ATAR Notes: Forum
Archived Discussion => English Studies => 2015 Exam Discussion => English & EAL => Topic started by: literally lauren on October 28, 2015, 11:51:05 am
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Discussion for Text Response here!
What did you think of your prompts? Any especially easy or hard ones? Just grateful it's all over and you never have to think about your texts again? If you needed a reminder of different prompts you want to discuss, a copy of Section A can be found here!
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I found the prompts Mabo easy (I chose the second one), but I did extremely bad. I didn't finish it.
I hope I get a 33...
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I found the prompts Mabo easy (I chose the second one), but I did extremely bad. I didn't finish it.
I hope I get a 33...
A friend of mine didn't finish any of the three sections and got a 50. How much did you manage to write down?
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I did question two for Brooklyn
I didn't find this prompt too difficult as our last SAC question was quite similar. Hopefully I went well!
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Medea ones were fairly sensible, hopefully I did well :D Felt alright.
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Medea ones were good. But my essay was awful. Feel really disappointed. I went with the 'extreme emotions' one.
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I thought the Medea ones were fairly reasonable.
I chose the "extreme emotions" one because it felt a lot more easy to provide evidence for.
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I did the Stasiland one about exposing a world that is cruel/absurd just so I could talk about hot chocolate and a truckload of puppies. More seriously, I was happy there was a prompt about absurdity as it is the theme I feel most comfortable with. Would've liked to have seen prompts that varied a bit more, but no real loss.
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To the people who feel like they went awful -- don't worry! I had the same feeling. I remember walking out of my exam so disappointed that I probably wouldn't break the 40s, which had been my goal all year, and I ended up in the high forties. (I also went to a dodgy public school so it legitimately was a very big shock).
I screwed up my timing and wrote my LA in 90 minutes for only 950 words, then rushed an 850~~ word text response out in close to an hour before smashing out a 700 word imaginative story in thirty minutes. It wasn't an ideal exam but what I forgot was that everyone else would also have been making mistakes, and that VCAA know you only have an hour for each piece... So long as they can see you hitting the criteria, they'll give you some leeway on icky mistakes. Just be really proud that you completed such a mammoth exam and and even more mammoth year. You've all done really well to get to this point and to have studied so hard. It's really tough, so just pat yourself on the back and don't stress too much about it :).
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To the people who feel like they went awful -- don't worry! I had the same feeling. I remember walking out of my exam so disappointed that I probably wouldn't break the 40s, which had been my goal all year, and I ended up in the high forties. (I also went to a dodgy public school so it legitimately was a very big shock).
I screwed up my timing and wrote my LA in 90 minutes for only 950 words, then rushed an 850~~ word text response out in close to an hour before smashing out a 700 word imaginative story in thirty minutes. It wasn't an ideal exam but what I forgot was that everyone else would also have been making mistakes, and that VCAA know you only have an hour for each piece... So long as they can see you hitting the criteria, they'll give you some leeway on icky mistakes. Just be really proud that you completed such a mammoth exam and and even more mammoth year. You've all done really well to get to this point and to have studied so hard. It's really tough, so just pat yourself on the back and don't stress too much about it :).
This actually helped so much, thank you! I tried my best and don't think I could have studied more but was still unhappy, but this post made me feel so much better!
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A friend of mine didn't finish any of the three sections and got a 50. How much did you manage to write down?
Stellar intro and conclusion (not that it matters) for Mabo, and a bit of a body paragraph. I'm thinking along the lines of a 4-5. That's pretty amazing about what you said about people who didn't finish essays.
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The prompts for All About Eve were pretty good. I'm fairly sure that all schools would have covered both of those prompts (or at least something really similar). Everyone I spoke to in my school that did the film were happy. Unfortunately the lang analysis compromised the quality of my text response. Conversely, the people that did the other text (Burial Rites) had mixed feelings, I was doing that book up to two weeks ago but backed-out when I attempted breaking down the prompts.
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I was happy with the Will You Please Be Quiet, Please? prompts, ended up choosing the first one.
I'm really struggling to determine if I wrote well or not, I felt so blank reading back over my essay and couldn't process it properly.
I'm really just glad it's over :)
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Both of The War Poems prompts were a gift. I'm so glad I chose to stick with it :)
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Did anyone else do Harwood?
I went with the prompt about memories but I'm really not feeling confident about it! :/
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I went for Burial Rites prompt one, which I thought was pretty good.
Don't think I'll be having much discussion on here, since it's a new text and I'd bet not too many people did it :)
Hope everyone went well!
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Thanks heaps Literally Lauren, I did Mabo's second topic which quite closely links to your first Mabo topic in your third exam paper. So thanks heaps. Found it relatively easy.
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Thought the second Cat's Eye prompt was a tad limiting but the first one was absolutely perfect and something that I had lots of material/quotes to work with which I absolutely enjoyed writing for (even more weirdly, they both had quotes in their prompts so a bit of a reverse of the "How" in 2013 Exam)! Our other text (The Complete MAUS), I had a check of the prompts and it was a given that one of the prompts would be about graphical techniques ("visual imagery") but the prompts weren't a massive surprise in that regard and little variety (opinionated vs. quantifying as seen with Cat's Eye) but overall, the prompts for both texts were doable and well received from our cohort.
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general consensus around various grammar schools is that the henry topics were a gift from heaven
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How much do you think I would of got:
I wrote a pretty good intro and conclusion, and I had nearly one good body paragraph. This was on Mabo.
I ran out of toime...
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I studied Medea and In The Country Of Men this year, and I found the prompts for both texts quite decent & easy. I only prepared for Medea but I think that if I did some work for ITCOM, I could have easily written a nice text response for it. Anyways, I did Medea and I chose the first prompt (extreme emotions). I had many ideas for both prompts so it was a bit hard to choose but yes, overall I think I did well! I talked about how Euripides articulates the tension between reason and passion but ultimately it is natural human instict to act selfish and both Jason and Medea are driven by their extreme passion.(love/ambition)
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Thought the second Cat's Eye prompt was a tad limiting but the first one was absolutely perfect and something that I had lots of material/quotes to work with which I absolutely enjoyed writing for (even more weirdly, they both had quotes in their prompts so a bit of a reverse of the "How" in 2013 Exam)! Our other text (The Complete MAUS), I had a check of the prompts and it was a given that one of the prompts would be about graphical techniques ("visual imagery") but the prompts weren't a massive surprise in that regard and little variety (opinionated vs. quantifying as seen with Cat's Eye) but overall, the prompts for both texts were doable and well received from our cohort.
I loved the visual imagery one. It was exactly what I prayed for and didn't have too much of a twist to it. It was a given that there would be one about graphic techniques but I was really anxious it would tie back to something I'm not prepared for, such as "visual imagery is used to emphasize the tension and incompatibility between vladek and art". In the end it was a nice vanilla visual imagery topic that I wrote a piece for in 55 minutes without stopping and wasting time for much at all.
Sometimes, such as the case here, a lack of suprised is a gift.
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general consensus around various grammar schools is that the henry topics were a gift from heaven
yes omg. i literally planned the exact leadership question 2 days ago, and pretty much just copied it word for word. it really could not have worked out any better for me.
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Did anyone do This Boy's Life? I was doing Henry IV but switched out a few weeks ago to This Boy's Life. So much regret, seeing the easy Henry prompts in comparison to the obscure (imo) TBL ones.
I did the Rosemary prompt - it was a very narrow topic so I went on tangents often. Hoping this doesn't kill my score too much :\
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Did anyone do This Boy's Life? I was doing Henry IV but switched out a few weeks ago to This Boy's Life. So much regret, seeing the easy Henry prompts in comparison to the obscure (imo) TBL ones.
I did the Rosemary prompt - it was a very narrow topic so I went on tangents often. Hoping this doesn't kill my score too much :\
Yeah i did the same prompt too, felt the key words in the prompt were really simplistic and restricted my interpretation. Although i tried to diverge away from talking about just Rosemary and Jack felt it was very limiting imo. Other prompt seemed worse though hahaha
what did you talk about?
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Yeah i did the same prompt too, felt the key words in the prompt were really simplistic and restricted my interpretation. Although i tried to diverge away from talking about just Rosemary and Jack felt it was very limiting imo. Other prompt seemed worse though hahaha
what did you talk about?
Yeah exactly! I felt myself diverging away a lot, which was worrying because it felt like I was dodging the prompt, but I wouldn't have been able to say much otherwise. I essentially said that yes, Rosemary is unable to be a good mother.
Paragraph 1: She has her own shit to deal with in life (e.g. her own traumatic childhood, abusive boyfriends etc.) so she can't be there for Toby as a good parent
Paragraph 2: Her taste in boyfriends are bad for Toby, because they act as bad fathers to him. Somehow (in my mind, although looking back, this is super tangential) this meant that Rosemary was a bad mother.
Paragraph 3: A big part of Toby's life is finding his identity. Rosemary can't help him do that, because one must find his own identity independently. Therefore, she can't be a 'good mother' in the sense of helping him find himself.
Conclusion: Rosemary can't be a good mother, but it's not her fault, because she has her own shit to deal with. Besides, Toby doesn't need her.
Pretty piss poor essay in terms of sticking to the prompt... it'll probably be the worst out of the three. What'd you write about?
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Yeah exactly! I felt myself diverging away a lot, which was worrying because it felt like I was dodging the prompt, but I wouldn't have been able to say much otherwise. I essentially said that yes, Rosemary is unable to be a good mother.
Paragraph 1: She has her own shit to deal with in life (e.g. her own traumatic childhood, abusive boyfriends etc.) so she can't be there for Toby as a good parent
Paragraph 2: Her taste in boyfriends are bad for Toby, because they act as bad fathers to him. Somehow (in my mind, although looking back, this is super tangential) this meant that Rosemary was a bad mother.
Paragraph 3: A big part of Toby's life is finding his identity. Rosemary can't help him do that, because one must find his own identity independently. Therefore, she can't be a 'good mother' in the sense of helping him find himself.
Conclusion: Rosemary can't be a good mother, but it's not her fault, because she has her own shit to deal with. Besides, Toby doesn't need her.
Pretty piss poor essay in terms of sticking to the prompt... it'll probably be the worst out of the three. What'd you write about?
I feel ya brother
my stance was like:
Paragraph 1: Something about societal/gender roles which inhibits Rosemary to look after toby or something ( cant remember what i wrote her but it was mainly 1950's america context related)
Paragraph 2: The abusive men in her life which spared her no time for Jack etc, she had her own shit to deal with.
Paragraph 3: Rosemary's compassion and love towards Jack somewhat blinded her to the boy he was, and as a result he got away with countless deeds and acts of delinquency. ( she couldn't raise her voice at him etc) + talked about the role reversal between Jack and Rosemary
Paragraph 4: Essentially just challenged the prompt by saying although it may seem that Rosemary is displaying bad motherly characteristics, she acts as a moral compass to guide Jack subconsciously and is a source of inspiration etc. ( saying we cant judge Rosemary, as Wolff praises her throughout)
Conclusion: Rosemary at the tip of the iceberg Rosemary displays the characteristics of a bad mother, yet Wolff attempts to display that we shouldn't base assumptions on individuals etc etc.
Interesting how we went on pretty separate tangents, just shows how we both interpreted the topic and the pretty shit novel differently haha.
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Did anyone do This Boy's Life? I was doing Henry IV but switched out a few weeks ago to This Boy's Life. So much regret, seeing the easy Henry prompts in comparison to the obscure (imo) TBL ones.
I did the Rosemary prompt - it was a very narrow topic so I went on tangents often. Hoping this doesn't kill my score too much :\
Same, i looked at the other TBL prompt and nearly cried. I had to go with the Rosemary. It was okay.. that word 'unable' It kinda helped. But yeah i went on a tangents too.
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I feel ya brother
my stance was like:
Paragraph 1: Something about societal/gender roles which inhibits Rosemary to look after toby or something ( cant remember what i wrote her but it was mainly 1950's america context related)
Paragraph 2: The abusive men in her life which spared her no time for Jack etc, she had her own shit to deal with.
Paragraph 3: Rosemary's compassion and love towards Jack somewhat blinded her to the boy he was, and as a result he got away with countless deeds and acts of delinquency. ( she couldn't raise her voice at him etc) + talked about the role reversal between Jack and Rosemary
Paragraph 4: Essentially just challenged the prompt by saying although it may seem that Rosemary is displaying bad motherly characteristics, she acts as a moral compass to guide Jack subconsciously and is a source of inspiration etc. ( saying we cant judge Rosemary, as Wolff praises her throughout)
Conclusion: Rosemary at the tip of the iceberg Rosemary displays the characteristics of a bad mother, yet Wolff attempts to display that we shouldn't base assumptions on individuals etc etc.
Interesting how we went on pretty separate tangents, just shows how we both interpreted the topic and the pretty shit novel differently haha.
Nice! My first paragraph ('she has her own shit to deal with') also included a lot of gender roles and oppression. Sounds like we went on the same tangents for paragraphs 1 and 2 (which reassures me, because I trust in your abilities a lot more than mine hahaha). I really like your third paragraph, it's deals with the prompt very closely, which was something I was missing in my tangential discussions. And I like how you challenge the prompt as well - I think you'll score well! Although I have to admit that your elaborate essay scares me when I look at my own shitty 600-700 word one :')
Same, i looked at the other TBL prompt and nearly cried. I had to go with the Rosemary. It was okay.. that word 'unable' It kinda helped. But yeah i went on a tangents too.
The first prompt was badly written; I feel as if they didn't spend much time thinking about the prompts they wrote. Characters in the memoir never really betray him, the only one I can think of off the top of my head is his biological father. Even when Dwight sells Toby's Winchester, we aren't surprised, because of his consistent nastiness. So it's not really much of a betrayal.
And I feel the same way - it was okay - mediocre, which is a real shame, because I had some really original ideas about TBL which I was unable to express to address the prompt
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Nice! My first paragraph ('she has her own shit to deal with') also included a lot of gender roles and oppression. Sounds like we went on the same tangents for paragraphs 1 and 2 (which reassures me, because I trust in your abilities a lot more than mine hahaha). I really like your third paragraph, it's deals with the prompt very closely, which was something I was missing in my tangential discussions. And I like how you challenge the prompt as well - I think you'll score well! Although I have to admit that your elaborate essay scares me when I look at my own shitty 600-700 word one :')
The first prompt was badly written; I feel as if they didn't spend much time thinking about the prompts they wrote. Characters in the memoir never really betray him, the only one I can think of off the top of my head is his biological father. Even when Dwight sells Toby's Winchester, we aren't surprised, because of his consistent nastiness. So it's not really much of a betrayal.
And I feel the same way - it was okay - mediocre, which is a real shame, because I had some really original ideas about TBL which I was unable to express to address the prompt
You're concise expressive vocabulary will surpass my amateur ideas don't you worry haha
Im just praying that the VCAA assessors mark lenient on us
We'll be fine don't worry. Nek minit gets 25 in english and 50 lit hahaha
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Medea's first topic was fantastic, you could almost hear a huge sigh of relief in our exam hall because it was basically the interpretation we were taught at school.
My contention was bascially that Euripides is highlighting the dangers of extremity in an attempt to temper the Athenians desire for war.
Para 1: Medeas hamartia - dangers of excessive passion
Para 2: the hedonistic motivations of Jason and Medea - dangers of extreme ambition
Para 3: the sophistry employed by the main characters - dangers of extreme and emotional language (which Euripides argues has gripped Athens)
Pretty happy with it and I wrote 6 pages, so I'm hoping for an 8 or maybe even a 9 if I'm very lucky. By far the best piece I wrote on the exam, let's not talk about language analysis lol.
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Medea's first topic was fantastic, you could almost hear a huge sigh of relief in our exam hall because it was basically the interpretation we were taught at school.
My contention was bascially that Euripides is highlighting the dangers of extremity in an attempt to temper the Athenians desire for war.
Para 1: Medeas hamartia - dangers of excessive passion
Para 2: the hedonistic motivations of Jason and Medea - dangers of extreme ambition
Para 3: the sophistry employed by the main characters - dangers of extreme and emotional language (which Euripides argues has gripped Athens)
Pretty happy with it and I wrote 6 pages, so I'm hoping for an 8 or maybe even a 9 if I'm very lucky. By far the best piece I wrote on the exam, let's not talk about language analysis lol.
glad it went well for you :)
i did something like
para 1: excessive passion
para 2: excessive logic
para 3: the necessity of moderation between the two
i felt like LA was my strongest and text response my weakest haha...i think i can scrape an 8 too, though i wrote way less than you. like 4 and 1/2 pages.
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HENRY IV Topics?? wow you guys are lucky as hell! :)
Can't believe VCAA
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glad it went well for you :)
i did something like
para 1: excessive passion
para 2: excessive logic
para 3: the necessity of moderation between the two
i felt like LA was my strongest and text response my weakest haha...i think i can scrape an 8 too, though i wrote way less than you. like 4 and 1/2 pages.
Yeah i wrote something similar :)
Para 1: Medea's violent feminism doesn't do her any favours
Para 2: Neither do Medea's killings
Para 3: but she balances herself by the end so it's all good
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HENRY IV Topics?? wow you guys are lucky as hell! :)
Can't believe VCAA
leadership one was a gift, out of curiosity how would you have responded to this?
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I did the first Stasiland one
Only wrote 3 paragraphs, but it would have been approx. 850 words so hopefully that's fine
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Yeah i wrote something similar :)
Para 1: Medea's violent feminism doesn't do her any favours
Para 2: Neither do Medea's killings
Para 3: but she balances herself by the end so it's all good
that sounds solid! how did you find the overall exam?? I feel like i really should have gone for the second topic. like, i would have had a lot more that was original to say, but tbh i'm glad that the medea topics weren't awful awful. i was preparing for something on manipulation, or oaths, or exile, or sense of place or heroism. the old excess emotion caught me off guard but that's ok. i feel like it could have gone much better, but also so much worse.
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that sounds solid! how did you find the overall exam?? I feel like i really should have gone for the second topic. like, i would have had a lot more that was original to say, but tbh i'm glad that the medea topics weren't awful awful. i was preparing for something on manipulation, or oaths, or exile, or sense of place or heroism. the old excess emotion caught me off guard but that's ok. i feel like it could have gone much better, but also so much worse.
Really?
I found the first Medea topic to be the most obvious interpretation of the text.
Maybe it's just due to whatever your school teaches you.
Anyway, looking at your lit score I'm sure you smashed it.
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that sounds solid! how did you find the overall exam?? I feel like i really should have gone for the second topic. like, i would have had a lot more that was original to say, but tbh i'm glad that the medea topics weren't awful awful. i was preparing for something on manipulation, or oaths, or exile, or sense of place or heroism. the old excess emotion caught me off guard but that's ok. i feel like it could have gone much better, but also so much worse.
I found the exam good, apart from Section C, but I guess I fudged a decent amount in there :P
My text response and context were essentially memorised word for word since the topics fit some previous essays exactly, my only concern is that I did the entire exam sleep deprived so I woke up this morning, and was like whaaa, what did I even write yesterday. When I checked it over in the exam it read nicely, so hopefully its just irrational nerves, but the last time I wrote something sleep deprived I made a fool of myself so :P
Don't worry about it though bro. With a 46 in lit the expression of your writing is bound to be top and you can defs make up for an alright interpretation with flair as long as its backed up with quotes :)
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Did anyone do else "the white tiger". Would it be easier to write a good essay on a books first year in the exam (less time the book has been studied) or makes no difference?