Revision Guides Useful?

[DestinationAlan]

Hi guys, I was just enquiring which series of books is really useful in helping out in revising for the Year 12 Exam. Or if they're useful in general. I'm currently in Year 11 and want to prepare up ahead. I know that I can't rely on the revision guides themselves and must utilise my own understanding and teacher and so on. If this will help anyone then I'm doing English, Literature, Global Politics, HHD and Legal Studies

Anyway, searching the internet I came across: A+ Guides, ExamPro (I bought the English and Literature ones), Cambridge Checkpoints, Legal Studies on Engage Education and the Connect Education ones.

Which one of these have comprehensive notes and has anyone used any of these guides before? And are there any more series I should look out for?

[walkec]

Hi guys, I was just enquiring which series of books is really useful in helping out in revising for the Year 12 Exam. Or if they're useful in general. I'm currently in Year 11 and want to prepare up ahead. I know that I can't rely on the revision guides themselves and must utilise my own understanding and teacher and so on. If this will help anyone then I'm doing English, Literature, Global Politics, HHD and Legal Studies

Anyway, searching the internet I came across: A+ Guides, ExamPro (I bought the English and Literature ones), Cambridge Checkpoints, Legal Studies on Engage Education and the Connect Education ones.

Which one of these have comprehensive notes and has anyone used any of these guides before? And are there any more series I should look out for?

I'll speak for English, Literature, HHD.
I'd not rely on guides for Lit and English if you are wishing to score highly. These subjects have a strong emphasis on unique interpretations and assurance if your own readings, and regurgitating information on a SAC or the exam from these guides doesn't necessarily mean you'll do well. They're alright for first readings, but not so much for developing a really deep interpretation of the text.

I've used the A+ HHD one at my school's library a couple of times but I didn't really find it overly helpful in terms of revision questions. It's good to get some simplified clarification on concepts though. However, the problem with buying a published guide for a subject like HHD is that aspects relevant to the course can change drastically year to year, so I wouldn't be relying on this to be your sole source of information. I also think that if you have a good HHD like I do, that questions and exercises they set you in class should be more than sufficient.

I can also talk about Checkpoints as I bought this for my 3/4 subject last year. I didn't really like how it was questions from VCAA exams (as Food Tech doesn't have many company papers - I wanted to save VCAA papers for the end of the year). But they can be good for flow charts and simplified explanations. I also have quite liked using A+ notes for Biology this year - I'm not sure if the layout of notes would be similar for other subjects.

[DestinationAlan]

I'll speak for English, Literature, HHD.
I'd not rely on guides for Lit and English if you are wishing to score highly. These subjects have a strong emphasis on unique interpretations and assurance if your own readings, and regurgitating information on a SAC or the exam from these guides doesn't necessarily mean you'll do well. They're alright for first readings, but not so much for developing a really deep interpretation of the text.

I've used the A+ HHD one at my school's library a couple of times but I didn't really find it overly helpful in terms of revision questions. It's good to get some simplified clarification on concepts though. However, the problem with buying a published guide for a subject like HHD is that aspects relevant to the course can change drastically year to year, so I wouldn't be relying on this to be your sole source of information. I also think that if you have a good HHD like I do, that questions and exercises they set you in class should be more than sufficient.

I can also talk about Checkpoints as I bought this for my 3/4 subject last year. I didn't really like how it was questions from VCAA exams (as Food Tech doesn't have many company papers - I wanted to save VCAA papers for the end of the year). But they can be good for flow charts and simplified explanations. I also have quite liked using A+ notes for Biology this year - I'm not sure if the layout of notes would be similar for other subjects.

The reason why I resorted to the formula guides is that I struggle at Literature alot actually. The sophistication and crazy A kids from other schools (and my class) discourages me and makes me think "I won't even get 30! Why did I choose Lit!!". But you're right, I did give my own spin towards the last Language Analysis i did last week and the teacher said it was good.

In terms of Health, I heard my school's approach to teaching is a bit dry and people lose motivation immensely. That's what the 1/2 Kids said anyway as I'm going straight into 3/4 HHD.

[walkec]

The reason why I resorted to the formula guides is that I struggle at Literature alot actually. The sophistication and crazy A kids from other schools (and my class) discourages me and makes me think "I won't even get 30! Why did I choose Lit!!". But you're right, I did give my own spin towards the last Language Analysis i did last week and the teacher said it was good.

In terms of Health, I heard my school's approach to teaching is a bit dry and people lose motivation immensely. That's what the 1/2 Kids said anyway as I'm going straight into 3/4 HHD.

Persevere with Literature. I did not like it at all at the start of this year, so much so after each day I had it in the first 3 weeks that I came home and cried. Just stick with it and try to enjoy it without pressuring yourself to get A+ all the time and you should find your grades will go up because you're less anxious about it.

[DestinationAlan]

Persevere with Literature. I did not like it at all at the start of this year, so much so after each day I had it in the first 3 weeks that I came home and cried. Just stick with it and try to enjoy it without pressuring yourself to get A+ all the time and you should find your grades will go up because you're less anxious about it.

That's what I did for English and surprisingly my marks did go up. Now if I can do it for my other subjects....Hahaha.

[AmericanBeauty]

I'm doing a few of your subjects.

Legal Studies - you don't really need to make notes. YouTube 'Tim MacDonald' and he has podcasts for all the Legal Studies videos. You'll find this is incredibly helpful, I'll be cramming for ten days straight binge listening to his videos for my exams! There is a guy on ATARNotes who made notes around the guys videos which you can use to visually supplement the notes.

Politics: You just have to make your own notes. The subject is all about learning case studies and applying them. The subject is also really great and fun to learn so you should have a great time doing it - there is also a guy on YouTube called 'Alex Bacalaj' who records his classes as lectures and allows you to rematch his classes. These were pretty helpful.

English: I'm not great at English but I've found taking your own notes to be beneficial with regards to Text Response and Whose Reality (Context). For Language Analysis which I'm pretty bad at, it's just more or less getting into the groove of analysing writing. Study guides don't really help.