Hey Logan!
Welcome to the world of VCE journaling!!!! I hope you'll continue with it throughout the rest of your years in high school, unlike me, who doesn't update my journal consistently hahah. Geez, three maths, damn, you'll be sitting so many exams since all maths subjects have 2 exams each, good luck with that lmao.
Regarding methods, honestly, in yr 11 methods, most stuff, apart from probability, are just yr 10 advanced maths, but a teeny bit more challenging (idk if it's just me or not). If you're really good at yr 10 maths, go ahead with yr 11 methods, especially by doing textbook work.
I've got a few tips in English:
TEXT RESPONSE:
*Read and annotate the text as you go along. When it comes to annotation, I use yellow as important info about events or characters, or facts, and other colours for different themes explored in a text that I'm studying.
* It'd be good if you read the text for the second time just to consolidate your knowledge of the text.
* It's fine to sit on the fence, but don't do that in the middle of a paragraph, be clear with your idea in every paragraph. If you don't wholly agree or disagree with a prompt, do one or two paragraph/s on one of your sides, then the rest on the other side, which I normally do.
* Ik it's not an argument piece, but since you're providing your opinion/s about a prompt, argue. What I mean is: ask why you believe that way (using third person, not first person obv). How can you prove your points? Essentially: explain WHY and provide evidence.
* Try incorporating at least one quote per paragraph. This gives you an advantage as you are showing that you know the text well.
ARGUMENT ANALYSIS
* Be specific about your target audience, don't just simply say 'the audience' or 'the reader'. It's never a general audience. For example, if it's targeted to Australian readers, you say 'Australian public', 'Australians', 'Australian readers', something like that.
* Don't just identify the techniques and tell stories, i.e. what happens in the article, and think you're done. So many students do that, which isn't right. Do identify the techniques, then provide an example (it'd be good if you use quotes from the given article/s), and keep nailing the how's and why's when discussing the likelihood of the effect on the target audience. For example, when discussing the effect, you say something like: the writer builds up [target audience]'s agitation of [blah blah blah blah].
OVERALL - PRACTICE ESSAYS!!!!
* Very important, the more you practise, the better you get.
* When doing a couple of first practice essays, just use your notes, and make a very detailed plan, so you'll know what you're writing.
* Once you feel more comfortable with them, try doing them without your notes, and do them under timed conditions. It is hard to do it under timed conditions, so I reckon that you should give yourself around extra 30 min, then gradually decrease the time as you practise more.
I can't help you that much with comparative yet as I've just started that area. I hope those tips are helpful, and enjoy the rest of you high school life!!!!
From mi-xao-14 ^^