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IGCSE · Cambridge (CIE) · 0408

Crocodiles · friendship, provisional home and interrupted return

Trace separation and reunion without turning either into a final ending · Distinguish the first expulsion from the later roadside detention · Explain how repeated details alter expectation

Section SET-2025-3 · 2025 · Paper 3 · In the Sea There are Crocodiles

Cambridge IGCSE World Literature 0408 · 2025-P3-CROCODILES / 2025-P3-A / 2025-P3-B / SET-2025-3 / SET-2026-3 / SET-2027-3
Exam scope and assessment notes

0408 preparation for exam year(s) 2025, 2026, 2027. The assessment changes in 2028; follow the component and selected texts for your year. Original StudyForA teaching for the 2025–2027 Paper 3 option In the Sea There Are Crocodiles, by Fabio Geda, translated by Howard Curtis. Twenty-eight lessons teach the Author’s Note and all six country chapters, with passage, whole-book essay, voice and retrieval workshops. All three complete 2025–2027 selected-work entries link this whole-book teaching pathway. Reading completion, qualified teacher assessment and calibrated full papers are not certified by these self-review exercises. Read the entire unabridged centre-selected book; lessons and models do not replace it. The public reader is a reflowed 133-page version; its page numbers are locators, not certified centre-edition pagination. Use your copy for exact wording, typography and paragraph breaks. The protected book is linked, not reproduced here. Questions and models are original self-review and do not award Cambridge marks or grades. Other well-supported readings can be valid. Qualified literature-teacher review and calibrated full papers remain unfinished. In 2025–2027, Paper 3 is closed book: 90 minutes, one extract response and one whole-text essay, 25 marks each. This book is not a 2028–2030 Paper 3 option. It is excluded from 2025–2027 coursework because it is on those years’ Paper 3 lists; private candidates cannot enter 0408. The lessons analyse a narrative of past experience, not present-day travel, legal or personal-safety advice.

Before you begin

  • Read the Author’s Note and the named chapter scenes in the centre’s complete Howard Curtis translation. Use the linked reader’s text version if needed; its page numbering differs from print editions.
  • Distinguish the experiencing child, the later narrating Enaiat, Fabio’s conversational questions and the authorial/translation process. Reconstructed dialogue is not a certified recording.
  • Read all six country chapters before the whole-book workshops. Teaching availability does not certify individual reading, mastery or an official assessment result.

Work on paper. Try each question before revealing help, and explain why your method works.

Quick readiness check

What should support a claim about a literary text?

What you will learn

  • Trace separation and reunion without turning either into a final ending
  • Distinguish the first expulsion from the later roadside detention
  • Explain how repeated details alter expectation

Crocodiles · departures that do not have one meaning

  • Read the named scenes in the complete centre-selected book or the linked public reading before answering. The protected book is not reproduced here.
  • Reader page numbers identify this web version only. Use chapter and scene locators when working with another edition.
  • Write your own developed response before opening the model. Use brief accurate evidence from your copy; paraphrase plainly when exact wording is uncertain.

Original whole-book teaching and self-review, not official Cambridge questions, marks, coursework or a calibrated full paper. The lessons and models do not replace reading the complete centre-selected book or qualified assessment.

What is close enough to feel?

Read Sufi’s departure, the television and the later reunion, reader pp.54–57.

  1. 1. How does the telling distinguish the child’s immediate priorities from the later voice’s knowledge?

    Compare after trying

    The missing companion is registered in sleep and play, so the child’s loss is repeatedly present in his own body and day. His first reaction to the television belongs to that limited position, and Hamid must explain what he is seeing.

    The later narrator acknowledges the wider tragedy rather than asking the reader to share the initial ignorance forever. I find the distinction useful because it preserves the scale of a lonely child’s life without making that scale the book’s only possible judgement.

    Why this response fits

    • Keep the earlier experience and later acknowledgement separate.
    • Use the concrete routines of friendship.

Two interruptions and different kinds of knowledge

Compare the Baharestan raid and return with the bus detention, reader pp.57–63.

  1. 1. How does the repeated threat avoid becoming a mechanically repeated episode?

    Compare after trying

    The raid interrupts a growing sense of home and produces an expulsion, followed by return to possessions guarded by others. The later journey begins with a different hope of joining Sufi and a mistaken expectation that a stopped bus may only mean sheep.

    The roadside room and detention then distinguish imagined horror from actual coercive work. Release is unexplained, and the other boys’ future remains outside the account. These differences make insecurity recurrent without making each occurrence identical or all consequences known.

    Why this response fits

    • Keep the three-day detention separate from expulsion.
    • Analyse the altered expectation and limits of knowledge.

An absence changes the scale of what matters

Sufi’s departure is felt through the missing body beside the sleeping child and the shared games no longer available. The television account of the attacks in New York is initially mistaken for a film; the later voice acknowledges their seriousness while explaining the child’s more immediate loss. That is a distinction between then and later, not a claim that the event never mattered. Hamid’s exercise book preserves the contact through which reunion becomes possible. The visit to Sufi lasts a week; Enaiat returns to the place he is beginning to regard as home.

Belonging is interrupted rather than simply disproved

Baharestan offers language learning, everyday kindness and a nickname, but the police raid exposes the fragility of that position. The first expulsion sends the workers to Afghanistan through a camp other than the two feared centres. On returning, Enaiat finds his stored money protected by the two workers left behind. He waits to say goodbye to Hamid before moving towards Qom. This sequence keeps individual solidarity distinct from institutional force. The raid does not prove that every earlier friendly act was false, just as friendly acts could not guarantee that it would never happen.

A repeated journey produces a changed outcome

On the later bus, Enaiat expects another harmless interruption like the earlier flock of sheep, but this stop is a roadblock. The feared names recur as a verbal pattern. The room he imagines as a torture chamber turns out to be a dirty kitchen; this does not make the forced work benign. He is held for three days, then released for a reason he does not know, while four other boys remain. This roadside detention is not another completed expulsion to Afghanistan. Do not invent the others’ later fate or make the unexpected release an explained legal entitlement.

Sources for this lesson

Pause and explain

Is the three-day roadside detention the same event as the first expulsion from Baharestan?

Put the idea to work

Worked example

Improve “All three police encounters send him straight back to Afghanistan”.

Show the worked solution
  1. Separate the Baharestan expulsion, roadside detention and later factory expulsion.
  2. The roadside scene ends in unexplained release and continuation to Qom.

Answer Repeated threats have different narrated outcomes; collapsing them removes the changing expectations.

Try a topic test

Choose Easy, Normal or Difficult. Save your answers and open worked review after finishing.

Test this topic →

From guided practice to a new situation

Write your answer and reasoning first. Use a hint only if you are stuck. The model solution is for self-checking; your written work is not automatically marked.

1 · Guided

What makes Sufi’s absence concrete?

Give me a hint

Use a routine rather than a general statement of sadness.

Compare my reasoning
  1. The familiar place beside the sleeper is empty.
  2. Break-time activities lose a companion.

Small repeated actions give the loss an everyday scale.

Look for these in your work

  • Choose a precise detail
  • Explain its emotional work
2 · Independent

How does the return of the stored money qualify the expulsion episode?

Give me a hint

Separate the raid from the workers who remain.

Compare my reasoning
  1. Institutional action removes the group.
  2. Other workers protect what has been left.

The narrative preserves solidarity within an experience of dispossession instead of making all people interchangeable.

Look for these in your work

  • Distinguish agents
  • Avoid a total judgement
3 · Transfer

Explain the later bus stop through the earlier sheep.

Give me a hint

Track the expectation and its failure.

Compare my reasoning
  1. An earlier sudden stop was harmless.
  2. The later stop produces a real removal and detention.

The echo lets a momentary reassuring assumption sharpen the interruption that follows.

Look for these in your work

  • Connect the two scenes
  • Keep their outcomes distinct

Common mistakes

  • Do not claim that the four boys left at the roadside station are later killed; their fate is not given.
  • Do not treat the childhood response to the television as the later narrator’s final assessment of the event.
Recall without your notes

What can you explain now?

Is the three-day roadside detention the same event as the first expulsion from Baharestan?

Compare with the explanation

No; it happens later on the way to Qom and ends in release, not that expulsion.

A repeated fear or place name does not make different encounters the same occurrence.

After trying it yourself, choose your next review. This is your self-assessment.

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Make it stick

Is the three-day roadside detention the same event as the first expulsion from Baharestan?

If you needed the solution, close it and solve the problem again from a blank page. A correct answer is stronger when you can explain the reason for each step.

Keep learning World Literature

Course scope and assessment

238 original lessons provide 714 guided, independent and transfer tasks, plus 431 reading-tracker and long-response prompts. Twenty skill and route entries, three year-specific Cherry Orchard entries, two Anowa entries, three Crocodiles entries, one 2027 Little Foxes entry, two year-specific Volume 1 poetry entries, one historical 2025 Volume 2 poetry entry and three year-specific Volume 2 story entries link teaching. Anowa has ten lessons through the Prologue and all three phases, with thirty staged tasks and ten original developed responses. Complete primary reading locators support analysis of the contested community frame, partnership, enslavement, the children, remembered dream, separation and ending. The protected play is linked rather than reproduced; editorial BECE material is not reused. Both eligible 2025–2026 Anowa rows link the whole-play pathway. Twenty-eight lessons teach the Author’s Note and all six country chapters of In the Sea There Are Crocodiles, with eighty-four staged tasks and sixty original developed responses. Four workshops teach passage analysis, whole-book argument, layered voice and retrieval/revision. All three complete 2025–2027 book entries link the whole-book pathway; the existing supplemental route remains available without adding another counted requirement. The public reflowed reading is linked rather than reproduced, with edition limits explicit. Twenty-two Little Foxes lessons teach all three acts for 2027, with sixty-six staged tasks and forty-eight original developed responses. Hospitality, silenced voices, the mill, financial negotiation, the proposed marriage, Horace’s return and refusal, the bonds, Birdie’s disclosure, withheld help, the final bargain and Alexandra’s decision are taught through actual stage directions and dialogue locators. Four workshops develop passage analysis, whole-play argument, stagecraft and corrective retrieval. SET-2027-2 links the full sequence; the existing supplemental route remains available without inflating counted requirements. The protected acting script is linked rather than reproduced; exact centre-edition wording and revisions must be checked. The Cherry Orchard has an 18-lesson whole-text sequence with five actual Julius West excerpts and three argument models. The 2026–2027 poetry option has teaching for all fourteen members, three complete public-domain poems and close-reading, comparison and retrieval workshops. Twenty-four lessons teach all ten 2026–2028 Stories of Ourselves Volume 2 members, with named reading and writing sequences and evidence, passage-context, essay and ten-member retrieval workshops. Two complete public-domain narratives, nineteen actual prose extracts and Katie’s complete twenty-line poem within Besant’s prose story support close reading and whole-story writing. The Shrinking Shoe follows the original 1895 prose and its five sections; the embedded poem is not a Paper 2 set poem. All three eligible ten-story selection rows link the complete pathway. Wodehouse and Woolf use brief quotations and original commentary with complete reading sources; their full texts are not reproduced here. Twelve lessons teach twelve compulsory 2028–2030 Volume 3 poems, with thirty-six staged tasks and twenty-four developed-response prompts. The Dutt and Kingsley excerpts and Cissoko’s exact translation still need verified reading and teaching; full-selection workshops remain unfinished, so all three complete poetry rows remain unlinked. Fourteen lessons teach seven 2029–2030 Volume 3 stories with thirty-five developed-response prompts. Twelve actual older primary excerpts support four stories; Achebe, Desai and Danticat use original commentary with complete primary reading links rather than reproducing their protected texts. A separate partial-member pathway supports The Necklace, The Model Millionaire, Sultana’s Dream, The Interlopers, The Sacrificial Egg, Sale and New York Day Women without linking either complete ten-story row. The three other members and full-selection workshops remain unfinished. Read the full centre-selected works and protected anthology; check edition differences, including Weissenhorn’s older Necklace translation. The historical 2025 poetry pathway teaches all fourteen members through eighteen lessons, fifty-four staged tasks and fifty-one developed-response models. Three complete public-domain poems remain printed with line breaks; eleven protected poems use complete primary reading links and original commentary. Four workshops teach close analysis, whole-poem argument, preparation comparisons and specific retrieval of all fourteen members. The complete SET-2025-5 option links this sequence; the historical supplemental route remains without increasing counted requirements. Archival Cambridge and WJEC papers supply primary poems, not reused questions or later-year assessment rules. Centre-edition differences remain explicit. Forty-six lessons provide original teaching and practice for nine historical 2025 story members: The Doll’s House, The Gold Watch, A Visit, A Walk to the Jetty, In the Mountains, Mrs. Sen’s, Promenade, The Plantation and The Paper Menagerie. Together they provide one hundred and thirty-eight staged tasks and one hundred and one developed-response models. A Visit uses complete primary reading visually checked across printed pages 306–310. Promenade follows the complete seven-page narrative on printed pages 416–422; its four lessons trace bodily control, wordless meetings, the interrupted circuit and changed final walk. Mrs. Sen’s has six lessons through the complete story, with eighteen staged tasks and thirteen developed-response models. Teaching follows the collection scan from its unnumbered opening through printed p.135, with food, letters, recordings, separate journeys and the changed final care arrangement. The Plantation has five lessons, fifteen staged tasks and eleven developed-response models through all four numbered sections, visually checked against printed pages 423–429 through the final dawn bird-call. In the Mountains has seven lessons, twenty-one staged tasks and fifteen developed-response models through the final invitation to eat. The complete publisher transcription supports scene-based reading; automated-text errors and subscription access remain explicit, and original printed pages were not visually verified. A Walk to the Jetty has seven lessons, twenty-one staged tasks and fifteen developed-response models through the complete six-page retype’s final berth. Reader annotations and the appended question are separate; the complete publisher version has wording differences, so exact quotations require the approved edition. The centre edition remains required for exact quotations. The protected stories are linked, not reproduced. The partial member pathway is supplemental; Words and full-selection workshops remain unfinished, so SET-2025-6 stays unlinked. Fifteen year-specific prescribed-work entries remain unfinished; complete centre-selected coursework reading also needs substantive text-specific teaching. The 51-entry map is a StudyForA preparation map, not official numbered syllabus sections or a percentage of student mastery. Written practice is self-checked and is not officially marked. Full timed papers and qualified literature-teacher assessment remain unfinished. Fictional exercises are labelled separately from actual excerpts; alternative well-supported readings can be valid. Centre-authenticated coursework and Cambridge moderation are separate from self-check practice.

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