The diploma exam
Two papers of equal weight: two pieces of writing, and seventy reading questions on texts you have never seen. Neither can be crammed the night before, and both can be prepared for properly.
- 1. Two parts, half each
- 2. Part A: the two assignments
- 3. Part B: the reading blueprint
- 4. What you will be reading
- 5. What preparation looks like
- 6. Official material
Two parts, half each
The idea: Part A is written response, Part B is reading, and they are worth exactly the same. The diploma is 30% of your final mark.
| Part | What it is | Worth |
|---|---|---|
| Part A: Written Response | Assignment I: Personal Response to Texts, and Assignment II: Critical/Analytical Response | 50% |
| Part B: Reading | 70 multiple-choice questions on unfamiliar texts | 50% |
The exam is designed so most students finish comfortably in 3 hours, and every student may take up to 6. In English that time is genuinely usable: planning before writing, and re-reading a difficult selection, are what the extra hours are for.
Part A: the two assignments
The idea: one asks what you think, in any form; the other asks you to argue a claim about a literary text you know. They are scored on different things.
Assignment I: Personal Response to Texts — 20% of the exam
A text is provided, and an idea is drawn from it. You explore that idea, in whatever prose or poetic form you choose, using your own experience, observations and reading.
| Scoring category | Worth | What it rewards |
|---|---|---|
| Ideas and Impressions | 10% | How thoughtfully you explore the idea, and how your response connects to the text provided. |
| Presentation | 10% | Voice, the form you chose, how the piece is put together, and control of language. |
Suggested length: 600–1200 words.
Assignment II: Critical/Analytical Response to Literary Texts — 30% of the exam
You choose a literary text you have studied and argue a position about it in response to the assignment's idea.
| Scoring category | Worth | What it rewards |
|---|---|---|
| Thought and Understanding | 7.5% | How well you understand the text and the idea, and how perceptive the argument is. |
| Supporting Evidence | 7.5% | Specific, well-chosen detail from the literary text you chose. |
| Form and Structure | 5.0% | Organization that develops an argument rather than retelling a plot. |
| Matters of Choice | 5.0% | Word choice, sentence variety, precision. |
| Matters of Correctness | 5.0% | Grammar, punctuation, spelling. |
Suggested length: 800–1600 words.
Thought and Understanding plus Supporting Evidence make up half of Assignment II, which answers the question of whether to write more or to think harder.
Part B: the reading blueprint
The idea: seventy questions, and only a handful are literal. Most ask you to infer, apply or analyze — which is a skill you can build.
| Kind of thinking | Questions |
|---|---|
| Form literal understandings — what the text says | 5–15 |
| Infer, apply and analyze — what it implies and how it works | 30–40 |
| Assess and form generalizations — judgment across a text or between texts | 15–25 |
| What is being assessed | Questions |
|---|---|
| Constructing meaning from content and context | 30–40 |
| Relating form, elements and technique to content, purpose and effect | 20–25 |
| Connecting self, culture and milieu to text and text creators | 10–15 |
Read those two tables together and the message is clear: at most fifteen questions can be answered by finding a line, and twenty to twenty-five are specifically about technique and its effect — the thing the devices unit is for.
What you will be reading
The idea: the selections are unfamiliar by design, and they are drawn from a published range — so the forms, at least, can stop being a surprise.
- Excerpts from longer works: a novel, book-length nonfiction, modern drama, and Shakespeare.
- Shorter texts: poetry, short stories, and essays — persuasive, personal, expository, biographical and autobiographical.
- Popular nonfiction: news stories, feature articles, reviews, interviews, technical writing.
- Visual texts: photographs, works of art, cartoons, advertisements, posters.
- At least a third are Canadian texts, as the program requires.
- Some questions link two selections, asking you to consider texts connected by technique, context or theme.
Shakespeare in particular is worth rehearsing, since unfamiliar language on an exam clock is its own skill. Read the passage for situation and relationship first, and the archaic vocabulary second.
What preparation looks like
The idea: you cannot revise the texts, so revise the two things that travel: a method for reading, and a text you know deeply enough to argue about.
- Prepare two literary texts properly for Assignment II — a novel or play and a shorter work — including six to eight short quotations you can actually recall.
- Practise the reading method, not just more questions: read for shape, answer in your head, then eliminate. The close reading unit sets it out.
- Write timed responses. Both assignments are planning problems as much as writing problems, and ten minutes of planning saves an hour of drifting.
- Read the scored exemplars on Alberta's site — the fastest way to calibrate what a strong response actually looks like.
- Read unfamiliar poems regularly. Fifteen minutes with a poem you have never seen is the single most transferable preparation for Part B.
Official material
The idea: the bulletin and the released items are the authoritative description of what is being marked.
- English Language Arts 30–1 Information Bulletin 2025–2026 — The blueprints, both scoring guides with their criteria, and the suggested word-count ranges.
- Writing diploma exams — Where the released items, the scored student exemplars and the practice tests live.
- Diploma exams — overview — Exam dates, rules, accommodations and how results are reported.
Then use the written-response walkthrough and the sample reading section here, plus the printable worksheets and practice questions.