KNEC News

KCSE 2023 English Paper 1-3 report and performance analysis

November 25, 2024

2023 KCSE ENG 101/3 REPORT

This year’s marking exercise has been a smooth one. We thank all examiners that participated in this year’s exercise. The following are comments on the performance of the paper.

1. Question 1a was the favourite question of the candidates. 90% of the candidates attempted question 1a. The rubric was friendly to all calibre of candidates.

2. Most candidates did not decipher question 1b because it came to our realization that critical roles played by one in a particular ceremony, is not an obvious thing to most of the candidates. Our children do not attend ceremonies nowadays, fund-raising,weddings etc. Most if the candidates who attempted 1b were talking of a wedding ceremony in which the critical role they played in, was not clearly brought out.

3. Being the last year, Ole Kulet’s Blossoms of the Savannah was a friendly question with most candidates having an idea of the requirements if the question. Though most of the Kenyan candidates fail to bisect the compulsory novel sufficiently. This is a real crisis in schools. Most of them were unable to bring out the deliberate efforts of Resian amidst her challenges to succeed and recover her dream.

3. A new Anthology of short stories, poses uncertainty in most schools that attempts this question. Few candidates attempted this and all because it is story no.10 out of 14 stories in the Anthology. Most candidates anticipated the first 7 stories not knowing KNEC is unpredictable. For those who attempted it, were mixing characters from the other stories like Ninema, Man with Awesome Power, The Incident in the Park etc. This was not a well prepared for story. Because of this, most candidates reported to question 3b.

4. Question 3b was the best for all candidates, unfortunately, the most technical optional book. It was a question that all Kenyan candidates would relate to. Most candidates did not interpret the question as expected hence, did little justice to it. Most of them were just sweeping over points and not explaining deeper. Most of the points were intertwined and just needed the students to expound on the sufferings of the people of Kutula brought about by lacuna Kasoo’s failures as a leader.

6. Question 3c was not common in this year’s KCSE English paper 3. This is because the set text is new in the curriculum and I guess the perspective of the novel is skewed and treated as a boring book.

Believe you me, The Artist of the Floating World is the best performed optional this year. It is a simple book that any candidate can conquer. In fact, it had a simple marking scheme with little expectations for the candidate. Very few candidates attempted this question.

Summary;

1. Prepare adequately for all set texts.
2. For the top calibre of school, they thrive in the optional play and the shirt stories.
3. For the average schools, probability to perform in the optional novel is high.
4. Do what is right for the candidate

🔹Q1. *FUNCTIONAL WRITING

➡️Candidates were expected to write *Personal Journal*

➡️ *FORMAT*
☑️Most candidates were caught offside more so in the format of personal Journal which was attracting 4 marks.
☑️ To score 4 marks, candidates were expected to write *Day, Date, Month and year* (any these items missing- no mark)
☑️ Four subtopics given in the question were to be captured in every entry.

( Full date- Day, date, month, year- 2 mks
Four Subtopics given in the question – 2 mks

👆🏿👆🏿 These two items were captured by very few candidates making majority of the candidates to miss the the 4 marks.

➡️ *CONTENT*
To score the 8 marks for the content, candidates were expected to
☑️ State one event per entry based on the instructions in the question (1mk)
☑️State the feeling or though brought by the event stated per entry (1mk)
☑️ Most Candidates were unable to bring out the feeling or though but stated the events making most of them to secure 4/8 marks in the content.

➡️ *LANGUAGE* 8 marks
☑️ Most candidates were posting minimum of 3 marks in the language.

🔹Q2 *CLOZE TEST*

2023 Cloze Test was a bit friendly to the candidates with majority posting a minimum of 3/10. Some even scored 9/10

🔹 *Q3 ORAL SKILLS*

This was the worst perfomed section in this paper with most candidates struggling to score 10/30

☑️ *Question on Speech* 6 marks
➡️Most candidates were not expecting the practical aspects of testing oral skills, they were unable to identify elements of speech, what is achieved by use of comma in a speech however they scored on how to say the last statement of the speech making the majority to secure 2/6 marks here.
☑️ *Question on Sounds* (6mks)

Candidates were expected to group the sound into voice and voiceless
☑️ This section was wonderfully performed as majority posted 4/6 marks

☑️ *Question on Self introduction* 5 mks
Most candidates were unable to demonstrate the basic concept of making self introduction. With most of them securing 2/5 marks

☑️ *Question on syllabic stress* 3 mks
This area tested the syllabic stress rule -Verb, noun, diphthong. It was performed well.

☑️ Question on public speaking, paying attention and listening 4 marks, Most candidates secure full marks in this section.
☑️ Question on Etiquette -How to call a classmate during the on going lesson -6marks

➡️ This was perceived by the candidates to be simple, but due to it’s practical aspect. Most candidates secure 3/6 . They were expected to
Knock -wait -Excuse -pass the msg -thank the teacher then close the door.

*Way forward*

Let’s go practical when teaching *Oral Skills* and teach all the *Function Writing items*

KCSE 2023 101/2
HIGHLIGHTS
🔷The paper was averagely performed. Below 10 marks were very few this year.

☑️Question 1: Comprehension
❇️Most students scored above eight out of 20 marks. Question 1 a) and 1 b) were mere recall questions, and most students scooped the 4 marks.
❇️Question 1 c) was a summary: most students were able to write the summary and scooped between 4 and 6 marks.
❇️Most students, therefore, collected 10 marks on page 1.
❇️The challenge came on page 2: almost all candidates were unable to respond to higher order demands of Question 1 e). ❇️Then again, almost all candidates failed to give meanings of words and phrases as demanded by Questions f i) and f iii); same to h i) and f ii).
❇️Another challenge in this question was the grammar question of 1 g), most students could not rewrite the question as instructed.

▶️Question 2: The excerpt.
💠This question was fairly performed. Only a small portion of candidates could say what happened before the excerpt. A joke went round that those who scored it were aided. The same applied to what happened after.

💠Candidates were, however, able to respond aptly to questions on character traits, themes, and style.

💠Again, the question on attitude and grammar aspects proved a challenge to candidates. Most candidates scored above 9 out of 25. Top students scored between 20 and 23.

❇️Question 3: oral narrative.
It was not uncommon to see 20/20 in this section. Questions were straight, and it was heartwarming to see that most students responded correctly to the question on irony. Teachers prepared candidates well in oral narratives: questions on classification, character traits, and oral features were well attempted by most students. However, the demands for moral lesson caught most candidates off-guard. They were to use ‘one, we or people…’ to show universality. They were also to use expressions: ‘ should…, need… or ought to…’

Questin 4: Grammar
Students had problems responding appropriately to grammar questions, especially the ones that required rewriting. Punctuation was a big challenge to candidates: candidates missed capitalizations, commas, exclamation marks, question marks even fulstops. Most students were able to score 6 marks and above out of 15.

Verdict: Grammar, especially, rewrite questions need to be taught thoroughly.