VCE English Question Thread

[Alter]

I heard that when writing an introduction in text response essays, the very first sentence has to directly address/acknowledge the essay topic.
I'm a scrub at English so please excuse my lack of knowledge :p

Thanks.

What's your actual question here, sorry? Are you just checking to confirm if your understanding of how to write an introduction is correct?

If so, you're definitely on the money. You'll be wanting to break down the prompt using the introduction and signpost the ideas that you will late expand on. If your introduction does not immediately link to the prompt, the marker of your paper may assume you either don't understand what's going on, or that you're trying to churn out a pre-written essay.

Hope this helps - let me know if you had a more specific question you forgot to jot down.

[Photon]

What's your actual question here, sorry? Are you just checking to confirm if your understanding of how to write an introduction is correct?

If so, you're definitely on the money. You'll be wanting to break down the prompt using the introduction and signpost the ideas that you will late expand on. If your introduction does not immediately link to the prompt, the marker of your paper may assume you either don't understand what's going on, or that you're trying to churn out a pre-written essay.

Hope this helps - let me know if you had a more specific question you forgot to jot down.

That was really helpful  You pretty much answered my question haha.

But as an example there is a topic for Macbeth: "Fair is foul and foul is fair". How does the equivocation play a vital role in bringin about Macbeth's destruction.

Would it be okay to start off with "William Shakespeare's play Macbeth examines the impacts of equivocal language."

[Swagadaktal]

That was really helpful  You pretty much answered my question haha.

But as an example there is a topic for Macbeth: "Fair is foul and foul is fair". How does the equivocation play a vital role in bringin about Macbeth's destruction.

Would it be okay to start off with "William Shakespeare's play Macbeth examines the impacts of equivocal language."

Yeah I think that's fine because you directly tackle the topic.

A lot of people are like "macbeth was set in the (fancy word)  era and it has had a (fancy word) impact which demonstrates the threats of unbridled ambition and the anarchy that spells afterwards.

And the examiners are like ? bitch wat this gotta do with equivocation and destruction you hoe you can't just be writing your pre memorised intro that has nothing to do with this u know?

but if you directly tackle your examiner and teacher is like

[HopefulLawStudent]

Wordy question: Is it possible to posit a question?

[upandgo]

hi everyone  in regards to a question i posted recently about using the same text in both sections A and B... is it safe to discuss the east german stasi in my context response even though i've written about the novel 'stasiland' in section A?

[HopefulLawStudent]

hi everyone  in regards to a question i posted recently about using the same text in both sections A and B... is it safe to discuss the east german stasi in my context response even though i've written about the novel 'stasiland' in section A?

You can't talk about/refer to a Section A text for Section B. Ever. - My English teacher at the beginning of every single class we have because apparently last year, some students made that mistake in their exam even though they'd been explicitly warned weeks/months before NOT to do it.

You could, however, probably get away with talking about the East German Stasi so long as you don't refer to stasiland.

[upandgo]

You can't talk about/refer to a Section A text for Section B. Ever. - My English teacher at the beginning of every single class we have because apparently last year, some students made that mistake in their exam even though they'd been explicitly warned weeks/months before NOT to do it.

You could, however, probably get away with talking about the East German Stasi so long as you don't refer to stasiland.

thanks for the clarification! perhaps i should stay away from it in both practice and real exams just to be safe  .

[Photon]

Yeah I think that's fine because you directly tackle the topic.

A lot of people are like "macbeth was set in the (fancy word)  era and it has had a (fancy word) impact which demonstrates the threats of unbridled ambition and the anarchy that spells afterwards.

And the examiners are like ? bitch wat this gotta do with equivocation and destruction you hoe you can't just be writing your pre memorised intro that has nothing to do with this u know?

but if you directly tackle your examiner and teacher is like
(Image removed from quote.)

Thanks Swag. Great Job. Keep it up.

[Photon]

Dumb question but if I have to write a text response in an hour should I be aiming for 10 minutes per paragraph (including introduction and conclusion)? I'm talking about end-of-year year 12 exam. Unless I shouldn't be dedicating an hour to each of three essays.

xoxoxo

~Photon

[HopefulLawStudent]

Thereabouts, keeping in mind that you also need to leave some time at the end for editing.

[upandgo]

Dumb question but if I have to write a text response in an hour should I be aiming for 10 minutes per paragraph (including introduction and conclusion)? I'm talking about end-of-year year 12 exam. Unless I shouldn't be dedicating an hour to each of three essays.

xoxoxo

~Photon

thats what i do and it generally works out to be 1 hr for me (10 mins for intro, 3BP, concl.) along with 5 mins to plan and another 5 to proofread, but i'm clueless as to whether thats recommended 

[Alter]

It also depends on which section you're best at, I suppose. For some, planning a response in Section A might take a bit longer because you need to recall specific evidence/quotes from the text.

Similarly, you might find that you save time on the L.A (section C) because you should be spending a lot of your reading time planning out how you'll respond to that. I think it goes without saying that if you feel like you're spending too much time on a section, you should try to wrap it up ASAP to move onto another part or you'll find yourself running out of time. Three 8/10 essays is better than two 10/10s and a 3.

For these reasons I think it's crucial that you try to sit multiple English exams under REAL timed conditions before the exam (maybe 2-3 in real conditions). This is arguably one of the best ways to prepare for the exam overall tbh.

[literally lauren]

Is using the words 'white privilege' too informal for a language analysis? If so, what are some substitutes?
Thanks

Unless you're quoting, this is probably outside the scope of the task. Hard to suggest substitutes without knowing the context, but is the author making some kind of point based on racial intolerance or something? Try to just use general vocabulary in that case, as anything as specific or pejorative as 'white privilege' is likely to not suit the analysis. That said, it's highly unlikely you'll get anything pertaining to such ideas on the exam as they try and steer away from controversial or potentially upsetting topics (i.e. the L.A. material isn't going to be about cancer patients or the road toll because that might unfairly impact students who've been affected by such things - that's why the material is usually on dull/safe stuff like gardens and e-books)

can anyone help me with these prompts for brooklyn? i've got some ideas, but im still struggling to create a few more/ get textual details from the novel to explain my ideas thank you (im thinking of going with the second prompt for my essay, though)
Brooklyn by Colm Tóibín
i. ‘Eilis’ sense of duty dictates all of her decisions.’ To what extent do you agree?

OR

ii. How does Tóibín explore the complex nature of love in Brooklyn?

I'll mainly focus on this second one because it's a structural prompt and therefore more difficult (for most students at least.) First step is to reword this into something you can build an essay around, e.g. a statement like 'Toibin portrays love as a complex emotion in Brooklyn. Discuss.' Now ask yourself in what ways love is complex (remember that you can talk about both romantic love, like that between Eilis and Tony/Jim, as well as 'storge'/familial/filial love between Eilis and her family.) Then, think about why love is complex (e.g. because it's unrequited? because of distance? because people don't love each other equally? etc.) The tricky part comes when you have to return to the 'how' part of this question and start considering the structural features Toibin employs in order to create these ideas. Brooklyn (and most novels on the VCE lists, actually) aren't all that rife with structural nuance, but you could look at some of Eilis' narration, the symbolism of things like journeys and deaths, or particular quotes about her relationships.

In general, if you're coming across prompts that you feel you don't have enough textual evidence for, going back to the text or your notes can be a good revision exercise, especially when a prompt is foregrounding ideas you haven't thought of before. In this case, we're dealing with 'the complexity of love,' which probably wasn't a key theme you found on a first reading (because it's not that much of a key theme anyway ) but when you go back and look at certain passages explicitly looking for examples of the complexity of love, it becomes much easier to find relevant scenes and quotes

(Image removed from quote.)

Umm... where did you get that picture of me? You think there's something funny about my trendy cardigans?? -.-

Wordy question: Is it possible to posit a question?

Yep; that's one of the very few things you can 'posit.' To 'pose a question' would probably be the more conventional expression, but 'posit' is also acceptable in that case.

Dumb question but if I have to write a text response in an hour should I be aiming for 10 minutes per paragraph (including introduction and conclusion)? I'm talking about end-of-year year 12 exam. Unless I shouldn't be dedicating an hour to each of three essays.

For three body paragraphs, I'd probably go fifteen for each B.P. and then five for the intro and concl, giving you five minutes extra whenever you need it. But this is an end-of-year exam standard, and if you're not at that stage yet (and there's no real need to be because getting to grips with the content is more important) then don't stress. Also, this will depend on your own strengths and weaknesses (e.g. you might be someone who can churn out a first B.P. in five minutes flat, but struggles to write a third even in 25 minutes because you burn out too quickly, or you might be reeeeeally slow to start and need ten whole minutes of planning time, but after that, you can write consistently quickly for 50 minutes straight) and will vary from essay to essay too, as Alter said.

Better to write a great essay slowly, then get quicker, than to be writing average essays really quickly and then hoping you're essays will spontaneously get better

Three 8/10 essays is better than two 10/10s and a 3.

YEEEEESSS!!! I was struggling to put this succinctly to someone the other day who was asking why they couldn't just rely on one Area of Study to pull up their grades - the fact that you Year 12's have to write all three at the end of the year and that they're equally weighted should factor into your study somehow, so if you haven't touched Text Response in a couple of months, or if you've forgotten how to do a Language Analysis, or if you're like me and loathe writing Context pieces because you know you're bad at them - START THERE. Work on your weakest thing so that you can get everything up to a decent standard and you will be in a tangibly & mathematically better position than someone who's just a 'one trick pony' on the exam.

[Photon]

Hello. So for my creative writing SAC my teacher had us write a statement of intention to explain all the techniques that were used in the actual piece itself. I was wondering if that's an actual thing that we'll be asked to write in year 12 or if that's just something my teacher does.

Thanks.

[oooo]

Hello. So for my creative writing SAC my teacher had us write a statement of intention to explain all the techniques that were used in the actual piece itself. I was wondering if that's an actual thing that we'll be asked to write in year 12 or if that's just something my teacher does.

Thanks.

Yup, it's an actual thing.