AQA A-Level English Language and Literature NEA Making Connections and skills: a complete overview
A complete overview of the AQA A-Level English Language and Literature non-exam assessment and core skills, covering the Making Connections comparative investigation, comparing texts and genres, and writing the critical commentary, with how the NEA is structured and the integrated method it demands.
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What the NEA and skills demand
The non-exam assessment, Making Connections, is where the whole course comes together as independent work. It is a comparative investigation that applies the integrated method to a literary and a non-literary text, supported by two transferable skills examined across the qualification: comparison, and writing a critical commentary. This guide ties the NEA and its skills together; each has its own dot-point page with practice questions.
The Making Connections investigation
Making Connections is an independent comparative investigation, worth 20 percent of the A-level, marked by the school and moderated by AQA. You compare a literary text with non-literary material, usually around a shared theme, concept or method, and write an academic essay of roughly 2,500 to 3,000 words with full referencing. The keys are a narrow, answerable focus, genuine comparison throughout, and linguistic evidence driving every interpretive claim. Choose texts that are rich and genuinely connected, and settle the focus early so the analysis has a clear spine.
Comparing texts and genres
Comparison is a core skill in the NEA, in the Paris Anthology unseen comparison and in Exploring Conflict. Build a comparative framework: a set of strands (genre and purpose, representation, perspective, linguistic method) applied to both texts so you compare like with like. Treat genre itself as a comparison point, since each genre's conventions, audience and purpose shape its representation of the shared focus. Run the comparison throughout with connectives of similarity and difference, building an argument rather than a list, and evidence every claim with named features in both texts.
Writing the critical commentary
A critical commentary accompanies your own crafted writing (the re-creative task or original writing) and analyses your choices as rigorously as a set text. Identify your deliberate decisions, name them with accurate metalanguage, and explain their intended effect and their link to a base text or style model. The marks come from analysis, justification and reflection: analyse the choices, not the chronology of how you wrote, and keep the metalanguage precise.
The integrated method across the NEA
Everything in the NEA rests on the integrated method: literary interpretation proved with named linguistic features. Whether you are comparing two texts or analysing your own writing, a claim about meaning or effect must be evidenced, not asserted. Accurate metalanguage, integrated quotation and correct referencing are the academic hallmarks of a strong submission.
Check your knowledge
A mix of recall and application questions covering the NEA and core skills. Attempt them, then check against the solutions.
- What kinds of texts does Making Connections compare, and what is it worth? (2 marks)
- Explain why a narrow focus matters in the investigation. (3 marks)
- What is a comparative framework and why is it useful? (3 marks)
- Explain why genre can be a useful point of comparison. (3 marks)
- State the purpose of a critical commentary. (2 marks)
- Explain the difference between analysing choices and narrating the writing process. (3 marks)