How to pass the Unified State Exam in literature: an interview with an expert. Is it difficult to pass the Unified State Examination in literature? And what books are worth re-reading from the school curriculum?

When entering a university, an applicant must take the Unified State Exam, which usually consists of 4 or 3 subjects. At the same time, the Russian language exam is taken in all universities and for all specialties. Also one exam relevant to the specialty subject. In some universities this is literature.

Difficulties of passing the Unified State Exam in literature

The difficulty of this subject is great attention on creative tasks and ownership a large number information. For successful completion exam in literature, you need to study quite large number works. IN Unified State Examination codifier 150 poems, 11 novels, 6 plays, 4 stories, 10 poems, about 20 stories are listed. All these works must be read and analyzed. Since the Unified State Exam questions will contain a minimum of basic-level tasks and most creative tasks. When analyzing a work, it is imperative to tie it to historical events and the time in which the poet wrote. These facts will definitely be present in the exam questions. Use several sources of information, not only books and textbooks, but also video lessons. This will help you relax if you are tired from reading, remember better by activating your auditory memory.

Proven secrets for better memorization

Remembering the names of all the characters and all the events seems to be not an easy task. Several techniques will help with this for better memorization:

- Visualization technique. Present everything in pictures, most bright colors, you can even add your own little things that will make the information received more emotional and interesting for you. Information that is accompanied by some kind of emotion is etched in the memory much more than a boring text that does not hook you in any way.
- Another technique that helps add color to the text - sketch, in this case you will fully use visual memory.
- Association reception. Associate yourself and people you care about with the heroes of the works. While reading, imagine yourself and your loved ones in the place of the characters. Thus, what you read will acquire a vivid emotional coloring in your memory, and if you succeed in this technique, you will remember everything as if it happened to you.

Unified State Exam in Literature will be presented in three parts. The first part contains questions that require a short answer of one or two words. The second part of the questions will require a detailed answer. The third part is creative and will require writing an essay. The essay must be at least 200 words. Completed tasks in the third block will be assessed according to several criteria, which include:

Depth of understanding of the work and independence of opinion.
Level of theoretical literary knowledge.
The structure of the text, the logic and consistency of what is presented.
Compliance with the norms of literary speech.
Content and completeness of the answer.

Don't put off preparing until last days, start preparing as early as possible, use the recommendations you like, and you will succeed.

Literature is one of the most difficult subjects to pass on the Unified State Exam. An eleventh-grader explains what’s wrong with the criteria for assessing long-response assignments, why it’s not necessary to teach which of the characters in “Dead Souls” embroidered on tulle, and why architects and designers don’t need the Unified State Exam in literature at all.

For those who are preparing for the main school exam

1. Biased criteria

The criteria for the Unified State Examination in literature are formulated vaguely. The average schoolchild has a vague idea of what “depth of judgment” is and how to convincingly compare three works. In 2018, the criteria will be improved: there will be more of them and they will become more specific. But the “depth of response” has not gone away.

2. The assessment depends on the subjective opinion of the expert

The assessment system is not fully developed. As a result, the final assessment depends on subjective opinion expert in to a greater extent than from the criteria. The expert may not be able to discern the depth of understanding of the work. Discrepancies in scores occur very often. For example, the first evaluator gives the essay 12 points, the second - 7. The essay is sent for a third check, and the third expert decides to give 10 points. This is a common problem for humanitarian subjects on the Unified State Exam.

3. There is no room for personal opinion.

To pass the Unified State Exam in literature with 100 points, you must have telepathy skills. I don’t know how else to coordinate my answer with what is written in the criteria. And breaking up with them is risky. Suddenly the persuasiveness of the judgments presented turns out to be insufficient.

4. Instead of analysis - cramming

This is the problem with short answer items. They are aimed not at understanding the work, but at remembering minor details. How this will help in analysis is unclear.

Next year, short answer assignments will be eliminated. This will eliminate pointless cramming and leave more time for completing tasks with a detailed answer.

5. Some exam takers don’t need knowledge of literature.

Unified State Examination results in literature require everything creative specialties. If future screenwriters and journalists need knowledge of literature for their studies, then why photographers, designers and architects need it is unclear. Instead of practice, they teach in what year Saltykov-Shchedrin finished “The Wise Minnow.”

“Literature is the most creative subject in the school curriculum” is a dubious argument. The Unified State Exam teaches you to think according to a template, and literature, with the introduction of the Unified State Exam, Federal State Educational Standard and other terrible abbreviation initiatives, has lost its creative component.

To successfully pass the literature exam, you must read huge amount books, learn poems. And the main thing is to write high-quality essays! We learned from the guys who had already entered how to cope with all these difficulties.

DREAMS COME TRUE

Anastasia Mishina, first-year student at St. Petersburg State University, Faculty of Russian Philology, 91 points

For those who are yet to take the Unified State Exam test, I would like to wish them not to worry and to take their preparation seriously. In a year of systematic training you can reach a high level, so you don’t need to worry under any circumstances, dreams always come true!

It seems to me that my story is more the exception than the rule. I really started seriously preparing for the exam only two months in advance, because before that I wrote the All-Russian Olympiads, which I was counting on. At that moment I didn’t know where to go. But I knew that the Olympics provide a wide choice of directions. I was sure that I would take prize place It won’t be difficult for me, and only then will I decide which specialty to choose. But in April I was disappointed - I was two points short of winning the medal. Then I realized that I urgently needed to start preparing for the Unified State Exam, because there were only two months left!

Fortunately, I was always interested in literature, I initially had a good foundation in this subject, and besides, I studied journalism, worked as a correspondent in the press center, so my choice fell on either the Faculty of Journalism or the Faculty of Philology.

I began to prepare intensively, go to USE expert tutors and solve the FIPI task bank. I memorized quotes, wrote essays, read a lot, and prepared myself mentally to successfully pass exams.

The results amazed me! I honestly cried with happiness when I saw the number: “91”, because I wasn’t completely sure that I could do it. short term prepare and pass with such high scores.

PRAYING IS ALLOWED

Anastasia Zakhovaeva, first-year student at St. Petersburg State University, Faculty of Philology, Department of Russian Philology, 100 points

I started preparing for the Unified State Exam in Literature in the eleventh grade. However, express preparation began three months before the exam. On average, 14 hours a week were spent on literature classes, including school lessons, electives and self-education.

Of course, it was scary, especially because the Unified State Exam in Literature was on May 25, that is, the first of all. The day before, you shouldn’t reassure yourself that you worked all school year, you need to continue to conscientiously repeat the material and ask everyone to wish you good luck. Yes, luck when passing the Unified State Exam is very important! It never hurts to pray for the option that comes your way.

Then the main thing is to concentrate, not to pay attention to the creaking desks and chairs, to the gaze of the observer boring into your back, and just give your all 100%. During the exam, you should not frighten yourself with the thought that your fate is being decided. This is true, but psychological state it will not bring any benefit. It's better to think about it while academic year, when there is still time, strength and a certain enthusiasm.

Believe me, before the Unified State Exam you will be so tired of the constant demands of teachers, parents, of your own demands on yourself that your only desire before the exam will be to pass it as quickly as possible in order to leave the test point and breathe the May air from the chest of a free person.

However, you need to force yourself to forget about this desire immediately before the Unified State Exam. While you have another year to prepare, write a lot of essays, read textbooks, but sometimes give yourself time for simple rest.

Next time you will learn how to pass the Unified State Exam with a score of 90+.

Photo from Instagram @kkaterina_che

We tried to change it several times, but the tasks themselves didn’t change much. Therefore, I hope my advice will help graduates prepare for the exam and pass it with the maximum score. I myself received 91 points - the highest in our Stavropol Territory.

I advise you to start preparing in advance, in September. I’ll admit right away that I studied with a tutor. I was very lucky with him, or rather with her. Initially, I thought that studying with other students was detrimental to my grades, but I quickly realized how wrong I was. We prepared as a group of three people - me and two girls from my school.

First of all, we were told about the codifier - a list of everything that might come across in the exam. These are works of Russian literature, ranging from "Tales about Igor's Campaign" and ending "One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich" But main problem the fact that there are texts that are not taught in school.

We were strictly warned that in written replies 9 And 16 (earlier C2 And C4), where it is required to compare prose and poetic works with other literary context, you can use examples only from Russian literature. And any appeal to foreign classics will force examiners to mark zeros.

List required literature turned out to be quite impressive. But there was no, for example, “The Enchanted Wanderer”, Turgenev’s "Asi”, which we studied in literature lessons at our school. But satirical tales they entered there. In addition, some works, for example, “The History of a City” by the same Mikhail Evgrafovich, were “for review study,” and the tutor said that they would almost certainly not come up on the exam (or they might most likely come up where we have the right to choose , that is, as a topic for a large essay).

Poems were no less complex than epic and dramatic works. Firstly, there were a lot of them. Secondly, they had to be learned by heart, since the quotes in the assignment 16 (earlier C4) is a very useful thing. Thirdly, they need to be understood and be able to analyze.

But I don’t regret learning them at all. It happened somehow naturally during training tasks. Anyone could do it. Some poems gave me goosebumps with admiration. This was not the case in literature classes at school.

Russian poetry and everything after it were not included in the Unified State Examination. There was neither, nor, nor, nor, nor - although the experience of the last two years shows the opposite: the poems of these poets began to be actively included in exam tasks.

One of the main myths about the Unified State Exam goes something like this: if you don’t read something, it will be bad. Tested from my own experience - this is not so. Personally, I couldn’t master Oblomov either. But I re-read other works: , and further down the list. As you understand, I didn’t come across either Sholokhov’s or Goncharov’s creations. And one more important point: knowledge of the content of a work and the ability to understand and analyze it are completely different things.

Now about the exam tasks themselves. Part B is very easy, you just need to know the terms. For example, the definition of epic and drama, short story and novel, antithesis and oxymoron, romanticism and sentimentalism, plot and pathos. In general, you understand what I mean. There is no need to explain what this is. They give you a definition, and you just write the word on the answer sheet. I don't remember how many points were given for this part, but I know that it was very few.

Another thing - C-part. Where you had to write 5 mini-essays. Then they were called C1-C4(now tasks 8 , 9 And 15,16 ) and one big one - S-5(exercise 17.1-17.3 ). For me, the most difficult part of the Unified State Exam in Literature was the lack of time and pain in my fingers from intensive writing. And, of course, constant concentration and analytical thinking. I was also very afraid that no expert would understand my handwriting. Memorizing quotes is nothing compared to this. Moreover, it was possible 8 And 15 tasks (then C1 And C3) “quote” something that may not be a quote.

C1 And C3(Now - 8 And 15 ) were similar in that they asked questions about prosaic and poetic works, respectively, that had to be answered in detail. In these tasks, points were reduced for retelling the text instead of analyzing it (and if you don’t understand well what it’s about, it’s almost impossible to avoid retelling), for attempting reasoning that is not related to the topic, and, worst of all, for factual errors.

For example, if you called Ostrovsky’s drama “The Thunderstorm” a tragedy, a point will be deducted. But there were no problems with the use of quotes - the texts necessary for the analysis were printed before the questions.

IN C2 And C4(Now - 9 And 16 ) the question is asked: “Where else in Russian literature is a problem (or motive, or artistic technique), indicated in a given prose passage or poetic work? In my opinion, these tasks are even more difficult than C5.

Imagine, in order not to lose points, you need to remember a bunch of works, choose at least two from them that can be compared in some way, find positions for comparison, compare, and it is advisable to provide quotes to confirm your thoughts. And in C4 quotations are often quite large parts of a poem or even several verses. This is why they need to be taught.

Comparisons and arguments must be strong. The problem is that it is impossible to objectively evaluate this task: one evaluator will find the arguments convincing, but another will not.

Method of working with section tasks C2 the next one - in the introduction you list all the works that you want to compare. In the first paragraph of the main part you find similarities and differences between the work from the assignment and the first one you named, in the second paragraph you do the same, but with the second proposed work. Finally, in the conclusion you compare everything again, and it is important not to repeat yourself. At first I thought it was almost impossible, but by the time of the exam everything becomes possible.

Finally, C5(today is a task 17.1-17.3 ) - the most valuable. For this, if my memory serves me correctly, they gave about half the points. Yes, yes, you read that right. And writing it under conditions of lack of time is more than “nervous”.

C5 - big essay to choose from. You choose one of three topics and expand on it. And you reveal it as fully as possible. There are many things that are assessed here, but the main thing is the content aspect. If the problem is not solved, the expert will not look at anything else. And for the Unified State Exam you will get the maximum 50 points, provided that everything else is done perfectly. The second criterion is the terms, the same ones that were in B-parts. In 2014, they had to be consumed at least 10 (the figure, of course, is arbitrary, but it fits into the formulation of the criterion “ high level mastery of terminology"). Today, by the way, the criterion has been changed and it has been prescribed that at least in one place the term must be used for analysis. Third - quoting brief retelling episode, description - in a word, everything that proves knowledge of the text. In this case, a brief retelling was not forbidden. Fourth - logic and coherence of the text, everything is clear here.

Finally, something that is always paid attention to, but is reduced only in C5,- speech errors (today speech is already assessed in 8 out of 15 tasks). By the way, the beauty of the literature exam is that they don’t pay attention to grammar. This is very, very good. Because in a hurry, sometimes you write who knows what. In literature school, because of the strict assessment of grammatical errors, I was sometimes even given a “2”.

Good luck to everyone who will take the Unified State Exam in Literature this academic year!

Answer from TheQuestion partner

What is difficult for one is feasible for another, because all students are different. The difficulty depends on your level of preparation and time before the exam.

If you have 10th and 11th grade ahead, follow these steps.

1. Work through the prose.

Re-read the prose that is presented in the codifier. In a separate notebook, briefly write down the full title, author, main events and key quotes each work. When reading, highlight the system of images, compositional features, portrait and speech characteristics, artistic details. Learn the theme of the work and important quotes by heart.

2. Learn poetry.

Memorize poems and passages of poetry from the codifier. Write it down in your notebook brief information about the works: title, author, feelings, experiences, thoughts of the lyrical hero, eloquent quote.

3. Study the periods.

Design a visual literary “timeline” - the historical line of creativity of writers and poets.

XVIII century and the first half of the XIX century: Griboyedov, Pushkin, Lermontov, Gogol.
Second half of the 19th century: Goncharov, Turgenev, Saltykov-Shchedrin, Dostoevsky, Tolstoy, Chekhov, Tyutchev, Fet, Nekrasov.
XX century:
Bunin, Kuprin,
poets of the Silver Age,
Bulgakov, Platonov, Zoshchenko, Zamyatin, Sholokhov,
prose and poetry of the Great Patriotic War and about the war (Belov, Astafiev, Rasputin, Shukshin, Solzhenitsyn, Vampilov)
Modern prose and poetry.

Use stickers, portraits of writers, notes with quotes. Take notes

textbooks V.I. Korovin and S.A. Zinina, critical articles. Write out quotes from Belinsky’s works and learn them by heart. Use timelines about Russian literature and literary ones. Read and retell theoretical material aloud.

4. Practice theoretical tasks 1-7 and 10-14.

5. Learn to write detailed answers to tasks 8, 9, 15, 16.

6. Practice completing tasks 17.1, 17.2, 17.3, 17.4

If at the beginning of the 11th grade you decided to take the Unified State Exam in literature, then the algorithm will be different.

Repeat the historical and literary course: folklore, Old Russian literature, XVIII and XIX centuries. Use V.I. textbooks Korovin, reference books by E.A. Titarenko and L.A. Skubachevskaya.
Read works of art XX century from the codifier, take notes.
Study theoretical material to complete tasks 1-7, 10-14.
Write detailed answers to tasks 8, 9, 15 and 16.
Analyze template essays to formulate statements in tasks 17.1, 17.2, 17.3, 17.4.

For those who have decided to take literature 3 months before the Unified State Exam, I advise you to set your priorities differently.

Practice tasks 1-7, 10-14.
Learn to analyze the episode in detail in task B8-, determine the functions of a portrait or dialogue, or landscape, or artistic detail. Connect the completion of tasks B8-9 with terms A1-7.
Practice analyzing the poem in task B15-16. Learn to identify the functions of artistic and expressive means, figurative system, composition, identify the theme and idea of the work. Connect the completion of tasks B15-16 with terms A10-14.
Analyze template essays and practice your own statements in tasks 17.1, 17.2, 17.3.
Use reference material"cheat sheet" character.

If you want to prepare as effectively as possible for the Unified State Exam, Unified State Exam and Olympiads in the remaining time,

I didn’t take it, but I prepared for the exam and for several years I was on the Unified State Exam testing committee.

Why is it difficult?

1. The questions, on the one hand, are typical and terribly boring. On the other hand, every word in the question is important and you must answer the question posed strictly. If you ask what the role of Stolz’s image is, and you describe what kind of person he is and how he differs from Oblomov, this is wrong. We must answer what the ROLE OF IMAGE is.

2. There are tricky questions. This is especially true for questions about a fragment of text. You are offered a fragment where Bazarov and Kirsanov talk about art. The question is how the views of fathers and children are compared and what this is connected with. You begin to describe that Bazarov is a nihilist and denies art, and therefore the Kirsanovs love. This is wrong. Compared is not opposed. Bazarov is simply not interested in art, he doesn’t understand it, doesn’t know it and doesn’t want to know it. But the Kirsanovs, rather, defend art because it is necessary. Art! At the same time, Pavel Petrovich himself reads little and does not understand art.

3. Questions can be stupid and illiterate. What are the feelings of the lyrical hero in the poem “You are my fallen maple...”? ( Lyrical hero drunk Come on, kids, write about it). Why can "The Minor" be called a tragicomedy? (You can't call him that!)

4. Main principle work of the commission - do not give too many or too few points. Otherwise, there will be discrepancies in the assessment between the two inspectors, and then the authorities will doubt the competence of the commission. And everyone will be driven away. Therefore, people who read the textbook and summaries and people who like to read and think interestingly get about the same number of points.

5. There are poems. IN recent years increasingly offered poetic texts, which were not in the codifier. Complex and incomprehensible. That is, the premise about the “ugly peasant singer” will not work. People cry and write nonsense. Poetry in general is a complicated thing.

I took it in 2014. In general, yes, it’s not easy, but, in my opinion, if you are interested in the topic and love to write essays, then it’s easier than, say, history (from the humanities subjects). The base is needed significant, the whole program is not up to par summary, but at the problem level. And if in the parts where prose is analyzed it is still normal, then in the poetic questions it was really difficult, say, a work is given and you need to give examples with the same problem. Even with preparation, everything can simply fly out of my head, but maybe it’s just my dislike for poetry in general.

Practice makes a difference. The more training essays you write, the better, at some point you already create your own templates and groups of works (about this problem - like this, about that - others), you can even sort them somehow for yourself, because the list of topics and questions are quite limited and have a lot of overlap in exam options and parts. There are also basic works, but it’s better not to think ahead and be prepared for anything :) I don’t know about a tutor, it will never be superfluous, but if the school has in-depth literature classes, it’s worth going there, solving Yandex.ege (a good thing) and reading - read-read.

I took the literature exam 3.5 years ago and I may not know some completely new things, keep this in mind.
Firstly, it is difficult, since the exam involves writing 5(!) essays on various questions, in addition to answering the questions in Part B.
Secondly, this is even more difficult, since the list of references is quite large (here it is). Not only do you need to re-read this list and know it all, you need to be able to answer typical questions by works and by cycles of works (for example, by “Woe from Wit”: “Can it be said that Chatsky is doomed to loneliness?”, “What role does the image of Molchalin play?”, “What is Sophia’s trouble?”, etc. ), and there can be at least five such questions for just one work, and these questions must be answered with the correct theses, correctly disclose the theses, supported by logical arguments, while satisfying all evaluation criteria (there are 5 of them, it seems). Speaking of them:
Thirdly, an additional complication is that assessments on these criteria can very easily vary depending on the “wants” of the inspectors; your work can be considered either brilliant or mediocre if you deviate even one step from given typical theses and answers.
And fourthly, you need a lot of practice. Essays need to be written, written and written, for each work or cycle of works, several pieces per different topics(in total there can be up to 200 essays, 1-2 per day). Without practice and experience, the minimum score is guaranteed.
And, if anything, it’s best to hire a tutor.
Good luck, but if you have the opportunity not to get involved in this adventure, don’t get involved.