Speed vs Legibility

[lozil]

Yeah, my history ext teacher said we should be getting out 1700-2000 words in an hour (per essay)!!  No idea how I'm gonna achieve that

[jamonwindeyer]

Yeah, my history ext teacher said we should be getting out 1700-2000 words in an hour (per essay)!!  No idea how I'm gonna achieve that

I am sorry, but I think that's horrifically excessive. 2000 -> That's more than a word every two seconds! I could never do that, and I don't know anyone that could. At least, you could never do it without memorising the essay. I'd love to see a 2000 word essay written on the spot in an hour, ahaha

I don't know about History Extension, but in my essay subjects I probably got about 1400 words done in an hour (non-memorised), about 2700 words in two hours anyway (that's about where my Paper 2 essay totals were at from memory). 2000 words in an hour seems way beyond scope in my eyes

[RuiAce]

Extension essays go for 60 minutes, not 40.

But 2000 is still too much. A "reasonable extremity" in my opinion would probably be 1500 yeah

[ssarahj]

Extension essays go for 60 minutes, not 40.

But 2000 is still too much. A "reasonable extremity" in my opinion would probably be 1500 yeah

Yeah I'd agree with Rui here, around 1500 seems reasonable in an hour if you are extremely well-prepared, a fast writer who memorises could possibly come up with more. In saying that however, there are a lot of students I know who do exceptionally well writing much less, its about quality over quantity!

[lozil]

I am sorry, but I think that's horrifically excessive. 2000 -> That's more than a word every two seconds! I could never do that, and I don't know anyone that could. At least, you could never do it without memorising the essay. I'd love to see a 2000 word essay written on the spot in an hour, ahaha

I don't know about History Extension, but in my essay subjects I probably got about 1400 words done in an hour (non-memorised), about 2700 words in two hours anyway (that's about where my Paper 2 essay totals were at from memory). 2000 words in an hour seems way beyond scope in my eyes

Ok, that's a relief! I thought she was being a bit ambitious... Still, so much I want to write 

[conic curve]

Ok, that's a relief! I thought she was being a bit ambitious... Still, so much I want to write 

If your worried about writing so much, then practice writing under timed conditions

[elysepopplewell]

Yeah, my history ext teacher said we should be getting out 1700-2000 words in an hour (per essay)!!  No idea how I'm gonna achieve that

I tend to think that history teaches expect a lot more writing than what is actually necessary...that's just always been my experience! My teacher for modern history (well, she was the teacher for the other modern class, but we shared teachers sometimes) admitted to us after the exam that all year she had told us a huge number to give us a high goal to achieve, and if we fell short, we'd still be writing a lot.

In saying that, for Extension English, I wrote an essay about 2000 words in perhaps an hour and 5/10 minutes? I had it completely memorised. For something like history, I just don't think I could ever come that close. You can't completely memorise history essays for an exam. I could only write so much for Extension because it was memorised and the essay question was workable with my prepared work. I could not do it for something I have to think up on the spot!

History is one of the subjects that you need to optimise your reading time for, in order to get the absolute most out of your writing time. So rather than thinking about how you're not going to be able to write 2000 words (although, maybe if you eat your nutrigrain you might get close  ), think about how you can make the most of that time. Try build up the skill of thinking about the sentence ahead as you're still writing the sentence before. Try timed conditions if they work for you (I never did timed conditions, bar like, two occasions), find a pen that glides wonderfully, and focus on optimising your time, rather than a word count. You've got this!

[lozil]

I tend to think that history teaches expect a lot more writing than what is actually necessary...that's just always been my experience! My teacher for modern history (well, she was the teacher for the other modern class, but we shared teachers sometimes) admitted to us after the exam that all year she had told us a huge number to give us a high goal to achieve, and if we fell short, we'd still be writing a lot.

In saying that, for Extension English, I wrote an essay about 2000 words in perhaps an hour and 5/10 minutes? I had it completely memorised. For something like history, I just don't think I could ever come that close. You can't completely memorise history essays for an exam. I could only write so much for Extension because it was memorised and the essay question was workable with my prepared work. I could not do it for something I have to think up on the spot!

History is one of the subjects that you need to optimise your reading time for, in order to get the absolute most out of your writing time. So rather than thinking about how you're not going to be able to write 2000 words (although, maybe if you eat your nutrigrain you might get close  ), think about how you can make the most of that time. Try build up the skill of thinking about the sentence ahead as you're still writing the sentence before. Try timed conditions if they work for you (I never did timed conditions, bar like, two occasions), find a pen that glides wonderfully, and focus on optimising your time, rather than a word count. You've got this!

Aaarrghh ok. For question 1 I tend to spend the reading time reading the source (obviously :p) plus 5-10 minutes annotating/planning it before I actually write my response... Do you think this is too much time on the source?

[elysepopplewell]

Aaarrghh ok. For question 1 I tend to spend the reading time reading the source (obviously :p) plus 5-10 minutes annotating/planning it before I actually write my response... Do you think this is too much time on the source?

I didn't study Extension History so I don't have an exact plan of attack. Although, my plan for every exam was to spend the least amount of writing time, not writing, as possible. So I wanted to do any source/text reading and analysing in the reading time, plus a minute or two overboard for annotating, and then spend the rest writing my answer. But, take this with a grain of salt, because I don't know the demands of the History Extension paper!

[lozil]

I didn't study Extension History so I don't have an exact plan of attack. Although, my plan for every exam was to spend the least amount of writing time, not writing, as possible. So I wanted to do any source/text reading and analysing in the reading time, plus a minute or two overboard for annotating, and then spend the rest writing my answer. But, take this with a grain of salt, because I don't know the demands of the History Extension paper!

Ok, well thanks anyway!

[kb123]

Usually teachers are able to decipher your words, therefore I think you should aim for speed, although don't write totally illegibly in 2 year old scribbles. This is what I learned from my experience

Katya

[studybuddy7777]

I am notoriously messy and both my English and SOR II teachers make no denial of it. I recently got told to use a felt tip pen of you are messy as similar to writing in texta, it forces you to be neater. I sacrifice a little bit of speed then writing with a ballpoint, but I gain a lot of legibility.

The advice is out there. Up to you whether you take it on board or brush it to one side. Doesnt bother me

[sudodds]

Aaarrghh ok. For question 1 I tend to spend the reading time reading the source (obviously :p) plus 5-10 minutes annotating/planning it before I actually write my response... Do you think this is too much time on the source?

Hey! For History Extension you really do need to spend that 5-10 minutes planning, that is the perfect amount The sources, particularly in section 1 are really long, and require more than the reading time to understand. They don't treat it like you are writing a 1 hour essay, but a 50 minute essay. Even then, History Extension is not like Modern of Ancient whereby you need to write at least 1000 words in 45 mins to be considered a band 6, but is WAY more focused upon the actual content of your writing, and how well you engage with the source.

Spending the extra time to really nail that source and writing a 1100 word essay is better than writing a 1500 word essay but not engaging with the source Hope this helps! These are all tips from an old senior marker.

[RuiAce]

Speed is probably more important for English than anything else. Because it's essay after essay after essay. (Or insert a creative halfway through, but you get the idea.)

Write fast enough so that you can get your content on the paper. But if you sacrifice so much legibility to the point that BOSTES has to actually HIRE a decryptor for you then we have problems.

[teapancakes08]

My handwriting is torture to read, and that's not counting the number of teachers commenting to watch my handwriting. Even when I'm writing slowly it looks pretty terrible; the closest mental image I can give is messed up calligraphy, but that's probably an understatement. And that's not even getting into what it looks like when I'm coming up with things on the spot....

Any tips to counteract this?