Thoughts on doing two English subjects at the same time in year 12?

[DJA]

Yes. I am one of those crazy people as my friends like to call me who has chosen the path of doing both Literature and English for year 12 because I love English subjects. Literature has been a blast this year (we studied like 6 texts) and I can’t bear giving up English. Is this a difficult/unattainable task?

What sort of workload can I expect in terms of essays?
I would LOVE the opinions of people who have done both English and Lit for their VCE.

[jeanweasley]

It's totally fine, I did Lit and English and it was definitely manageable. I love how they complement each other as a subject. Definitely go for it.

[DJA]

It's totally fine, I did Lit and English and it was definitely manageable. I love how they complement each other as a subject. Definitely go for it.

Wow awesome!

Yes I totally agree. Doing English and lit 1/2  this year has been so so complementary. It has been fantastic. The huge vocab you build as you study lit has proved really fantastic for English. My markers always comment on it in exams this year.
Also the critical analysis skills of lit prove very useful for English.

Jean, what was the workload like? With English AND lit how many essays per week would I be writing? This is probs my biggest concern? I need to manage my time better for next year haha

[silverpixeli]

I'm not an english kid but I have a few friends who are english kids, who take both or wish they had taken both. The skills you learn in lit certainly complement english and doing both is sure to help your writing in general. Gauging how many essays you'll need to do a week is something I think you alone can do, you'll have to get a feel for how your writing is going and how much you need to improve/if at all to achieve to the standard that only you can set. Once you get the structure for each assessment task right, it's more about just improving your writing in general anyway, so at that point, you'll be effectively practicing for both subjects whenever you practice for either. You'll have most of the year to get used to it anyway, there's definitely nothing to be worried about in terms of workload.

[jeanweasley]

Jean, what was the workload like? With English AND lit how many essays per week would I be writing? This is probs my biggest concern? I need to manage my time better for next year haha

Well, I don't exactly know how to explain it but it felt like there was more workload for English than in Lit. I can't give you a figure for how many essays you would be writing as for these subjects, it's pretty much up to you (unless you're directed to give a practice piece). This is because in both of my classes, the student is required to do their own work and the teacher is just there to faciliate discussion so it's pretty much individual work. You are able to talk to other students but other than that, it was pretty relaxed for me. My Lit teacher was hilarious and I often found that we had a lot of free time with her. Our cohort for Lit was also very prepared and I think it really does help if your teacher believes in you. Aside from the essays you do in English, there really is nothing different and I found that my essays for both these subjects don't ever conflict with each other because I have more preparation to study for Lit than in English as the Lit SACs were far later in the week/month.

I think you would definitely be able to manage it, although a friend of mine has expressed concern that she tends to switch between the two different writing styles for English and Lit but she still ended up scoring 18/20 for her practise essays. I also think that doing Lit gives you a boost in developing analytical and writing skills you need for English especially for Language Analysis as the exam format for Lit is very much borrowed from Section C of the English Exam. I think that you just need to keep in mind that the essays you do (4 for Lit, 2 context essays, 2 text responses, 1 language analysis and 1 oral for English) is pretty much up to you. I found that often teachers in Year 12 do not bother teaching at all and it's pretty much individual work ethic that you need to rely on as you won't be spoon fed information as in previous years. I think though that if you do want to do welll, now is probably the time to start honing your writing skills so start developing word banks and reading your texts. I also found it intellectually stimulating as there is so much scope for these subjects. You do learn a lot from the texts you read because it sheds light on you as a person and especially the society we live in. The themes in the texts that you read are definitely adaptable in real life and in a sense, you do develop philosophical views and enlightens you to become a better individual.

However, that opinion may be purely biased as I have enjoyed both these subjects and am a humanities student , but I think that if you enjoy and have the passion for it, then why not?

Best wishes for the future!

[silverpixeli]

I also found it intellectually stimulating as there is so much scope for these subjects. You do learn a lot from the texts you read because it sheds light on you as a person and especially the society we live in. The themes in the texts that you read are definitely adaptable in real life and in a sense, you do develop philosophical views and enlightens you to become a better individual.

god damn! I wish I had experienced this in english, guess I'm just not an english/humanaties kid...

[jeanweasley]

god damn! I wish I had experienced this in english, guess I'm just not an english/humanaties kid...

Haha, I'm sure science/maths teaches you similar things. While I'm a humanities kid, I would still love to learn about science and math since I find that humanities and the sciences do complement each other. I was actually planning on doing Biology but I didn't have enough room for it and I wasn't bad at Chem either.

[maree271]

Yes. I am one of those crazy people as my friends like to call me who has chosen the path of doing both Literature and English for year 12 because I love English subjects. Literature has been a blast this year (we studied like 6 texts) and I can’t bear giving up English. Is this a difficult/unattainable task?

What sort of workload can I expect in terms of essays?
I would LOVE the opinions of people who have done both English and Lit for their VCE.

I did both!! It is not as bad as I thought it would be. Essays can be a bit overwhelming but usually they are manageable. What you learn in each class with help you in the other! So it will definitely give you a step ahead the rest.
Only thing that is a bit annoying is that you have to read like 8 books when others only have 4! Im sure you will be fine though

[mackintosh]

I also did both and found that in some areas these subjects were complementary whilst in others they were quite dissimilar. I found Literature to be a mix of LA and Text, in that the analytical skills were very similar to LA and the knowledge base you develop around each text is comparable to English. I found that English had the bigger workload, as you are focusing on honing three distinct skills, whereas the technique you master for Lit is carried across the whole Lit exam. If you are committed to doing both of them, then you must keep your mind on the fact that the exam tasks in English and Literature are quite different things and know which style of essay is appropriate to the task. Literature allows more for dwelling on the finer points of the material presented and is quite responsive, whereas English to a large extent is pre-prepared.  In that sense, English is generally more work for people, but less risk-prone. Hope this helps!

[DJA]

I also did both and found that in some areas these subjects were complementary whilst in others they were quite dissimilar. I found Literature to be a mix of LA and Text, in that the analytical skills were very similar to LA and the knowledge base you develop around each text is comparable to English. I found that English had the bigger workload, as you are focusing on honing three distinct skills, whereas the technique you master for Lit is carried across the whole Lit exam. If you are committed to doing both of them, then you must keep your mind on the fact that the exam tasks in English and Literature are quite different things and know which style of essay is appropriate to the task. Literature allows more for dwelling on the finer points of the material presented and is quite responsive, whereas English to a large extent is pre-prepared.  In that sense, English is generally more work for people, but less risk-prone. Hope this helps!

Thanks for this! Really does help.

And congratulations on your fine results 
50 in english and lit. Wow!

[TrivStar]

Yes. I am one of those crazy people as my friends like to call me who has chosen the path of doing both Literature and English for year 12 because I love English subjects. Literature has been a blast this year (we studied like 6 texts) and I can’t bear giving up English. Is this a difficult/unattainable task?

What sort of workload can I expect in terms of essays?
I would LOVE the opinions of people who have done both English and Lit for their VCE.

I'm actually quite surprised by this topic because at my school they pretty much insist that if you do Lit you do English as well! One girl dropped English in year 11 and just took Lit and my teacher was not impressed at all.

Anyway, all the info on this thread is really interesting thanks everyone!

[DJA]

I'm actually quite surprised by this topic because at my school they pretty much insist that if you do Lit you do English as well! One girl dropped English in year 11 and just took Lit and my teacher was not impressed at all.

Anyway, all the info on this thread is really interesting thanks everyone!

Wow. At our school its like very rare for someone to do both subjects (English and Literature) although when you look at it, it does kind of make sense to do both. They compliment each other so well!

Pumped for both subjects next year!