EuraStudy
This topic covers Appendix 2 of Pearson Edexcel 9GU0, the prescribed grammar list, together with the two translation tasks it is examined through: Paper 1 Section A, translation of an unseen Gujarati text into English for 20 marks in a recommended 20 minutes, and Paper 2 Section A, translation of an unseen English passage into Gujarati for 20 marks in a recommended 30 minutes. Both are marked by a points-based scheme in which one mark is given for each correct individual section of language, so they reward completeness and precision rather than elegance. The content of both is drawn from any one of the eight sub-themes. Grammar is not confined to these 40 marks, however: AO3, manipulate the language accurately in written forms using a range of lexis and structure, is 30 per cent of the whole qualification, and an AO3 grid is applied to every extended answer in every paper.
5 sections~32 min reading time4 competenciesLevel Foundation 1 · Standard 2 · Advanced 2
basic level
In the first year, secure four things before anything else: the gender of every noun you learn, the oblique in -ા, the primary case markers ને, થી and માં, and the present and simple past of twenty common verbs. Translate two or three sentences into Gujarati every day rather than a paragraph once a week — the points-based scheme rewards the accumulation of small correct decisions.
higher level
The full A-Level expects complex language, and the specification's own list names it: the pluperfect and future perfect, the passive, the subjunctive, subordination, and extended sentences carrying abstract argument. Build each of those deliberately into your writing rather than hoping one appears. And drill the ergative until it is automatic, because it is the single structure that most reliably separates a candidate who has learned Gujarati from one who has learned to recognise it.
Reading depth: In depth
Text size: Standard
Translate into English, then run the chunk check on your own version: ગામની શાળામાં હવે છોકરીઓની સંખ્યા છોકરાઓ જેટલી જ છે. વીસ વર્ષ પહેલાં એવું નહોતું. બદલાવ ધીમે ધીમે આવ્યો, પણ આવ્યો ખરો.
In the village school the number of girls is now the same as boys. Twenty years ago it was not so. The change came slowly, but it came. That is a perfectly readable English paragraph and it would be marked well below its apparent quality, for reasons the chunk check exposes.
ગામની શાળામાં / હવે / છોકરીઓની સંખ્યા / છોકરાઓ જેટલી / જ / છે. // વીસ વર્ષ પહેલાં / એવું નહોતું. // બદલાવ / ધીમે ધીમે / આવ્યો, / પણ / આવ્યો / ખરો. Thirteen stretches. This is the granularity the points-based scheme works at, and dividing a practice passage this way is the single most useful revision exercise for Section A.
ગામની શાળામાં, in the village school — present. હવે, now — present. છોકરીઓની સંખ્યા, the number of girls — present. છોકરાઓ જેટલી, as much as the boys — present as the same as. જ, the emphatic — MISSING; the Gujarati says exactly as many, and the emphasis is a markable stretch. વીસ વર્ષ પહેલાં — present. એવું નહોતું — present. બદલાવ — present. ધીમે ધીમે — present. આવ્યો — present. પણ — present. આવ્યો, the repetition — collapsed into it came, which is acceptable. ખરો — MISSING; ખરો here is an affirmative particle meaning indeed or certainly, and it is the point of the sentence.
In the village school the number of girls is now exactly the same as that of the boys. Twenty years ago that was not so. The change came slowly, but it did come. Two words in English — exactly and did — restore two markable stretches. Neither improves the style; both earn marks. That is the whole lesson of Section A.
Result: In the village school the number of girls is now exactly the same as that of the boys. Twenty years ago that was not so. The change came slowly, but it did come. The chunk check found two lost marks in a paragraph that read perfectly well, which is exactly how Section A marks are usually lost.
Typical mistakes
Active revision
એક ગુજરાતી ફકરો લો, તેનું અંગ્રેજીમાં ભાષાંતર કરો, પછી મૂળ ફકરાને નાના ટુકડામાં વહેંચીને તપાસો કે દરેક ટુકડાનો પ્રતિરૂપ તમારા અંગ્રેજીમાં છે કે નહીં. જે ટુકડા છૂટી ગયા હોય તેની યાદી બનાવો — એ જ તમારી ખરી ભૂલોની યાદી છે.
Active recall
Recall the key points — then reveal.
Sources: Pearson Edexcel Level 3 Advanced GCE in Gujarati (9GU0) specification (Pearson Edexcel)
The postposition system: what attaches directly and what needs a genitive
Translate into Gujarati: Because of the rain, the teacher went with the children to a hall near the school instead of to the ground.
Because of — compound, needs the dative: વરસાદને કારણે. With — compound, needs a genitive: બાળકોની સાથે. To a hall — Gujarati often needs no marker on a destination, or takes -માં for entering: હોલમાં. Near the school — compound, needs a genitive: શાળાની પાસે. Instead of to the ground — compound, needs a genitive: મેદાનમાં જવાને બદલે. Five prepositions, five decisions, and each one is a mark.
In Gujarati a modifying phrase precedes its noun, so near the school comes before hall: શાળાની પાસેના હોલમાં. Note what has happened to પાસે — because it is now modifying a noun rather than heading a phrase, it takes the genitive -ના, agreeing with હોલ. This is a step candidates almost always miss and it is the difference between the hall near the school and near the school, the hall.
The subject is શિક્ષક, the teacher. The verb is ગયા, went — and note the honorific plural agreement, ગયા rather than ગયો, which is standard when writing respectfully about a teacher. જવું is intransitive, so no ergative appears anywhere in this sentence, however past it is.
વરસાદને કારણે શિક્ષક બાળકોની સાથે મેદાનમાં જવાને બદલે શાળાની પાસેના હોલમાં ગયા. Reread it against the list: ને કારણે with the dative; ની સાથે with the genitive; ને બદલે after the verbal noun જવા; ની પાસેના with the genitive twice over; -માં on the destination; verb last; no ergative because the verb is intransitive.
Result: વરસાદને કારણે શિક્ષક બાળકોની સાથે મેદાનમાં જવાને બદલે શાળાની પાસેના હોલમાં ગયા. Five English prepositions became five separate Gujarati decisions, of which two required a genitive and one required the genitive to agree with a following noun. Working through them in order, rather than translating the sentence as a whole, is what makes this reliable.
Typical mistakes
Active revision
નીચેનાં દસ અંગ્રેજી શબ્દસમૂહોનું ગુજરાતીમાં ભાષાંતર કરો અને દરેક પછી લખો કે તમે પ્રાથમિક વિભક્તિ વાપરી કે સંયુક્ત નામયોગી: in the house; for my sister; near the school; after two years; with the teacher; from the village; on the table; because of the rain; about the film; between the two cities.
Active recall
Recall the key points — then reveal.
Sources: Pearson Edexcel Level 3 Advanced GCE in Gujarati (9GU0) specification (Pearson Edexcel)
Three genders, their endings and their agreement
The specification prints વેગવંતો ઘોડી and બટકબોલી છોકરો as examples of errors that do not hinder clarity. Diagnose each, correct it, and then say what a marker does with it.
ઘોડી is a mare, feminine, from ઘોડો a horse. વેગવંતો, swift, is a variable adjective and has taken the masculine -ો. The agreement is therefore wrong in gender. Corrected: વેગવંતી ઘોડી. Note that the meaning was never in doubt — a reader knows a mare is meant — which is exactly why the specification files it under errors that do not hinder clarity.
છોકરો is a boy, masculine. બટકબોલી, chatty or given to pert speech, is a variable adjective wearing the feminine -ી. Corrected: બટકબોલો છોકરો. The same diagnosis in the opposite direction, and again the meaning survives.
The specification's accuracy grid describes bands by the frequency of errors and their impact on clarity. An error that does not hinder clarity does not push you into the bottom bands — but the top band requires accurate language throughout, so a scattering of agreement errors caps you below it. In a Paper 2 essay marked out of 45 with 10 marks for accuracy alone, that cap is worth two or three marks per essay and four to six across the paper.
The fix is a final reading with one job only: find every variable adjective and every participle, look back to its noun, and check gender and number. Nothing else. Doing this as a separate pass takes ninety seconds and catches almost all of them, because the errors arise from writing forward at speed rather than from not knowing the rule.
Result: વેગવંતી ઘોડી and બટકબોલો છોકરો. Both errors were of the class the specification says does not hinder clarity, which means they cost AO3 marks quietly rather than loudly — and a single dedicated agreement pass at the end of every written answer removes nearly all of them.
Typical mistakes
Active revision
નીચેનાં દસ નામ સાથે મોટો અને સુંદર બંને વિશેષણ જોડીને ગુજરાતીમાં લખો, એકવચન અને બહુવચન બંનેમાં: છોકરો, છોકરી, ઘર, પુસ્તક, નદી, પર્વત, વાત, ઝરણું, હાથ, શાળા. પછી નોંધો કે કયું વિશેષણ બદલાયું અને કયું ન બદલાયું.
Active recall
Recall the key points — then reveal.
Sources: Pearson Edexcel Level 3 Advanced GCE in Gujarati (9GU0) specification (Pearson Edexcel)
When the ergative appears, and what the verb then agrees with
The tense and aspect ladder, built on કરવું
Translate into Gujarati: The committee wrote a letter. It read the report and accepted the recommendations. The secretary had already sent a note to the members, but nobody had replied. If they had answered earlier, the decision would have been taken last month.
The committee wrote a letter becomes સમિતિએ પત્ર લખ્યો. સમિતિ takes the ergative -એ because લખવું is transitive and the clause is perfective; પત્ર is masculine singular and unmarked, so the verb agrees with it as લખ્યો. Note what did NOT happen: the verb has not agreed with સમિતિ, which is feminine.
It read the report becomes તેણે અહેવાલ વાંચ્યો — ergative તેણે, and વાંચ્યો masculine because અહેવાલ is masculine. and accepted the recommendations becomes અને ભલામણો સ્વીકારી — ભલામણ is feminine, plural ભલામણો, so the verb is સ્વીકારી. The two verbs in one sentence take different endings because their objects have different genders, which is the whole point of the exercise.
The secretary had already sent a note to the members becomes મંત્રીએ સભ્યોને પહેલેથી જ ચિઠ્ઠી મોકલી હતી. The ergative is on મંત્રી; સભ્યોને is the indirect object with -ને; the direct object ચિઠ્ઠી is feminine and unmarked, so the verb agrees with it, મોકલી, and હતી makes it pluperfect and agrees too. but nobody had replied becomes પણ કોઈએ જવાબ આપ્યો નહોતો — કોઈએ carries the ergative even though it is nobody, because આપવું is transitive, and the verb agrees with the masculine જવાબ.
If they had answered earlier becomes જો તેમણે વહેલો જવાબ આપ્યો હોત — the ergative તેમણે, and આપ્યો હોત as the contrafactual. the decision would have been taken last month becomes તો ગયા મહિને નિર્ણય લેવાયો હોત, with the passive લેવાવું and again હોત. The જો… તો… pair must both be present. This sentence alone supplies a conditional, a contrafactual and a passive, all three of which the specification names as complex language.
Five perfective transitive clauses: સમિતિએ, તેણે, મંત્રીએ, કોઈએ, તેમણે — five ergatives, all present. Five agreements: લખ્યો with પત્ર, વાંચ્યો with અહેવાલ, સ્વીકારી with ભલામણો, મોકલી હતી with ચિઠ્ઠી, આપ્યો નહોતો with જવાબ. Every one of those is a markable stretch under the points-based scheme.
Result: સમિતિએ પત્ર લખ્યો। તેણે અહેવાલ વાંચ્યો અને ભલામણો સ્વીકારી। મંત્રીએ સભ્યોને પહેલેથી જ ચિઠ્ઠી મોકલી હતી, પણ કોઈએ જવાબ આપ્યો નહોતો। જો તેમણે વહેલો જવાબ આપ્યો હોત તો ગયા મહિને નિર્ણય લેવાયો હોત। Five ergatives, five object agreements, one pluperfect and one contrafactual conditional — the paragraph is a checklist for the whole system.
Typical mistakes
Active revision
નીચેનાં દસ વાક્યો ગુજરાતીમાં લખો અને દરેક પછી લખો કે તેમાં કર્તરિ પ્રત્યય -એ કેમ છે કે કેમ નથી: I wrote a letter. I write letters. The girl went. She read the book. They have read the books. We had done the work. He will do it. The work is done by me. Having seen the film, he wrote a review. It was said that the road would be built.
Active recall
Recall the key points — then reveal.
Sources: Pearson Edexcel Level 3 Advanced GCE in Gujarati (9GU0) specification (Pearson Edexcel)
The registers of address, and where each belongs
Diagnose and correct the specification's own examples of errors that hinder clarity and errors that prevent meaning: મહેશ ગયા અઠવાડિયે દુકાનમાં જઈને ખરીદી કરી છે; આવતાં છ મહિનામાં આ શહેરનો વિકાસ ન થયો; દાન આપણે ભેગા કર્યો.
ગયા અઠવાડિયે means last week, a completed period. કરી છે is a present perfect, which in Gujarati as in English resists a specific completed past time reference. The reader has to stop and work out whether the shopping happened last week or is being reported as a current state. Corrected: મહેશે ગયા અઠવાડિયે દુકાનમાં જઈને ખરીદી કરી. Note that the correction also supplies the ergative on મહેશ, which the original lacked — કરવી is transitive and the clause is now plainly perfective.
આવતાં છ મહિનામાં means in the coming six months, a future period. ન થયો is a simple past negative. Future time with past tense is exactly the mismatch the specification is illustrating. What was probably meant is a prediction or a conditional: આવતાં છ મહિનામાં આ શહેરનો વિકાસ નહીં થાય, the city will not develop in the coming six months, or with a conditional, જો રોકાણ ન આવે તો આવતાં છ મહિનામાં વિકાસ નહીં થાય.
દાન is a neuter singular noun, a donation or gift. ભેગા is a masculine plural form and કર્યો is a masculine singular participle, so three elements of one clause disagree with each other and none agrees with the noun. The specification files this among errors that prevent meaning because a reader cannot tell what is being said to have been collected. Corrected: આપણે દાન ભેગું કર્યું — with the neuter singular throughout, and with આપણે as the ergative form, which for the first person plural is identical to the nominative.
The three examples give you the order in which to reread. First, for every clause: who is doing this, and does the verb say so? Second, for every verb: does its tense match the time expression beside it? Third, for every adjective and participle: does it agree with its noun? The specification has effectively published its own marking priorities, and rereading in its order rather than in the order errors happen to catch your eye is worth real marks under time pressure.
Result: મહેશે ગયા અઠવાડિયે દુકાનમાં જઈને ખરીદી કરી; આવતાં છ મહિનામાં આ શહેરનો વિકાસ નહીં થાય; આપણે દાન ભેગું કર્યું. The specification's own three-level classification of error severity converts directly into a three-pass proofreading order — agent and person, then tense against time, then agreement.
Typical mistakes
Active revision
નીચેનાં ત્રણ ખોટાં વાક્યો સુધારો અને દરેક માટે લખો કે એ કઈ પ્રકારની ભૂલ છે — અર્થ અટકાવનારી, સ્પષ્ટતા ઘટાડનારી કે માત્ર સંવાદની: (૧) મહેશ ગયા અઠવાડિયે દુકાનમાં જઈને ખરીદી કરી છે. (૨) આવતાં છ મહિનામાં આ શહેરનો વિકાસ ન થયો. (૩) દાન આપણે ભેગા કર્યો.
Active recall
Recall the key points — then reveal.
Sources: Pearson Edexcel Level 3 Advanced GCE in Gujarati (9GU0) specification (Pearson Edexcel)
References & sources