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It’s worth mentioning that your IB English IOC is worth a hefty 15% of your final grade. The FOA in
comparison is only worth 10%. If you’re looking for FOA tips, you’ll find them here and here .
Now back to the IOC. Today I’m going to cover a strategy that I like to preach a lot called the ACTS
strategy. You can use this strategy in your Paper 1 and FOA (again, you can check the link for more).
Today’s talking points will be the following:
● What is ACTS?
● How to apply it to your IOC
● Some extra tips and precautions
Some things to keep in mind is that the IOC will be unseen. In other words, you have no idea what
you’re going to get. Your teacher may narrow down the literary works you’ve studied in Part 4 to a
select few novels, poems, short stories etc. However, it’s up to you to use ACTS to analyze and orally
present in your IOC.
So let’s get into it. First up, a recap, or introduction, to what ACTS is.
What Is ACTS?
A very good question. ACTS is an acronym. It’s a method of organizing how you present your IB
English IOC. It stands for:
A – Au
dience and Purpose
C – Co
ntext and Theme
T – To
ne and Mood
S – St yle and Structure
Each of these are aspects you can elaborate on when you’re presenting. It’s a very good idea to think
of this like a checklist and make sure your transitions between each one is smooth in your formal
presentation. Now that you know what it stands for, let’s talk about how to apply it.
How To Apply ACTS To Your IB English IOC
Be like Bill
For this bit, we’re going to go through how to use each part of ACTS. When you tackle your analysis
of any literary work given to you in your IOC, the ACTS method will give structure to your
presentation.
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Understanding what to look for is key when using ACTS. After all, it’s just an acronym. In addition to
understanding ACTS, it’s important to realize that you can integrate each part. This will be
explained below. So first up is the ‘A’ in ACTS.
Audience and Purpose
When you’re looking at analyzing your literary piece, the first thing you’re looking for is a potential
audience and the purpose for the piece being written. Here are a few things to ask yourself when
analyzing:
“What is the potential audience here? Why is X the potential audience?”
“What is the purpose for this writing? Is there some kind of thematic/social element being highlight?”
(link to context and theme)
“Where is the evidence that this writing is for audience X? Is there any evidence in the register or
particular diction employed?”
“Is there any relation between the target audience and the other aspects of ACTS?”
These are some questions to keep in mind when analyzing. Bare in mind, these are not the ONLY
questions you could ask but these will kick start your brain into gear.
It’s worth noting here that you could go the extra mile and do extra research on the literary texts.
Taking note of the author’s/poet’s personal history would give you some serious analyzing
advantages.
Some other good places to start would be with the date your literary text was written to get an idea
of the social/economic/political atmosphere at the time. There’s always something you can dig up
with a little bit of extra research and it pays huge dividends in your IB English IOC.
Context and Theme
Once again, we will ask some questions to give our brains the kickstart we need. As mentioned
earlier, some research beforehand would be extremely beneficial and it’s here where most of your
research will likely go into.
“What was the era like when this piece was written? What was the social/economic/political
situation?” (possible link to audience and purpose)
“Any underlying themes aside from the parallels to life at the time of the author/poet writing this
piece?”
“Is the theme an internal or external one? Is there a theme of struggle that the author/poet attempts to
emphasize on as a result of the historical context?”
“Does the underlying theme intend to have an effect on the purpose? (possible link to purpose)
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Remember that in addition to these questions, you can ask your own. These are just sample
questions that you’re free to use when you’re analyzing for yourself.
Notice all the links you can draw between the ACTS. The IB examiner who will be listening to your
verbal presentation on tape will be looking for these links.
Tone and Mood
At this stage of your analyzing/presentation, you’re kind of at a crossroads between prior
background research of the literary piece and you’re own theorizing. So some questions you’d be
asking could be:
“As a result of the purpose/theme/context, is the tone of this piece XYZ? Or is it the other way around?”
(possible link to purpose/theme/context and how each is made obvious through the tone and
mood)
“Is the mood more representative of the intended audience’s emotions?” (possible link to audience)
“Where does style and structure affect the tone and mood?” (possible link to tone and mood)
Style and Structure
This last aspect of your analysis is more flexible because it’s not necessarily tied so strongly to
history or context.
“What kind of syntax is employed that suggests a mood/theme/purpose of X?” (links to other aspects)
“Do any of the other aspects affect the structure of this writing? Why or why not?”
“Does the structure affect how the author depicts their idea/imagery?”
Just a few questions you could ask. As I’ve said before, don’t limit yourself to just these.
Some Extra Tips and Precautions For Your IB English IOC
● study the right texts.
● Don’t be so stiff with your analysis. Some of your own original thought is great in an IOC.
● Don’t actually talk about the analyzing questions above when you’re presenting.
● Be structured but don’t forget to draw links between each of the ACTS.
● Get in some mock practice with any literary text. You’ll only get 15 minutes or so of
presenting and an extra 2 of questions.
● Make sure to get some very good sleep the night before (trust me on this one).
● Finally, don’t go through your oral presentation as if it’s a checklist.
For example, don’t go like this: “So for audience and purpose, there’s perhaps the possibility
that X author intended this piece to be for Y audience due to the Z situation happening at the
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time. Therefore the audience and purpose is clearly…” That’s a one‑way ticket to a very low
grade.
Try instead to be more natural. Something like:
“Little Red Cap by Carol Ann Duffy is a crude yet anecdotal account of the poet’s past. It’s a
twisted representation of her past struggles with the relationship with an older man but
ultimately some could say that it emerges as a symbol for female empowerment towards the
end. In this case, it’s possible that her intended audience is X while her purpose for writing is
perhaps to Y and….”
Something a little like that.
Remember, you’re never done analyzing in English so don’t think a few history lessons will limit
your analysis!
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