ATAR Notes: Forum
VCE Stuff => Victorian Education Discussion => Topic started by: xXNovaxX on August 30, 2009, 12:09:57 am
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http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/story/0,21985,26000159-661,00.html
We all had a feeling it was coming
1= ENTER changing to ATAR (what a crumby name....ENTER is much better, because it is the "ENETR, you need to "enter" Uni etc LOl)
2= National Curriculum to be implemented for years Prep to 10
3=now years 11/12
What do you's think? I think it has its merits, because i don't think many if any places around the world have different education systems in EACH STATE, although thats probably because we are a large continent/country
But what has me go "urgh" even though we would have finished VCE is that as "unfair" as some people claim it is etc....now we have the whole COUNTRY to compete with (i think).
And now subjects are probably going to change...the subjects we have always liked will be changed. For example in NSW they have MORE types of English, i think its called English advance?
And for economics they have to write an ESSAY in the exam, and a lot of their questions are a lot more math's based. And even though i did methods and spesh (for half a year), I wouldn't want economic to become "mathsy"....i like it the way it is.
I bet the whole curriculum will probably be in favour/based on current NSW one since it has the larger population.
I don't know just my thoughts, and my questions which i still need answered. I guess it has its cons and pro's
Thoughts? comments?
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Interesting, we'll probably get eaten by BoS if this happens :(
Oh well :P
In terms of bettering education, I'd say it will likely be a fairer system, but making a system much bigger (I.E. expanding each individual state system into a national one) will probably see a lot more cracks and holes in said system emerge. I wonder just how unfair this will be on the little guy. Still, I await further details before passing any real judgment.
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quick. get on www.acenotes.com
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Good news for the Victorians, we're the smartest of the lot after all :P
(a bit late for us '09-'11ers though. dang.)
Interesting, we'll probably get eaten by BoS if this happens :(
This doesn't have to be the end for vcenotes. In such a large area as Australia there will inevitably be cultural differences between states, and perhaps vcenotes could cater for the state of Victoria.
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quick. get on www.acenotes.com
It's described as "Australian School Certificate"... shouldn't you be after "ascnotes.com"?
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http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/story/0,21985,26000159-661,00.html
But what has me go "urgh" even though we would have finished VCE is that as "unfair" as some people claim it is etc....now we have the whole COUNTRY to compete with (i think).
how does that make in unfair? I've seen this brought up a few times but I don't see what 'COMPETING WITH THE REST OF THE COUNTRY' has to do with anything?? would you rather that your enter score was dependent only on your ranking within your class? that way you are 'only' competing with ~20 other people. I know if that were the case I'd have an ENTER of about 50.
The only way that widening the pool would be detrimental to you is if people in other states were significantly smarter than us, which I'm sure they're not.
And now subjects are probably going to change...the subjects we have always liked will be changed. For example in NSW they have MORE types of English, i think its called English advance?
how can having more choices be bad?
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I was saying even though people say the CURRENT system is unfair....i was having an open mind to the NEW system.
I'm not saying having more choice is bad, i'm just saying i hope for example the economics we do NOW, doesn't become the Economics NSW does for example, and then if i was under the new system id be forced to having to rite essays and do maths etc in a subject which currently doesn't require it.
For example the NSW one has:
English standard
English Advanced
English Extension 1
English Extension 2
and ESL
Having a look through them, it seems pretty interesting. Maybe they should have like an English which has got to do more with where u wanna be. For example, if i wanted to be a journalist, we should have a subject branch form English which deals with different types of newspaper articles, more emphasis on spelling and grammar as well as expression, etc. Whereas if i was a more creative person, there should be an English which cotnains Context, story writing, spelling etc. I think that would be a good idea
Having a look at the exam papers from NSW, they have a subject called.....
COSMOLOGY !!! HAHA, they actually learn about stars, and space etc. LOL. never KNEW THAT existed in high school
MODERN HISTORY (we only have like the last few decades/century)
TOURISM- WTH.....hmm....
I guess my point is, some of the subjects are good, some are wacky, LOL, but currently in VCE all the subjects seem useful/good.
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but currently in VCE all the subjects seem useful/good.
Hah. Good one.
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OMG I wish Victoria had cosmology
/useless post which contributes nothing to the thread
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hahah, nah it does, lol. You're just saying what you think, lol, free speech :P, if you wnat to see posts which dont contribue anything to the thread read
"Why do you think so many people are bad at maths"
LMAOOOOOOOO. I shoulda kept my mouth shut, now im gonna be bombarded with complaints, haha
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Does this actually have a really significant change?
I thought they just changed the name of it and thats it..
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well as of 2010 i heard, the name ENETR is going to change to ATAR (such a lame name, stands for Australian Tertiary Entrance Rank), but the education department emphasized only the name was changing (except q'land which retianed its own name for some reason), but they said the marking remains the same as it is now.
But yesterday they said on herald sun that now its going to become a new curriculum and stuff.
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It'll be interesting to observe the popularity of certain subjects across different states. I presume that the percentages of students undertaking the maths and sciences will be relatively constant, but the prevalence of certain humanities subjects across the states could reflect the culture of the environment.
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yeah, that's a good point! I also wonder whether states like WA and Northern Territory are more into wood, metal etc, instead of the sciences and business degrees which are popular in NSW and Victoria.
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but currently in VCE all the subjects seem useful/good.
Hah. Good one.
LOL, thanks for pointing that out, I just relised the ambiguity of my statement. LOL
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If they're designing a new system, I'd like to see them liaise more with universities and industries as to what would be the most useful skills to develop in year 11 and 12 rather than just make up a patchwork quilt of random courses from all over the place. If that were the case, I think there would be a greater emphasis on literacy in terms of written clarity and comprehension and 'critical thinking' (i.e. fewer rote-learning subjects), just at a guess. Also, I think that SACs are a pretty flawed mode of assessment in terms of preparation for uni - assignments should be longer term and actually somewhat investigative with at least some use of research and citations (I think there was less independent research in year 12 than what there was in year 10!).
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I think there was less independent research in year 12 than what there was in year 10!
Yeah that is quite interesting, Year 12 you can generally rely on your textbooks to see you through, particularly with maths-science type subjects. In the old days you would spend ages finding books in the library, relavent websites and then compiling your knowledge while citing all your sources. Not much of that happening this year.
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I think there was less independent research in year 12 than what there was in year 10!
Yeah that is quite interesting, Year 12 you can generally rely on your textbooks to see you through, particularly with maths-science type subjects. In the old days you would spend ages finding books in the library, relavent websites and then compiling your knowledge while citing all your sources. Not much of that happening this year.
Actually... now that you mention it, I was very much the same!
There isn't much research in the curriculum, is there..?
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I think the independent research undertaken by students in bachelor degrees is ridiculously uneffective and inefficient as a form of learning. Discuss?
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Eriny (as usual) is right, haha. When i first entered VCE (rememebring I never knew what VCE was like), I was at first surprised that we never got ASSIGNMENTS, it was always just like 7-10 SACS for every subject every few weeks.
That is OKAY i guess,, I would hate to do for example a role play, or a "movie" as some books suggest. But there should also be some assignments where u can take home and research, and it should be difficult, and able to make you explore a wide variety of resources. It DOES make you learn.
And before people say "but people can cheat".....don't forget many Uni courses have TAKE HOME EXAMS, essays etc....it isn;t just all down to what you can memorize for a test. (not a typo).
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I think the independent research undertaken by students in bachelor degrees is ridiculously uneffective and inefficient as a form of learning. Discuss?
I disagree. Learning is best when self-driven. If the student wishes to engage deeper and broader understanding, undergraduate research is simply the most awesome experience (and I cannot wait).
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What I meant was for 'learning' as a whole - as in, to mandate that form of learning on an entire student population.
Learning may be 'best' when self driven, but then you are assuming that people are self-driven which is almost certainly not the case for most of the student population I see. Therefore, in my opinion, the style of learning mandated on students should reflect the acknowledgment that most students at undergraduate level are not self driven.
From personal experience, and from speaking to probably over 30-40 people that undertake this form of learning for university, the majority seem as though they:
1. Are just trying to make up the minimum number of references required for the essay
2. Aren't even reading the journal articles they find - merely trying to find something to back up an argument
3. Waste hours upon hours to find very little information
... I hope I havent confused you with honours style research/ higher degree research where you would actually undertake research yourself and write something based on that research (eg. surveys, observations etc).
I think we should be given say 20 articles to read and from those be expected to write an essay. The actual research process itself is too cumbersome for my liking when you have no articles given to you.
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something can still be seen as useless even if through FREE SPEECH they say it....
And someone can still point out (a part of free speech) that what someone says is useless.
Wait....i mgiht have the wrong end of the stick, don;t mean to sound so obnoxious :D
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What I meant was for 'learning' as a whole - as in, to mandate that form of learning on an entire student population.
Learning may be 'best' when self driven, but then you are assuming that people are self-driven which is almost certainly not the case for most of the student population I see. Therefore, in my opinion, the style of learning mandated on students should reflect the acknowledgment that most students at undergraduate level are not self driven.
From personal experience, and from speaking to probably over 30-40 people that undertake this form of learning for university, the majority seem as though they:
1. Are just trying to make up the minimum number of references required for the essay
2. Aren't even reading the journal articles they find - merely trying to find something to back up an argument
3. Waste hours upon hours to find very little information
... I hope I havent confused you with honours style research/ higher degree research where you would actually undertake research yourself and write something based on that research (eg. surveys, observations etc).
I think we should be given say 20 articles to read and from those be expected to write an essay. The actual research process itself is too cumbersome for my liking when you have no articles given to you.
oooh, THAT type of research..
I was thinking the type where I get a textbook, learn it, then solve some computational problem.
Also, Moderator Action: thread title edited to correct typo. It was annoying the hell out of me.
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What I meant was for 'learning' as a whole - as in, to mandate that form of learning on an entire student population.
Learning may be 'best' when self driven, but then you are assuming that people are self-driven which is almost certainly not the case for most of the student population I see. Therefore, in my opinion, the style of learning mandated on students should reflect the acknowledgment that most students at undergraduate level are not self driven.
From personal experience, and from speaking to probably over 30-40 people that undertake this form of learning for university, the majority seem as though they:
1. Are just trying to make up the minimum number of references required for the essay
2. Aren't even reading the journal articles they find - merely trying to find something to back up an argument
3. Waste hours upon hours to find very little information
... I hope I havent confused you with honours style research/ higher degree research where you would actually undertake research yourself and write something based on that research (eg. surveys, observations etc).
I think we should be given say 20 articles to read and from those be expected to write an essay. The actual research process itself is too cumbersome for my liking when you have no articles given to you.
It is crucial to learn how to find information and how to read information. In a job, there isn't going to be someone giving you 20 papers to read getting you to summarise it all, you're going to have to find them yourself. That said, in uni you are prescribed readings and given additional recommendations. But still, you describe a very inflexible way of answering an essay question. I don't know about other faculties, but that could potentially create a lot of problems for arts students. Especially if you're coming up with your own essay questions.
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same with science faculty
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What I meant was for 'learning' as a whole - as in, to mandate that form of learning on an entire student population.
Learning may be 'best' when self driven, but then you are assuming that people are self-driven which is almost certainly not the case for most of the student population I see. Therefore, in my opinion, the style of learning mandated on students should reflect the acknowledgment that most students at undergraduate level are not self driven.
From personal experience, and from speaking to probably over 30-40 people that undertake this form of learning for university, the majority seem as though they:
1. Are just trying to make up the minimum number of references required for the essay
2. Aren't even reading the journal articles they find - merely trying to find something to back up an argument
3. Waste hours upon hours to find very little information
... I hope I havent confused you with honours style research/ higher degree research where you would actually undertake research yourself and write something based on that research (eg. surveys, observations etc).
I think we should be given say 20 articles to read and from those be expected to write an essay. The actual research process itself is too cumbersome for my liking when you have no articles given to you.
It is crucial to learn how to find information and how to read information. In a job, there isn't going to be someone giving you 20 papers to read getting you to summarise it all, you're going to have to find them yourself. That said, in uni you are prescribed readings and given additional recommendations. But still, you describe a very inflexible way of answering an essay question. I don't know about other faculties, but that could potentially create a lot of problems for arts students. Especially if you're coming up with your own essay questions.
Same with Psych tbh, I think the markers will get bored reading what will really become nth essay containing the same information.
Being able to research scholarly, I feel anyway, is probably the most important skill that you get out of university, moreso than the actual academic content, which is bound to become out of date (depending on how fast research happens in your field, I know personally with neuroscience, I'm can guarantee that by the time I walk out with my degree, there will be some things I learnt in first year that won't be valid any more)