Difficulties with exam preparation

[zsteve]

Hi all, I just wanted to ask the community's views on this.
I've been doing a lot of practice for EL, but recently I've found that there are those times when I sit down to write an essay or do a practice exam, but everything goes wrong for some reason, and I mess it up. A lot of factors are involved, especially being tired after doing practice exams for other subjects. Then again, at times I do well (i.e ~69/75 for VCAA 2014).
Is this a common thing for English-related subjects? (basically having 'mental blank' or paralysis from writing well ) and how do you people manage that? Is it something I should be cautious of for the exam?

[odeaa]

Hi all, I just wanted to ask the community's views on this.
I've been doing a lot of practice for EL, but recently I've found that there are those times when I sit down to write an essay or do a practice exam, but everything goes wrong for some reason, and I mess it up. A lot of factors are involved, especially being tired after doing practice exams for other subjects. Then again, at times I do well (i.e ~69/75 for VCAA 2014).
Is this a common thing for English-related subjects? (basically having 'mental blank' or paralysis from writing well ) and how do you people manage that? Is it something I should be cautious of for the exam?

I havent really had that problem because i'm lazy and i will just do something else if i cant think straight, but what has helped sometimes in the past is just reading high scoring essays. for some reason it just helps everything flow back, and also just seeing nicely constructed sentences seems to get the creative juices going for me

which section specifically? i do tend to get stuck on sections a's and b sometimes, although after enough practise the essays become second nature (in my experience)