John Lara's The Samaritan: Answering Excerpt and Essay Questions - A Guide to Reading John Lara's The Samaritan, #3

This is another book among the several written on the theme og examinations. Often, students fail to do well in examinations, not because they have not read the text or prepared properly, but because they do not know how to present what they know to a second party. This is often a serious problem in college because nobody prepares the srudents on presentation. Most lecturers expect that the student has learnt this before, which is often not the case. This book is the third in a series which examines John Lara's play, The Samaritan. The first two discuss the elements of literature - plot, theme, characters and style. This book tries to prepare the student on how to present what is learnt in the first two book so that it is clear to the high school teacher or examiner and to the college lecturer. The book, like many others by the same author takes a practical high school exam - the Kenya Certificate of Secondary Examination, through which students qualify for mid-level colleges and universities - and uses its questions to examine how a candidate should manage both the time and space allowed in order to do what the examiner requires satisfactorily. However, the skills taught here are universally applicable. One only needs to consider the time and marks awarded to questions in the different exams and then adjust accordingly. This book looks at question interpretation for both excerpt and essay questions in literature, and then examines essay writing. Essay writing is taught from the basics - the nature of paragraphing, introductions and conclusions, and finally the complete essay. The book gives the student and the teacher the most practical tools for dealing with examinations in literature.