SAC 3.2 Result

[siddhartharora]

G'day everyone.

Did my SAC on Unit 3, Outcome 2 (Macroeconomic Activity, Sustainable Economic Growth and Low Inflation) today. Got my result today as well.

I spent this whole week + previous 2 weekends, revising through my extensive study notes and doing 6 practice SAC's. Was quite confident, but the result showed otherwise. Ended up getting 28/45. Right now, ranked 3rd but another top student who is expected to get 1st wasn't in today, so assuming he tops it, I'll be 4th.

Not really happy after this crap result. Any tips or thoughts? How did you guys go?

[chasej]

G'day everyone.

Did my SAC on Unit 3, Outcome 2 (Macroeconomic Activity, Sustainable Economic Growth and Low Inflation) today. Got my result today as well.

I spent this whole week + previous 2 weekends, revising through my extensive study notes and doing 6 practice SAC's. Was quite confident, but the result showed otherwise. Ended up getting 28/45. Right now, ranked 3rd but another top student who is expected to get 1st wasn't in today, so assuming he tops it, I'll be 4th.

Not really happy after this crap result. Any tips or thoughts? How did you guys go?

I didn't do as well as I was hoping for. 35/40 SAC was on Nature of Macroeconomic activity and eco growth. SAC was actually worth 30% of unit 3 assessment so it is actually counted as 30 markers so I lost about 3 marks in total. I have a pretty strong co-hort though and I'm hanging around the top ranks so I presume my result would (hopefully) be scaled up in the end so all is good ATM.

I am now sitting at ~63/70 (not bothered to do the exact maths, cause it doesn't really matter, since I can't change it now) with one more SAC and 30 more marks still to do in U3. Hopefully I smash this final U3 SAC and finish of with a raw A+ for this Unit, really trying to put some stuff into place for this upcoming SAC that would ensure best possible marks. I really only lost marks on this most recent SAC because of really, really, really stupid mistakes (one multiple choice question I read wrong and I used an incorrect supply factor in one extended response losing two marks (teacher is hardmarker and I lost two marks for using the term "Wages" instead of something like "Real unit labour costs" or "Real Wages".

Anyway the fact this was only silly mistakes gives me confidence that I am a good eco student and what I need to do now is just read the questions slower and I am capable of achieving full marks or if not close to it from now on (hopefully).  Been thinking about getting a tutor for once every fortnight or so to tie up the lose edges, if anyone knows any good ones please let me know BTW.

[abcdqdxD]

This is purely for Eco:

If you've spent 3 weeks preparing for a SAC and get a bad result, I suggest you to change your study method. Doing 6 practice sacs is overkill - economics isn't really about repetition. My belief is that if you've learnt the content thoroughly, doing 1-2 practice SACs is probably sufficient practice for you to get full marks. Another problem with doing too many practice SACs is that although they examine a wide range of questions,  some of your weaknesses will not be exposed, so once again I'd place greater emphasis on mastering the content over doing practice SACs.

Another reason may be that you actually know the content, but can't express it in words. If that's the case, take some time to plan out your answers in reading time.

[Wu]

This is purely for Eco:

If you've spent 3 weeks preparing for a SAC and get a bad result, I suggest you to change your study method. Doing 6 practice sacs is overkill - economics isn't really about repetition. My belief is that if you've learnt the content thoroughly, doing 1-2 practice SACs is probably sufficient practice for you to get full marks. Another problem with doing too many practice SACs is that although they examine a wide range of questions,  some of your weaknesses will not be exposed, so once again I'd place greater emphasis on mastering the content over doing practice SACs.

Another reason may be that you actually know the content, but can't express it in words. If that's the case, take some time to plan out your answers in reading time.

Ding ding ding -- right on the money.
Quality > quantity. Don't think that you have to do lots of practice sacs and exams in order to ever score well, or even just studying for extended periods of time; it's the content and your understanding of concepts which get you your marks. Economics is not a subject like, say, maths, where an unexpected question can be sprung up on you. In economics, everything is pretty much set in stone - you either know it or you don't. 

Personally, I had fun while doing my sac. My teacher is a strict but fair marker so I'm assuming that I lost one mark again on the macroeconomics/sustainable growth/low inflation sac.

[dantan]

I felt like I might add my two cents worth to this discussion because learning styles especially in economics is something I'm really big on with all my students. In short though, I definitely agree with the previous two posts that spamming practice SACs like in other subjects is not the way to be going about revising (unless, and only unless you are having trouble finishing within the time frame).

You will never truly have revised everything they can throw at you in economics. By this, I mean that there will always be a new way of putting a question to you, or a new idea, factor, concept etc. that you might not have heard of before, or be completely familiar with, therefore doing lots of practice SACs will not cover everything.

This is what I would do:

1. Read, a lot! I know this isn't considered a very effective way of learning content, but the reality is, so do well in economics, you have to be well read on a broad range of concepts and issues so that you at least have some idea of how you might tackle something you haven't necessarily seen before.

2. Learn your fundamental concepts (basic macro etc.) to the point of absolute mastery. As I said in the previous point, you might get something you've never seen on an exam/sac, but if you've mastered your concepts properly, this shouldn't pose any additional challenge. You would just apply the same method of thinking you've developed in your conceptual mastery process.

3. Figure out a solid structure and method of responding to questions and make sure it doesn't have any holes in it. In economics, you get marks for logically and clearly stepped out responses.

 @siddhartharora: Out of curiosity, what sort of things were you losing marks on? I might be able to help you if you let us know what things you weren't necessarily getting right.

[siddhartharora]

I felt like I might add my two cents worth to this discussion because learning styles especially in economics is something I'm really big on with all my students. In short though, I definitely agree with the previous two posts that spamming practice SACs like in other subjects is not the way to be going about revising (unless, and only unless you are having trouble finishing within the time frame).

You will never truly have revised everything they can throw at you in economics. By this, I mean that there will always be a new way of putting a question to you, or a new idea, factor, concept etc. that you might not have heard of before, or be completely familiar with, therefore doing lots of practice SACs will not cover everything.

This is what I would do:

1. Read, a lot! I know this isn't considered a very effective way of learning content, but the reality is, so do well in economics, you have to be well read on a broad range of concepts and issues so that you at least have some idea of how you might tackle something you haven't necessarily seen before.

2. Learn your fundamental concepts (basic macro etc.) to the point of absolute mastery. As I said in the previous point, you might get something you've never seen on an exam/sac, but if you've mastered your concepts properly, this shouldn't pose any additional challenge. You would just apply the same method of thinking you've developed in your conceptual mastery process.

3. Figure out a solid structure and method of responding to questions and make sure it doesn't have any holes in it. In economics, you get marks for logically and clearly stepped out responses.

 @siddhartharora: Out of curiosity, what sort of things were you losing marks on? I might be able to help you if you let us know what things you weren't necessarily getting right.

Thanks so much everyone for the feedback. I'll do my best to fix up these things and put my focus on the right things before the next SAC!

@dantan

I haven't had a look at the SAC yet, will probably get it tomorrow, but my teacher told me I lost 2 marks on a 4 mark question which was:
"Define the goal of sustainable economic growth. How is economic growth measured?"
I got 2 marks for the definition, but lost 2 marks for the second part. Apparently, I was meant to say that economic growth is measured using REAL GDP, when in fact the textbook etc. say that economic growth is measured using GDP, hence I went ahead and explained myself suggesting its GDP. Is my teacher going too far or is he on the track?

Will let you know by tomorrow where else I went wrong.

[chasej]

Thanks so much everyone for the feedback. I'll do my best to fix up these things and put my focus on the right things before the next SAC!

@dantan

I haven't had a look at the SAC yet, will probably get it tomorrow, but my teacher told me I lost 2 marks on a 4 mark question which was:
"Define the goal of sustainable economic growth. How is economic growth measured?"
I got 2 marks for the definition, but lost 2 marks for the second part. Apparently, I was meant to say that economic growth is measured using REAL GDP, when in fact the textbook etc. say that economic growth is measured using GDP, hence I went ahead and explained myself suggesting its GDP. Is my teacher going too far or is he on the track?

Will let you know by tomorrow where else I went wrong.

That question could be taken both ways I suppose. Examiners seem to have left questions out like that, probably for that very reason.

GDP is the total value of all goods and services produced in an economy over a given period of time.
Real GDP is GDP adjusted to take into account any inflation/price changes.

Economic growth is a sustained increase increase in the REAL VALUE of goods and services produced in an economy.

To me using this definition real GDP is more correct as real GDP allows as to find the real value of the increase in production.

Pretty harsh marking though by your teacher. If I was marking I would have given you 3/4 as you were on the right track. Just missed out on one detail.

[dantan]

There are a couple of things I'm noticing here so bear with me:

1. Firstly, I kind of think that this isn't really a good question, and certainly not one worthy of 4 marks (in my opinion anyway). VCAA have a very limited amount of marks with which to assess a great deal of content, they aren't going to waste time asking simple things like how growth is measured. If they added on something about limitations of GDP to the question, I'd understand why it's worth the marks it is, but presently I'm struggling to see how there is 4 marks in that question.

2. I think you should have already mentioned real GDP in your definition of the goal. i.e. "this is believed to be around 3-4% Real GDP growth annually."

3. Your teacher is right in the sense that you should always use Real GDP rather than just GDP, as this is almost always the case in real life.

So I think your teacher is right in once sense, but honestly, I think it is a poorly written question as it doesn't really test much in my opinion.

[siddhartharora]

CHANGE IN RESULT

We got our SAC's back, and I re-calculated my score, and he did not include a page of results, as well as I gained a mark in a question.

Previous score: 28/45
New/final score: 31.5/45
Previous ranking: 4th overall
New ranking: 2nd overall

In regards to the GDP question, I'll keep that in mind for next time.
One aspect of the SAC that really pulled me down was multiple choice. I got 8/15, where as the student above me got 15/15. Really need to focus on multiple choice questions and getting them right. Any advice on tackling multiple choice questions in Economics?

[chasej]

CHANGE IN RESULT

We got our SAC's back, and I re-calculated my score, and he did not include a page of results, as well as I gained a mark in a question.

Previous score: 28/45
New/final score: 31.5/45
Previous ranking: 4th overall
New ranking: 2nd overall

In regards to the GDP question, I'll keep that in mind for next time.
One aspect of the SAC that really pulled me down was multiple choice. I got 8/15, where as the student above me got 15/15. Really need to focus on multiple choice questions and getting them right. Any advice on tackling multiple choice questions in Economics?

1. Read the actual question slowly. It would take 10 seconds longer to read but at least you will make sure you actually understand the root of the question (I lost a mark in the last SAC simply because I read "likely to" instead of "least likely to". Really stupid mistake.

2. Read all the possible answers. Don't just read a, say its correct than select it as its possible the last answer could be like "both a and c are correct" or a more suitable answer could appear after that.

3. You should be able to immediately ignore two answers pretty quickly.
I normally put a little symbol next to each answer to see what affect it will have to make it easier to see the answer. For example if the question asks "which aggregate demand factor is most likely to increase the rate of economic growth? , I would put a down arrow next to factors which would decrease growth, a cross next to the answers that have no relevance at all (like supply factors) and than it should be pretty easy to find the correct answer.

Also historically multiple choice questions just test knowledge of the basic key concepts which are normally the first two or three dot points in each section of the key knowledge while extended response test the longer key knowledge points towards the bottom of each section in the key knowledge. For example you would rarely get a question like "explain the meaning of the RBA's goal of low inflation", its just to easy. What would be more likely to appear on an exam is something like "explain two factors which have influenced the RBA's low rate of inflation over the last 4 years".

[dantan]

chasej is right on the money there!

MC Questions are hard, and often have the potential to be some of the most difficult questions on the paper (so it's good they're only worth a mark each). So you should get good at effectively reading/answering them quickly, as you'll have the least time for these on a paper.

As chasej said, they love popping things like negatives in there just to trip up people who don't read properly (doesn't explain, isn't true, is least likely etc.).

There is always a 'more correct' answer. As simple as it seems, you should always be able to eliminate three answers (even if you don't understand why what you're left with is the correct answer).

I also used chasej's method of using a symbol or something next to the options to help me with my answers. So a common question they like to give is something like: Which of the following factors will have affect AD in a different way to the others. You should then have three options with a little up arrow next to it, and one down, or vice versa.

Just like all questions, MC is just another technique you need to refine. Though, in all honesty, if you're losing more marks on MC than you are on SA, I would most definitely say that's a good thing!

[abcdqdxD]

So I missed a SAC and did it today instead. The SAC I got was 10 times harder than the one the others did (teacher showed me).

On the original SAC, it had simple graphs such as CPI, EG, CC and BC

My sac had:

Tradeables/non-tradeables price index/commodities price index (or something like that) and no CPI/BC/CC graphs were given, yet questions required me to comment on inflation over the trend period when the CPI graph wasnt even given... is this fair? my teacher said she wanted to "challenge me", but I suspect rank 2 isn't that far behind :S

/endrant

[dantan]

I doubt it's fair at all, but if that's what your teacher decided to give you then that's it I suppose. Commodities price index is not too challenging and something I think is fairly relevant still, though I would agree that tradeables/non-tradeables is a bit difficult.

How did you end up going?

[abcdqdxD]

Haven't got my result back, probably not great :/

[janson34]

not great=95-100%