ATAR Notes: Forum
HSC Stuff => HSC English Stuff => HSC Subjects + Help => Area of Study (Old Syllabus) => Topic started by: elysepopplewell on July 31, 2017, 10:00:56 am
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You've started! The ball is rolling on the trial exams. Congratulations on making it through the first exam!
If you were doing the Catholic Secondary Schools Association paper: tell us about it!
What did you think of the unseen texts? The creative? The essay? What was most difficult, or what fell riiiiight into place for you?
If you didn't do the CSSA paper but have finished your Trial Paper One - please tell us about your paper as well!
Papers were required to be held until today (Thursday 17th) so we can now chat about the questions and the approaches we took. However, please do not share copies of the exam or anything similar!
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I walked in confident. I walked out in absolute shambles.
My analysis for part 1 was dodgy, I failed to appropriate the stimulus effectively for my story in part 2 and because I was so anxious and so fearful of the essay question, I took the most convoluted and insanely moronic stance for the essay in part 3, one that it seemed no one else took :-\
I'm so demotivated, I just don't feel like studying for the Modules tomorrow. Everyone seemed to do so well today and english advanced is my worst ranking subject and so I devoted so much time to it, sacrificing other subjects and it seems that it failed to pay off.
Adieu HSC.
What stance did you take on the essay?
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What stance did you take on the essay?
I'll PM you the thesis in light of what's noted.
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I'll PM you the thesis in light of what's noted.
Ok cool i'll do same
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I walked in confident. I walked out in absolute shambles.
My analysis for part 1 was dodgy, I failed to appropriate the stimulus effectively for my story in part 2 and because I was so anxious and so fearful of the essay question, I took the most convoluted and insanely moronic stance for the essay in part 3, one that it seemed no one else took :-\
I'm so demotivated, I just don't feel like studying for the Modules tomorrow. Everyone seemed to do so well today and english advanced is my worst ranking subject and so I devoted so much time to it, sacrificing other subjects and it seems that it failed to pay off.
Adieu HSC.
Take a proper break, and do your best to forget about it.
This is normal in the HSC and isn't something to be ashamed of either. What's important is how you control these things. No point thinking about it now that it's over, but to be fair that's not a mindset that can be easily developed straight out of an exam. So take some time to relax and then forget about it until you get the paper back.
(I could not have been more disappointed with my paper 2 at the time, but I pulled through in the long run.)
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I walked in confident. I walked out in absolute shambles.
My analysis for part 1 was dodgy, I failed to appropriate the stimulus effectively for my story in part 2 and because I was so anxious and so fearful of the essay question, I took the most convoluted and insanely moronic stance for the essay in part 3, one that it seemed no one else took :-\
I'm so demotivated, I just don't feel like studying for the Modules tomorrow. Everyone seemed to do so well today and english advanced is my worst ranking subject and so I devoted so much time to it, sacrificing other subjects and it seems that it failed to pay off.
Adieu HSC.
We've all been there, demotivated after an exam. YOu can't change the past, nor should you stay stuck in it.
Go for a run or kick the ball for an hour or two (alternatively, relay for a day) and then get back into it =). Exercise is great for getting into something that takes your mind off.
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The creative worked well with my story which was really good! unfortunately my essay was seriously weak..... :'( :'( and I don't think I did at all well with the short answer either :'( :'(
I thought the unseen texts were pretty good though, very interesting but I did struggle a bit to find techniques...maybe this was just me?
Also, the creative questions was very specific i thought, so would have been hard to adapt to for some people....?
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The short answer I think the tiger tooth one was the weirdest but hopefully it wasn't that bad overall.
Creative I got lucky I had one of the hard parts of the question but not sure if I had the type of discovery they wanted.
Essay was broad and they tried to trick us with some words, forgot some of my topic sentences and analysis since I crammed it but managed to finish it all in time.
Pretty hard paper, scared for paper 2 now but I like paper 2 better.
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I thought that the Unseen questions were a bit harder to do, for me at least. Nothing really jumped out of the texts to answer the questions with for me :(
I didn't walk in with a set creative, and I feel like I did okay for it. Hopefully better than last time. But it was more specific that we usually get (idk about other schools tho) and some of my friends think that they sacrificed too much in adapting their writing to the question. I did a plan tho, shout out to Emily for being awesome on the forum last night!
The essay question I LOVED! Didn't finish writing it, but if I saw that in the HSC I would have wept for joy man. Don't feel too flash about not finishing it, but I think that I did a better job at analysing Robert Gray's poems than I did last time.
Overall I would say that it was an okay paper, but the Unseen was kinda a blow for me :/
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I thought that the Unseen questions were a bit harder to do, for me at least.
I definitely agree with you on this!!!
particularly the third text, extract about the water etc.??? hardly knew what was going on, let alone trying to talk about the discovery!! eek! :o
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I was literally able to write my creative almost word for word. I thought the essay question was a little obscure and my introduction wasn't great. I got to understand it a little more while I was writing but I think my poor thesis will be a detriment to my mark. I struggled to interpret text three in the unseen but other than that I'm hoping to not drop many more marks for that section. Overall, I'm fairly happy but still have a lot of work to do for paper two.
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As I PM'ed you Elyse I thought it was a really good practice for me in terms of adapting to the question for both the creative and the essay. The essay was harder to adapt to as the question didn't match my two poems I prepared but I was really proud of the thesis I came up with... it was VERY complex but the beauty is no one would have done it in the whole form so I'll either sink or swim there. The unseen texts were alright, the last one was a bit confusing but overall the main message of each was easy enough to understand. Loved the first stimulus though, captured exactly how most students would have felt attempting the exam haha!
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i have never felt so motivated to study in my life after that exam. it was probably the worst and i'm not proud AT ALL with what i wrote. the creative was weirdly specific. the whole time i was thinking that paper 2 is going to be better. going to have a bit of a break, have a nap then come back ready to study again! good luck for tomorrow everyone!
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Texts 3 and 4, I found were actually quite interesting and nice for the questions. I agree, the first time I read through text 3, I was so confused. Second reading though made sense. Creative writing was 100% not for my planned story, but I just implemented a book (I hope that is fine??)
Then the essay, it completely threw me off, and due to time already running out, I honestly don't think I wrote a proper essay. I was hoping for 80%, feel like I dropped to a 60. My severe abdomen cramps didn't help either.
Oh well, I've got tomorrow to lose aswell :)
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The unseen texts were really difficult to analyse. They were confusing (especially text 3), and I struggled to find techniques.
Upon first glance, I dreaded the creative piece, but in the end I was able to write my prepared story almost word for word. It more or less fit the question, so I just changed some smaller elements to make sure I addressed the question.
The essay question wasn't too bad; again, I changed some elements around to adapt to the question, but it was otherwise alright. I basically used the ideas I prepared, so that was good.
Overall, the unseen was probably the worst section. I hope I was able to fit my responses to the question, at least, I think I did.
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It's only two years into discovery, but we really haven't seen this angle on an essay question for AOS in it's recent history. I do think that when you stripped it away, you had a lot of freedom to follow through with the essays you've practiced or planned, you just had to adjust the wording to bring the aspects of the composer's intentions and the text's reception to the forefront. I can definitely see how that would throw people in an exam, it's not a typical essay question pattern. But, what it was actually asking was not unreasonable.
As for the creative - I can imagine that some people would have really struggled to work with this, I know with my creative I would have had to take a quite unique approach to answering what it wanted. But nonetheless, I think this is a good exercise for adjusting the agility of your stories in prep for HSC!
I haven't yet seen the unseen texts - but the consensus seems to be it was tricky!
If you're done with Paper One: Grab something nice and greasy wholesome for lunch, and get back on the horse for tomorrow. Paper One is done - if you bombed out, you can resurrect your English mark tomorrow. Proactivity is key to exams in succession.
I'll be here to keep talking about the exam, so vent all you like!
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That was sooo badddd. Wasted so much time panicking and didn't get to do it well at all. Why do they want us to suffer?
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I panicked a lot at the beginning so I had trouble with section one :P and when I looked at the essay I was like what???? Hahah but when I got to it it was actually ok and I'm glad I finished the paper :) not sure if I twisted my creative enough but fingers crossed it was enough!
Was really tough though!
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Elyse, would you be able to give me some last minute tips on studying for the close study module? (we're doing Merchant of Venice)
They can pretty much ask about any aspect of the play, and I'm just wondering how i'm supposed to come up with a thesis, and how to structure the essay...?
Thank you :) and thanks for this chat, so cool to hear how others went, esp coming from a very small school :)
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Has anyone done Judith Wright for MOd C?
I'm stressing out trying to find a good related text.
Does anyone know any good pictures to use as RTs?
Oh and that PAPER 1 was so full of bs
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Yes omg the text 3 for section 1 was Soo confusing in my first go (gotta admit I wasn't even 100% sure what they meant when reading it for the 2nd time...)
The creative was also very specific imo, had to introduce a completely different story at the end of my creative to fit the stimulus in
The essay question was also unique, had trouble adapting the essay and I don't think I made it concise either, so it seems like I just threw in random words from the question
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I personally thought that the stimulus for the creative was a bit odd. It was a bit hard to manipulate my creative to that stimulus. And the unseen texts were a bit hard to analyse, especially text three. I didn't like the essay question at all. Don't think I answered the question properly :'(
good luck everyone for paper two though!!!
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idek if my school bought the paper or not but the unseen was pretty shit
the creative however was amazing
Elyse do u remember reading my creative, it was about the journalist whos out to find a story but ends up findign her dead brother
so the stimulus perfectly fitted my piece im so happy ahahha
seeing all your posts i dont think my school bought the cssa paper actually
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Unseen was not too bad. But the questions for the Discovery essay, especially the Creative question tripped me hard and I wasn't able to finish. I guess memorising essays was a bad idea... lol
oh well :PPP
btw, Elyse, if you wanted a general idea on the unseen texts used in the trials, i am happy to pm!
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Unseen was not too bad. But the questions for the Discovery essay, especially the Creative question tripped me hard and I wasn't able to finish. I guess memorising essays was a bad idea... lol
oh well :PPP
btw, Elyse, if you wanted a general idea on the unseen texts used in the trials, i am happy to pm!
If you have the time to PM me, would love to hear about it!!
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Short Answer gave me nightmares, Creative proper mugged me off (I mean where tf were the options for different stimuli) although I was most confident with the essay. But once again, this exam re-affirmed the hatred I hold toward CSSA exams......now Wishing upon that Notre Dame Early Entry Thooooooooo hahahahaha
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My time constraints worked out amazingly, i went in seemingly optimisitc trying to get 50 minutes for my AOS essay, the unseen texts although not amazing, were doable in 40 minutes easily. (Although i had a bit of a laught to myself that i thought one of the main persona's was a dolphin in one of the unseen texts before he just turned out to be a ..... regular human. I completely went in with a creative that was easily molded, but set for either a map , tree , globe , or sprout picture as they come up quite frequently. I did not even put thought into the fact that it couldve been a specific sentence stimulus (Not to directly highlight what it was, but i had to re write my creative from a different perspective, which wasn't a deal breaker however it wasn't ideal either). Smashed out a creative in 30 minutes which i was more than happy with to spare a bit of extra time to perfect my AoS Essay !!!
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If we don't do well in the trials at all but have done really well in other assessments is there still a likelihood of getting a good atar? Like i'm pretty sure I was ranked first in Standard until today and I need an 80 Atar to get into the course I want to do... averaging 88ish% in most of my assessments for english but really stuffed up the exam...
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I understand all that. I just really don't the culmination of my high schooling to end because I got nervous and anxious and didn't do as well in this examination block.
Thanks for the words of advice.
You've got another 2.5 months until the culmination of your high schooling - This is a practice run. A trial run, if you will - Seriously not worth stressing about these things at all because everyone goes better in the HSC ;D
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(Although i had a bit of a laught to myself that i thought one of the main persona's was a dolphin in one of the unseen texts before he just turned out to be a ..... regular human.
I laughed out loud when I read this hahahaha, the best thing ever.
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I laughed out loud when I read this hahahaha, the best thing ever.
Hey Elyse, I PM'd you a question so that I wouldn't give away the creative stimulus. Thx!
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Personally, I think Part 1 had good first two questions, but annoying last three questions. Part 2 was annoying cause my creative didn't fit, and Part 3 was alright. Overall I'm a bit worried but I should do better in Paper 2 and the HSC. *fingers crossed*
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Short Answer gave me nightmares, Creative proper mugged me off (I mean where tf were the options for different stimuli) although I was most confident with the essay. But once again, this exam re-affirmed the hatred I hold toward CSSA exams......now Wishing upon that Notre Dame Early Entry Thooooooooo hahahahaha
I feel you so much m8.
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i remembered that text 3 was made into a tv show a while ago about a boy trying to get into the olympics! so i was lucky i knew that, it made it a lot easier to understand.
i spent lots of time practicing a good creative only to not have it fit the question at all... so i had to use one from ages ago and i just rambled for pages it was awful. anyone else doing Yeats tomorrow?
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I felt fairly confident adapting to the Essay question. While it was something I've never seen I felt that it was fairly straight forward and free.
Creative is where I panicked. The question was rather obscure and definitely something I would never have predicted. Hopefully I was able to adapt my creative well enough. I had extremely high hopes for my creative as I got full marks last time but I feel that this question really threw me and the entire school off.
Short answer was a bit weird. Didn't like Text 4 and 3 much but used them anyway for the 5 marker.
Is anyone able to specifically PM me the Creative Question? I want to break it down myself and adapt my creative to it again.
Cheers, Wales
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i remembered that text 3 was made into a tv show a while ago about a boy trying to get into the olympics! so i was lucky i knew that, it made it a lot easier to understand.
i spent lots of time practicing a good creative only to not have it fit the question at all... so i had to use one from ages ago and i just rambled for pages it was awful. anyone else doing Yeats tomorrow?
Unlucky man. I could feel the tension in the room and heard a string of profanity emerge when people saw the creative question.
I'm doing Yeats tomorrow too. I really do hope they don't specify a poem for us to do. I would be screwed ): Goodluck!
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i remembered that text 3 was made into a tv show a while ago about a boy trying to get into the olympics! so i was lucky i knew that, it made it a lot easier to understand.
i spent lots of time practicing a good creative only to not have it fit the question at all... so i had to use one from ages ago and i just rambled for pages it was awful. anyone else doing Yeats tomorrow?
Yeah I think I understood text 3 only because I had read the book
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i remembered that text 3 was made into a tv show a while ago about a boy trying to get into the olympics! so i was lucky i knew that, it made it a lot easier to understand.
I recognised it, probably would have helped if I had read the book or seen the show but still didn't make that much sense to me.
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thankfully one of my prepared creative writings fit perfectly so that was straightforward, but the essay really stumped me?! would love to know what kind of direction they were asking of us...the only direction I took was the way out of the exam room :(
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The creative and essay weren't too bad but section 1 really stuffed me up! I spent ages trying to figure out Unseen Text 2 and for a minute, I doubted my capabilities in the English language. IT was like text 2 had no connection to discovery and to attempt to do so would be quite a stretch. Our Standard English teacher was telling us later on that even he had questioned the authenticity of the second text. To be honest, it felt like they were trying to get us to waffle on and on especially with the first and third text. Paper 1 was supposed to be an easy entry into trials but instead it's confused me even more.
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The creative and essay weren't too bad but section 1 really stuffed me up! I spent ages trying to figure out Unseen Text 2 and for a minute, I doubted my capabilities in the English language. IT was like text 2 had no connection to discovery and to attempt to do so would be quite a stretch. Our Standard English teacher was telling us later on that even he had questioned the authenticity of the second text. To be honest, it felt like they were trying to get us to waffle on and on especially with the first and third text. Paper 1 was supposed to be an easy entry into trials but instead it's confused me even more.
Hey Kaya! Glad to hear the majority of the paper went well for you! :)
Welcome to the forums - if you need any help please let us know :)
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wow!! seriously can't believe that everyone was in the same boat today! that paper sucked...and paper 2 is meant to be even more challenging...all the best with it everyone!! i'm sure a bad day today can make us do even better! :D
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Didnt do cssa but I still had paper 1 today. Did it start absolutely bucketing down during the exam where anyone else sat it though? The noise was so loud I could hardly hear myself think, and it was pretty debilitating because I'd been holding in the need to pee since I entered the exam hall and the rain just made me conscious of it >:(
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Didnt do cssa but I still had paper 1 today. Did it start absolutely bucketing down during the exam where anyone else sat it though? The noise was so loud I could hardly hear myself think, and it was pretty debilitating because I'd been holding in the need to pee since I entered the exam hall and the rain just made me conscious of it >:(
Nope it was not raining thankfully
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Didnt do cssa but I still had paper 1 today. Did it start absolutely bucketing down during the exam where anyone else sat it though? The noise was so loud I could hardly hear myself think, and it was pretty debilitating because I'd been holding in the need to pee since I entered the exam hall and the rain just made me conscious of it >:(
Pathetic fallacy!
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Didnt do cssa but I still had paper 1 today. Did it start absolutely bucketing down during the exam where anyone else sat it though? The noise was so loud I could hardly hear myself think, and it was pretty debilitating because I'd been holding in the need to pee since I entered the exam hall and the rain just made me conscious of it >:(
Oh my gosh!!! This was me too!!! And it was the worst when I was doing unseen texts and I couldn't focus at all on what the text was saying (and my school picked weird texts!)
It was good though because halfway through my creative i remembered i forgot to mention the rain in my creative...so i guess it helped in that regard!
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Just got my results from paper one and I'm not very happy. For the essay and creative, I got 13 which I was happy about but I got mediocre comments at best: 'a perceptive and sensitive response' and 'a very creative idea' respectively. Then in the reading section, I got 6, from 15 in task 1 to 6 in trials. I actually thought my analysis was better in trials. That's not me trying to be ostentatious, I was still expecting 11-12 because our first task was marked extremely kind. I was talking to other people and most thought the marking was appalling and completely inconsistent. I'll give you an example of my comments for one of the questions out of 3... '1'. Like cheers marker, really helpful. Other said they got 4/15 in the creative writing for task 1 and got 14/15 in trials for the same narrative. It's honestly infuriating as we had to do task 1 twice as people knew the questions beforehand and I got 12/15 for reading without finishing and only dropped marks on the one I didn't finish. I get better feedback from the AN community who do it for free than I do from external markers getting paid $80/h. Anyway, that's my rant, hopefully everyone else had better markers and in turn got reasonable marks.
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Just got my results from paper one and I'm not very happy. For the essay and creative, I got 13 which I was happy about but I got mediocre comments at best: 'a perceptive and sensitive response' and 'a very creative idea' respectively. Then in the reading section, I got 6, from 15 in task 1 to 6 in trials. I actually thought my analysis was better in trials. That's not me trying to be ostentatious, I was still expecting 11-12 because our first task was marked extremely kind. I was talking to other people and most thought the marking was appalling and completely inconsistent. I'll give you an example of my comments for one of the questions out of 3... '1'. Like cheers marker, really helpful. Other said they got 4/15 in the creative writing for task 1 and got 14/15 in trials for the same narrative. It's honestly infuriating as we had to do task 1 twice as people knew the questions beforehand and I got 12/15 for reading without finishing and only dropped marks on the one I didn't finish. I get better feedback from the AN community who do it for free than I do from external markers getting paid $80/h. Anyway, that's my rant, hopefully everyone else had better markers and in turn got reasonable marks.
Aww jeez, I'm so sorry friend, sounds like you really got dealt the short straw :( definitely don't view your expectations as unrealistic or unfounded, and that is a ridiculous drop to get without justification! I'd be chasing the marker and demanding some more specific feedback - It doesn't have to be an antagonistic exchange, you need to know what happened so you don't do it again! :)
Stories like this are why Elyse, Susie and I (and others) do the essay marking, because good feedback should be there for everyone when they need it - We'll always be here if you need us! :)
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Aww jeez, I'm so sorry friend, sounds like you really got dealt the short straw :( definitely don't view your expectations as unrealistic or unfounded, and that is a ridiculous drop to get without justification! I'd be chasing the marker and demanding some more specific feedback - It doesn't have to be an antagonistic exchange, you need to know what happened so you don't do it again! :)
Stories like this are why Elyse, Susie and I (and others) do the essay marking, because good feedback should be there for everyone when they need it - We'll always be here if you need us! :)
Yeah, I'm definitely going to chase it up. Lost more marks in the reading section than I did for the other five sections of the two papers. I'm extremely happy with 90/105 but for 9 of those marks to come from one section seems a bit dubious.
Your feedback (even though it wasn't directly for me) was a major reason I got the marks I did. It wasn't until I joined AN that I fully understood how to write an English essay i.e without retell/concept focused/impact on responder etc. So thanks a lot for being so helpful and genuinely being the best community. I often wonder about the marks I could get if I had people like you, Elyse, Rui teaching me my respective subjects. You guys are the best!
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Your feedback (even though it wasn't directly for me) was a major reason I got the marks I did. It wasn't until I joined AN that I fully understood how to write an English essay i.e without retell/concept focused/impact on responder etc. So thanks a lot for being so helpful and genuinely being the best community. I often wonder about the marks I could get if I had people like you, Elyse, Rui teaching me my respective subjects. You guys are the best!
Aww, so glad we could be helpful! You 100% earned those marks, congrats on working hard and achieving such a great result (and fingers crossed you can chase a few more marks ;D)!
Maybe we should open a school? ;)
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40/45 for paper 1 with 15/15 short answer, 13/15 creative and 12/15 discovery essay. Essay they said like my paragraphs need to be structured more coherently and answer the question more (thought I did...) so not sure what this means. Paper 2 got 50/60 so pretty happy overall but mod A dropped from 19 to 15 in one trial with the same content written so it just shows how subjective english is with marking...
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What I thought was my strongest module turned out to be my weakest and my weakest was my highest mark :\
Rather disappointed with my marks for Eng overall but hopefully HSC is better!
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40/45 for paper 1 with 15/15 short answer, 13/15 creative and 12/15 discovery essay. Essay they said like my paragraphs need to be structured more coherently and answer the question more (thought I did...) so not sure what this means. Paper 2 got 50/60 so pretty happy overall but mod A dropped from 19 to 15 in one trial with the same content written so it just shows how subjective english is with marking...
bet you don't know the difference between apples and old men
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heyy!
does anyone have the essay question from CSSA paper 1 trial?
i can't find it anywhere and can't remember it :(
tku!
ATB ;)
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heyy!
does anyone have the essay question from CSSA paper 1 trial?
i can't find it anywhere and can't remember it :(
tku!
ATB ;)
I have a hard copy but I can't put it up cos copyright issues sorry
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heyy!
does anyone have the essay question from CSSA paper 1 trial?
i can't find it anywhere and can't remember it :(
tku!
ATB ;)
In general, ALL CSSA papers are copyrighted, as are some other companies (e.g. Independents). Please do not request these papers in the future as we will not tolerate the distribution of copyrighted materials.
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In general, ALL CSSA papers are copyrighted, as are some other companies (e.g. Independents). Please do not request these papers in the future as we will not tolerate the distribution of copyrighted materials.
hokeypokes NP :D
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heyy!
does anyone have the essay question from CSSA paper 1 trial?
i can't find it anywhere and can't remember it :(
tku!
ATB ;)
Off memory the question was (something like): Discoveries are made more memorable by the ways that composers represent them in their text.