Learn in your language
Skip to content
IGCSE · Cambridge (CIE) · 0408

Little Foxes · a delayed return and different kinds of concern

Compare the morning opening with the previous evening’s display · Distinguish an explanation invented in uncertainty from the actual delay · Analyse concern through attention, speech and action

Cambridge IGCSE World Literature 0408 · 2027-P3-FOXES / 2025-P3-A / 2025-P3-B
Exam scope and assessment notes

0408 preparation for exam year(s) 2027. The assessment changes in 2028; follow the component and selected texts for your year. Original StudyForA teaching for Lillian Hellman’s The Little Foxes, listed as Little Foxes in Cambridge’s 2027 Paper 3 selection. Twenty-two lessons teach all three acts of Little Foxes and four whole-play workshops, with sixty-six staged tasks and forty-eight original developed-response models. The complete SET-2027-2 option links this teaching for 2027; the existing supplemental route remains available without adding another counted requirement. Complete primary reading, qualified teacher review and full timed calibration remain separate requirements. Read the complete unabridged centre-selected script. The linked public scan is a Dramatists Play Service acting edition with printed pages through 79; reader scan numbers and printed page numbers differ. Check exact wording, revisions, blocking and punctuation against the centre edition. The protected play and its page images are linked, not reproduced here. Questions and models are original self-review and do not award Cambridge marks or grades. Other well-supported interpretations can be valid. Qualified literature-teacher review and calibrated full papers remain unfinished. For 2027, Paper 3 is closed book: 90 minutes, one extract response and one whole-text essay, 25 marks each. This play is not a prescribed 2025 or 2026 Paper 3 option, nor a 2028–2030 Paper 3 prose option. It is excluded from 2027 coursework because it is on that year’s Paper 3 list; private candidates cannot enter 0408. Analyse the play’s racism, unequal relationships and domestic violence critically rather than adopting a character’s claims as the author’s or a general truth.

Before you begin

  • Read the named scenes in the complete centre-selected script; read all three acts before attempting the whole-play workshops. Reader scans are two-page views; printed page locators refer to the linked acting edition.
  • Distinguish stage directions, observable action, a character’s claim and an inference about intention. A performance can realise the written directions in different ways.
  • The teaching sequence does not prove individual mastery. Read the complete play, write your own responses and seek qualified literature-teacher feedback; full timed calibration remains unfinished.

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

  • Compare the morning opening with the previous evening’s display
  • Distinguish an explanation invented in uncertainty from the actual delay
  • Analyse concern through attention, speech and action

Little Foxes · waiting and welcoming

  • Read the named scenes in the complete script before answering. The protected play is not reproduced here.
  • Printed page locators refer to the linked acting edition. Use the act and scene event when your centre edition differs.
  • Write a developed answer before opening the original model. Use brief checked wording from your copy and explain the effect of dialogue, movement or timing.

Original self-review for whole-play preparation, not official Cambridge questions, marks, coursework or a calibrated paper. These lessons do not replace the complete play, the learner’s own writing or qualified assessment; they do not certify individual mastery.

Concern before the return

Read the Act II opening, Cal’s request and Regina’s explanations, printed pp.29–35.

  1. 1. How does the writing make the wait expose different interests?

    Compare after trying

    The ordinary work and closed shutters replace the earlier display, while the missing travellers disturb expectations. Addie’s sleepless attention differs from Oscar’s complaints about routine and the commercial anxiety which the audience already understands.

    The challenged cousin story shows that an explanation offered confidently need not be true. I read the delay as a pressure which makes habits and interests audible, rather than proof of one common feeling of family concern.

    Why this response fits

    • Use the setting and contrasting actions.
    • Keep the possible explanations distinct from the later actual account.

What the arrival shows

Read Horace’s supported entrance and the responses to him, printed pp.36–40.

  1. 1. How does the staging test the words used to welcome Horace?

    Compare after trying

    His careful movement and dependence on Addie make physical effort visible before the family’s greetings. Alexandra’s wish for rest continues what she did when the journey became too difficult.

    Oscar’s description of apparent good health sits uneasily beside that evidence, while Birdie notices the change in his face. I would judge the welcome through responsiveness to this particular person, rather than accept every affectionate phrase as an accurate account of his needs.

    Why this response fits

    • Compare visible action with spoken description.
    • Avoid inventing a diagnosis or treating welcome as one uniform response.

The same room contains a changed expectation

A week later, closed shutters, cleaning materials and waiting replace the previous act’s elaborate entertainment. Addie has stayed awake for the travellers, while Oscar’s missed shooting and impatience with breakfast connect his worry with disrupted habits. Cal’s attempt to direct excess game towards hungry people meets a threat about others hunting. That exchange develops Birdie’s earlier objection to waste without making the household’s resources equally available. The servants can observe and judge, but the response to their speech exposes the limits of what they may ask. Compare these actual actions instead of assuming that every worried person has the same motive.

An explanation can be plausible and still untrue

Regina offers possible reasons for the delay, including a visit to a cousin. Ben points out that the cousin is dead and the train does not take that route. His correction exposes one attempted explanation, but does not establish that no delay has occurred or that Horace has refused to travel. Alexandra later explains that they stopped overnight in Mobile because the journey was too hard for her father. Her decision to make him rest supplies a concrete action of care. It should not be displaced by Regina’s earlier speculation or treated as an accident invented by the student.

The arrival lets concern acquire a bodily measure

Horace enters supported by Addie, moving stiffly and carefully, while Alexandra guards the medicine and wants quiet. The audience can see the effort of arrival before Oscar calls him well. Birdie, by contrast, recognises that he does not look well. Neither social cheerfulness nor the power to issue instructions should replace the stage evidence about his difficulty. The scene tests welcome through how people respond to a particular need. It does not require a medical diagnosis from the reader or make a character’s description of care automatically adequate because it sounds affectionate.

Sources for this lesson

Pause and explain

Why does Alexandra say their journey was delayed?

Put the idea to work

Worked example

Correct “The late arrival proves Horace never left Baltimore”.

Show the worked solution
  1. Regina’s possible explanations are not confirmed facts.
  2. Alexandra reports the overnight rest in Mobile.

Answer The actual return corrects an inference drawn from waiting.

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

How does the opening room change the mood?

Give me a hint

Compare the work and waiting with the earlier entertainment.

Compare my reasoning
  1. The shutters and cleaning materials mark an ordinary morning.
  2. The expected return has not happened.

The same room now makes delay and strained expectation visible.

Look for these in your work

  • Use the changed setting
  • Connect it with an expectation
2 · Independent

Compare two kinds of concern.

Give me a hint

Choose an action rather than a label.

Compare my reasoning
  1. Addie has waited through the night.
  2. Alexandra has stopped the journey to give her father rest.

Concern becomes practical attention to another person’s condition, which can be tested against more self-interested talk.

Look for these in your work

  • Use particular actions
  • Avoid equating every motive
3 · Transfer

How does Cal’s request develop an earlier conflict?

Give me a hint

Return to Birdie’s objection about wasteful shooting.

Compare my reasoning
  1. Food is available through Oscar’s hunting.
  2. The suggestion of sharing meets a threat about others hunting.

The exchange makes possession and exclusion matter beside the household’s language of generosity.

Look for these in your work

  • Connect separated scenes
  • Retain the unequal response

Common mistakes

  • Do not turn Regina’s speculation into the actual itinerary.
  • Do not use Oscar’s cheerful description to erase the difficulty shown in Horace’s movement.
Recall without your notes

What can you explain now?

Why does Alexandra say their journey was delayed?

Compare with the explanation

They stopped overnight in Mobile because Horace did not feel well.

Her account gives a specific event and an act of care, rather than confirming the invented cousin story.

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

Your review choice appears on Today. Sign in to sync it across devices.

Make it stick

Why does Alexandra say their journey was delayed?

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.

StudyForA · Learn with understanding

Original teaching content and links to official sources. Check your exam year and qualification before using a resource.