Hi everyone! How are you! I hope you had a good start to exams today, or if you don't do English, Goodluck! :)
I wrote this two weeks ago and didn't post it, but here are my belated thoughts on my Jap oral:
I had my oral for Japanese (today), and I am really happy with it! – (two weeks ago). Almost all of the questions that they asked were ones that I had practiced the answer to! There were a few false starts, some pauses and some weird improvised answers to the few unexpected questions, but ultimately, good!!
Also, I was very nervous, but not as nervous as I know I can get. Yes, my face was trembling a bit at the start, but it went away. My heart was beating super fast the whole time, but not as fast as it could get! The assessors were both super nice, and laughed a couple of times when I attempted to say something funny, so that was nice! I also remembered to smile, which was something I struggled with in the practices. It went so much better than the mock oral!! Apparently, smiling and stuff rather than looking like you would rather not be there, can make around a 10% difference to your marks, so it’s pretty important.
Spoiler
My advice on dealing with nerves!
It may not work for everyone, but it works (to an extent) for me. Deny any nerves, don’t say you’re nervous, act very chill, don’t scrunch up your body language as if you are nervous, tell yourself and others you are excited, don’t tell people that you are scared, focus on the positive adjectives such as confident, relaxed, excited. I know these things are probably not true, but you can trick your brain into believing they are.
Deep breaths.
Yoga! I did some morning yoga that was very good in helping wake me up and be a bit more calm.
Freestyle dancing. Probably not for everyone, but very fun to release some nervous energy.
Avoid others beforehand.
Spoiler
fun excerpt
Examiner: What's your opinion on this?
Me:
Examiner:
Me:... it good
I have been going to school to study everyday in the silent study area, which is a good thing for me, because I find it hard to make myself study when I am at home. However, yesterday, the day dragged on, and I started getting bored, I reread both my texts though (Black Diggers and The Longest Memory) and also went on walks with my friends, which was nice. My brain was attempting to find the tiniest ways to procrastinate. I had forgotten to put on deodorant, so my brain decided that I could walk to the shops and buy some deodorant, which would use up some time, so my friend and I walked there and back. It was such a nice temperature yesterday with the wind and the warmth. I also kept drinking a lot of water so I had an excuse to get up from my seat and go to the bathroom every so often. I have had clarinet choir practices at lunchtime too, so they are fun. I never really appreciated them that much, but now that school is over for year twelves I feel like every clarinet rehearsal is an extra thing I can enjoy before I leave the school. One of the year 8s asked me why I was still at school, and thought I was in Uni now haha.
So… the English Exam! I’m so relieved English is over!!! It went really good though!! I started nervous crazy smiling when I first flicked though to look at the prompts! The prompt for section A (Rear Window) was basically word for word the prompt to the practice exam I wrote on Sunday! I am so grateful to my teacher because she had said she had a feeling that the topic would come up on the exam and it did! Also for section B, the topics was really good, I had written a couple of essays on change, and it was my best topic I think! The analysing argument section is always my best section, but I felt like since the article was so bland, I didn’t particularly write anything particularly significant that sounded good. I spent like 50 mins on the first article though, and then went over the hour with my hand buzzing furiously trying to finish, I forgot the image in the second article though oops. I guess it’s no use aiming for a study score now, but I’m hoping for 38 or 39. A 40 would be super cool, but I’m not sure it’s possible.
I actually have the best exam timetable! I have methods next week then the week after chem and physics, then the week after Jap. My methods teacher saw my timetable and was like, well you’d better get 40s in everything then, because you have week gaps in between. One of my friends will have finished her exams by next Thursday, but she has two days with two exams!
Hey Owlbird! How's life post-VCE? What are your plans for 2020?
Hi eemmaa! Thanks for your post!! ;D
I'm doing a bachelor of psychology as Monash uni this year!
It has been a long time!
I was going to post and then I have been lazy!
It feels too late to describe my feelings about my scores, so I’ll do it really briefly!
Spoiler
Methods: 37 A bit higher than I expected after feeling horrible about the exams.
English: 41 Yay! Around what I expected and I was really happy!
Physics: 41 A bit lower than I expected considering the exam seemed so easy. I lost 23 marks according to the statement of marks, which was a lot more than I thought lol.
Chemistry: 42 I was very amazed. How did I do better on chem than physics! Chem was so hard! I expected in the thirties. I lost 26.5 marks on the exam.
Japanese: 43 Yayayay! I was proud! I did better than any practice exam.
Atar: 98.2 Much higher than I expected! I was very surprised!
UNI THOUGHTS!!!
Wooo! So exciting!
I’m nervous though about making friends and meeting new people.
I’m so excited about the o week activities. I was looking through them all, and I want to go to everything, but there are some time clashes haha. I should be trying to make new friends and be social, but I don’t feel comfortable going to major activities that my friends aren’t going to. I’m normally (slightly) less nervous about doing things by myself, maybe once I’ve been to a couple of things I’ll start feeling less nervous to be social.
I had been originally thinking of doing a bachelor of science, but then the night before preferences closed I freaked out and thought ‘what am I doing with my life?!!’ and I changed to physio, but then the next day, I changed to a Bachelor of Psychology, and stayed with that. I’m excited to do psychology! Even though I didn’t study it in VCE, it’s an interesting topic, so hopefully I will enjoy it, because I do like reading articles and researching psych stuff. The main reason I changed was because I had no end goal for science and I was worried I’d graduate with no job. I feel more comfortable knowing I have something to aim for now. It’s 6 years altogether to become a psychologist.
I’m really happy with my decision of Monash uni, (I mean I haven’t studied there yet, but I do feel content with the vibe of everything so far).
I still haven’t found a part time job ahhhh. I feel un-independent and dependent, and lazy. I’ve handed in many resumes at my local shops and applied online for all the big companies. I only got one opportunity for a phone interview, but I was rejected. Another of my friends is feeling the same as me, I feel bad for her, since she’s been looking for a job much longer than I have. I’ll keep trying and applying, so hopefully before uni starts I can find somewhere.
It’s cool that we have so long for holidays! I haven’t done a large amount of the productive stuff I planned on doing these holidays yet.
I keep switching between ‘ahhh I want uni to start right now, why is it still a month away’ and ‘ahhhh my holidays are depleting and I’ve done nothing productive, uni is coming too so soon’.
Goodluck guys with starting off the year!!
;D ;D ;D