 3.2 Section A: Reading meaning and effects – content, covering 3.2.3 Impact of language, structure and grammar. Each one has a worked solution and a mark scheme showing where the marks go.