Possible to take 3/4 Food Tech

[thaaanyan]

Hi there,
I was just wandering if it's possible to take 3/4 food tech without having completed a 1/2 in the subject?
I'm in year eleven right now but the 1/2 class clashes with several of my other ones (including the current 3/4 in lit i'm taking) so there's no way for me to switch now; but I was thinking of possibly doing it next year in Twelve as a 3/4?
I really love food tech and the study design looks really good to me! Another problem is I didn't take food tech in Year 10 either, so if I do take it i'll be reaching all the way back to Year Nine in memory - if I am allowed, I'd be super appreciative it someone could point me in the right direction to some theory/info/ANYTHING I could do to prepare over the holidays?? (Do you guys even think I SHOULD take food tech??)

Thanks so much guys!
Any help at all would be lovely - and sorry if I stuff this post up, it's my first actual one.

[walkec]

DO FOOD TECH! IT IS THE BEST SUBJECT EVER
(btw, I wasn't shouting, just emphasising my point).

Don't be concerned about not having done the 1/2. The dux of my class last year got a 49 and hadn't done food tech since year 10 - so it's definitely possible!

If you have any specific questions about the course, feel free to PM me. I took Food Tech as my 3/4 in Year 11 last year and I will be more than willing to answer any questions you may have about the course itself or specifics like folio.

Things I loved about Food Tech:
-the practical side to it and how it links in with the theory.
-folio (this was the highlight for me - you get to be as creative as you want, which is something I really liked!)
-the content was applicable to real life
-you understand why ingredients work in making certain foods

Food Tech = life (well not anymore, seeing I finished it last year. *sobs* - I miss it so much! Absolute highlight of each week for the past 2 years)

[thaaanyan]

HAHAHAHA, thank you for such a prompt and awesome reply
is food tech like a lot of memorisation on the theory side?
did you prepare a lot over the holidays?
HOW DID YOU DO SO WELL??
Thank-you so much i'll definitely bombard you with questions come next year, your enthusiasm is making me so excited to take the subject!!

[walkec]

is food tech like a lot of memorisation on the theory side?
-to an extent. If you want to do really well, you will need to apply your rote learnt content to application style questions. I suggest having a look at past exams to gauge an idea of the application questions - especially look at the extended response question in the exam. (available in the 2012 paper and onwards).

did you prepare a lot over the holidays?
-I just did my holiday homework as set my the terrible teacher I had in my school's VCE Headstart teacher (thank goodness I ended up getting a different teacher) and came up with a few possible themes for my folio.

HOW DID YOU DO SO WELL??
-I was very lucky to have such an awesome teacher, so that definitely helped! But I also bought a second hand copy of the 2012 Cambridge Checkpoints off eBay and this was like my supplementary Food Tech bible. There were heaps of flow chart and diagrams in there which were really helpful. I also recommend getting a supplementary textbook. My school's set textbook was Food for VCE but I borrowed a copy of Food Solutions from the school library for the whole year and used that. I found this really helpful because Food Solutions has a lot more depth of concepts, which is something you will need to be able to apply and understand to do very well.l
-Ask lots of questions and do lots of questions (especially exam style ones) and get your teacher to mark them
-When you eat some foods, like bread, think about what the functional properties of the ingredients are and the complex processes that have been used to produce the food. Same goes with applying primary and secondary processing to foods you eat. (If these terms don't make sense now, don't worry, they will! You will be sick of them by the end of the course!)

Folio advice:
-Work out how you will lay out your pages from the start and stick things down as you go - like at the end of each week I would have a massive folio session on Friday night and just stick everything in from that week.
-Back up your folio work at least in 2 different places.
-organisation is super, super important. I cannot stress this enough.
-try and have a more creative design brief and choose more creative options as there is a criterion that rewards you for the complexity of your items.

[marsbareater12]

+1 to the Food Solutions textbook. It's the one my school uses and it's great.

You can easily pick it up. The only thing is, there's quite a bit of repetition of theory, so while most of the class will be like "psh, key foods? got this" (which comprises 2 chapters of the textbook - the other repeated chapter is food safety, I think that's all?) you might be like
"yep gotta go over this in my own time to catch up".

In addition, hmm... Year 11, you get taught "X is a letter with two strokes that comprises the makeup of it". Whereas, in Year 12, it'd be like "X is a letter with two strokes that comprises the makeup of it, also [paragraph of history] [paragraph of changes in the use of x] [paragraph of. i dunno. modern applications of x in design]". (wow that was a terrible analogy I am so sorry but basically I'm just trying to say a lot of 3+4 theory is just expanding on 1+2 theory, except for the repeated stuff in the above paragraph).

BASICALLY YOU WILL BE TOTALLY FINE. ♥

[thaaanyan]

THANK-YOU GUYS SO MUCH FOR THE COMPREHENSIVE AND QUICK REPLIES!
i'm starting to feel a bit better about going in blind!
Walkec, thank you so much for the extra tips I'll definitely check out Cambridge Checkpoints & the Food Solutions textbook.
Marsbareater12 Don't worry I totally get what you're saying!  I feel a bit less stressed out now.

Thank-you guys so much
I'm definitely going to speak to the Head Coordinator about taking it next year!

[bellaellaella]

No need to stress at all! I picked food tech up again this year after not having done it since year 8 and am doing just fine.
It's the same as every other subject in that if you put the work in, you'll get results (:

[flares]

Folio advice:
-Work out how you will lay out your pages from the start and stick things down as you go - like at the end of each week I would have a massive folio session on Friday night and just stick everything in from that week.
-Back up your folio work at least in 2 different places.
-organisation is super, super important. I cannot stress this enough.
-try and have a more creative design brief and choose more creative options as there is a criterion that rewards you for the complexity of your items.

I'm in year 11 as well, i know i'm far from year 12, but i'm also picking up food tech next year without having done units 1&2.
Just some questions,
-with the folio, it becomes your 'diary' for that subject, right? so do i literally stick in anything i want that i like into the folio?
- back up my folio; soo electronically? the writing n stuff?

thanks

[walkec]

I'm in year 11 as well, i know i'm far from year 12, but i'm also picking up food tech next year without having done units 1&2.
Just some questions,
-with the folio, it becomes your 'diary' for that subject, right? so do i literally stick in anything i want that i like into the folio?
- back up my folio; soo electronically? the writing n stuff?

thanks

• you don't just stick in anything you want. There are certain criteria to meet, and therefore you need to put things in your folio that meet the criteria. It's sort of difficult to explain now, but it will make more sense once you start your folio
• I backed up my folio by also storing it on a USB. I had a "folio" folder and would save all my work in that on my computer, and then just copy and paste the folder onto the USB any time I updated stuff.