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[Ask Me Anything] #5: pi

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spectroscopy:
what are your thoughts on the non mhs/macrob select entry schools?

do you reckon you'll stick around on AN once you start working or will you pull a ninwa on us and officially retire?

pi:

--- Quote from: Work!! on September 21, 2016, 07:49:26 pm ---Bit more normal than the previous questions, but when you were studying particularly in Year 12 was there anything out of the ordinary that you did, and you think that worked?

--- End quote ---

Hey thanks for the non-HighTide related question :) Finally we have a user showing some maturity around here!

Firstly, I think it's important to realise that there really is no "normal", each student will have their own unique experience in year 12. I was fortunate to be in a position where I was in relatively good health and everything at home was pretty good, so I could dedicate as much time as I needed to my studying. I can't even begin to imagine how people get through the year and still do so well with other factors coming into play, those guys are the real unsung heroes!

As for what I did, it was probably less than you think, but I'll run through my subjects:

English:
I was a really big fan of reading. Reading my books multiple times, reading high-standard essays (even if not on my books), reading study guides, etc. I really thing a lot can be achieved by just reading. I should put a note here that I was never an amazing English student, I was always around the B/B+ level (since year 7 lol). During the year 11/12 summer holidays, I did a lot of thinking into why I wasn't hitting this higher tier, and I found that the way I was constructing my essays was poor and inefficient. I often included too many irrelevant details and often didn't flesh out my arguments enough to make them powerful. I had two options: write more to improve, or read more to see how the pros went about it, or.. well I could do both, but I'm also lazy, so I chose option #2. And I think it really helped! During the year, I read 100+ essays, and I wrote ~10. For the whole year, including trial exams, I only wrote ~10 essays. Sounds outrageous, but that's what I did and I think it worked quite well. I'm a very big fan of reflecting on what went wrong, taking steps to make it right, and then back yourself to do it. Spending a lot of time reading and just thinking about what quotes I could use to support what topic, were two things I found to be really valuable, and probably do go against the norm of just writing lots of essays. If I had my time again, would I write more? I probably would, but reading and thinking is just as important, if not more important in many regards. I got 44 raw.

Specialist Maths:
This was the other subject I put a lot of effort into. I really enjoyed this subject. As is widely known, there's no secret to becoming proficient at VCE maths, you just need to understand what's going on and then do lots of questions. I followed that age-old strategy, opting not to re-invent the wheel. So I did the standard "do all questions from the textbook", learn from mistakes, seek questions from elsewhere if I was struggling with a topic, etc. Those things were all good and everyone should do that. What I also found useful was making use of the bound reference form the get-go. I started to construct mine as I went through the year, adding theory and challenging questions as I went. I found that useful, because I could "revise" maths just by... you guessed it, reading! I could read my bound ref, look at the theory, look at the questions, reaffirm my knowledge. I found that useful, and I think it's underappreciated. I got 40 raw.

Chemistry:
Chem was a bit of a let-down to me, I came into it thinking it would be amazing, but it just wasn't as interesting as I'd have hoped. If I could do the course again, I'd make some changes to my tact. But what I did was to basically rock up to class, pay attention, read the textbook if I had any troubles, and then moved onto practice exams. That methodology was perhaps too arrogant. I should have written some notes, to say the least. I felt a lot of my understanding was quite superficial, and although I didn't have trouble with any topic, I probably would have done better had I taken the theory side of it a little more seriously. Practice exams though, are again a gold-mine for chem, great way to brush up on your areas on weakness. A common flaw I found in my VCE was that I didn't do enough prac papers, I probably did <15 for each chem exam I had (we had a mid-year one in 2011). This was probably mostly due to my own laziness, but I think you should be more until you're consistently getting scores you're happy with. I got ok scores, but not great scores, and not sure I was too happy with them. I got low 40s raw (can't remember now lol).

Maths Methods CAS:
This subject I treated with little respect. Being a "spesh student", I honestly considered myself a bit "above" for studying for this. This was obviously not the case, but I don't have too many regrets either. I did the hard yards for this subject in units 1/2, I nailed those concepts really well. Given 3/4 is basically 1/2 with different probability (or so it was when I did it), I had little issues with the subject. I learnt probability on the CAS on the go as I did prac papers, consulting the textbook when necessary. This, in retrospect, was a mistake as I only had a superficial understanding of some topics that came back to haunt me in my Exam 2 (eg. conditional prob). Furthermore, again, I didn't do enough prac papers. I probably didn't do any full Exam 2s, mainly due to laziness. Sit down for two hours straight doing maths? No thanks. If I had my time again, I'd slap that child and actually do them. I did however, do plenty of Exam 1s. The reason for that was "if I could do it by hand, obviously I could do it by CAS". And to a great extent, I feel that's true. But it's not completely true, and safe to say I ended up dropping marks on Exam 2. I got raw 46.

Bio:
I did this subject in Year 11. This was my first exposure to VCE, and unlike many Year 11s, I barely had any idea of what the ATAR was, what a study score comprised of, how well I needed to do to get a 40+, etc. Safe to say, I didn't put heaps of effort into my first semester and my Exam 1 result was disappointing. I didn't make notes, I hardly did prac papers, it was a disaster. During that term break, I had a lot to reflect on, I needed to save my study score. So I turned my year around, I made notes, I read heaps of study guides, did regular questions, went to revision lectures, made an account on AN (it was 'VN' back then), and I had quite a deep understanding of Unit 4. I think I only dropped a handful of marks in that exam. My advice would be to take this subject seriously, there's a lot of content and you need to be revise regularly. My course, med, is very similar, you can't remember it all the first time, you need to constantly read and re-read and re-re-read. The best thing to read is something you've written yourself, and thus I'd recommend making notes too. I got 42 raw.

Physics:
If you know of me on the forum, I really don't like this subject, reasons outlined here. My advice here is a testament to 'studying smart' and NOT 'studying hard'. I literally did no work at all for this subject until the night before the SACs or the exams. How? The cheat-sheet you get in VCE physics makes it possible to do relatively well without understanding anything (providing you have some basic understanding about maths - which I felt I had). If you have a good cheat-sheer that covers most bases, that works when you test it on a handful of past VCAA exams, then I think you're set. Minimal work, maximal gains. This is probably unique to physics. I got 41 raw.

Other studying things:
When I studied, I had study goals in mind. I didn't have a timetable, timetables are restrictive and boring. I had the thought of "I won't sleep unless x, y, and z" are done. And even if that meant I got 4 hours sleep because I procrastinated too much, so be it. Important to get things done, and get them done regularly. Something else I found useful was taking Friday nights off. No study at all on Fridays. I continue this throughout uni too. Taking time off is a /good/ thing, we all need time to recharge our batteries, I chose Fridays. Good chance to chill with the fam, watch some footy, have classic Friday night pizza, etc. You should never feel guilty for taking a break, you should feel guilty for procrastinating :P The last thing I found useful, was to not at all dwell on class rankings. I cannot change how someone else is doing, so why bother caring? Just do your own thing. VCE is grueling enough and has enough worries, don't add to those worries by wondering how everyone else's VCEs are going too.

So all-in-all, I think there are a few things that I did that most people don't do enough of:
- Reflect on everything. No point marking exams if you're going to improve on what you got wrong.
- Reading good quality resources is under-rated.
- Do enough prac exams such that you're meeting your goals. Keep doing them until you are, don't settle for less if you don't have to.
- Take breaks, but they have to really be breaks. Don't feel guilty about taking breaks, we all need them.
- Don't play the numbers game, play the 'do the best I can' game.

Good luck :)

edit: this post turned out to be a lot longer than planned, need to channel this energy into my thesis LOL

pi:
Going to double-post, but I'm a mod and I live on the edge.


--- Quote from: HughMungus on September 21, 2016, 07:51:14 pm ---if Hightide was a wart, which part of the body would he spread to first?

--- End quote ---

I would practice good preventative medicine and would never contract HighTide.


--- Quote from: Calebark on September 21, 2016, 07:59:02 pm ---How many digits of pi can you recite?

--- End quote ---

Like, 4 digits? There are two types of people in the world: those who live to recite pi, and those that appreciate pi and move on with life :)


--- Quote from: Calebark on September 21, 2016, 07:59:02 pm ---What's your favourite dog breed, and why is it a German Shepherd?

--- End quote ---




--- Quote from: Calebark on September 21, 2016, 07:59:02 pm ---What specialty is interesting you most right now?

--- End quote ---

Good question! I'm still a little torn between becoming a physician (ie. medical specialist, eg. neurologist) and a radiologist. I like those because there's a great deal of diagnostic thinking in both fields, which is one of the things I really love about medicine: it's a challenging puzzle and everyone is unique. Luckily I have got a rotation in each field next year, so I'll be able to *hopefully* clear things up more next year. But of the two right now, I'd be leaning towards becoming a physician, and in particular, neurology or rheumatology.

pi:
I'll triple post now, soz Aaron.


--- Quote from: n.a on September 21, 2016, 08:11:16 pm ---Monash Med vs UniMelb Postgrad Med? Non subjectively please.

--- End quote ---

Good question. I've gotten to know the UoM course quite well this year as I take some MD students for weekly tutes (I'm based at one of their clinical schools this year).

I think each has their merits. Without getting into the nitty-gritty of each course, here are some points to note:

Monash:
- If you want to do med after yr12, why wait? This is the course for you. 5 short snappy years, good uni, good teaching, very strong cohort. It's often said that the crème de la crème of VCE come to Monash medicine, and that's hard to argue with.
- Requires the UMAT. This test is dodgy. Lots of people who are genuinely intelligent people and would make great medical students, don't do well. Does this mean they're not suited for medicine? Of course not, it just means that perhaps on that particular day, their mind and the UMAT didn't tick in time. And that's ok. There's a fair big of luck involved in getting into Monash med.
- The 2 year pre-clin + 3 year clin strikes a nice balance. But I think a lot of students lose a lot of pre-clin knowledge as it isn't integrated well into the clinical years, especially anatomy and physiology. I believe the new MD model changes that in some regard, but I don't know much about it.
- Pre-clin years are in Clayton. Clayton is a hole. It's isolated, takes 30 mins to get to from the CBD, and has the Menzies. Not ideal.
- The cohort can be competitive, especially towards the end of fourth year. Expect this in any medical degree.

UoM:
- If you're not sure on med, taking the graduate pathway is the way for you. You get to dabble in the theory you go into in med, learn many concepts in more depth. That's a good thing, essentially gives you a couple extra pre-clin years. The UoM MD is essentially the crème de la crème of Biomed students, one could argue perhaps their cohort is inherently weaker than Monash because many didn't get into Monash, but I'd argue: who cares? We don't know why they didn't get in, and it doesn't matter. Both cohorts are strong in their own right.
- Requires the GAMSAT. I'm led to believe there is less luck involved in this test, it rewards effort. That's good for many people who weren't great at the UMAT.
- Course structure of 1 + 3 (or 2.5)... not a fan. You'd assume that MD1s retain a lot of knowledge from their Biomed/Sci degrees, I don't think this is the case in real life. I find that although they learnt a lot about x, y and z, they didn't learn to connect those different topics, and thus, knowledge was forgotten easily. Hence, most people don't find MD1 the walk in the park it should be. It's a tough year. Their clinical years have a similar structure to Monash, it's a good one.
- You're based next to the CBD, brilliant location!
- From most accounts, the Biomed cohort can get a bit savage, especially when it comes to the GAMSAT. Heard too many stories supporting that claim for me to believe it would be possible to avoid that atmosphere throughout the degree. You'll probably encounter it at some point. I don't like that. This is less-so at Monash.

So that's my run-down. Each course has pros and cons, but wouldn't be up to me to say which is /better/. Monash was better for me because I knew what I wanted.

HughMungus:
What in the name of all that is holy, made you study physics, the love of your life at MHS???? Was it the bad influence of HT?

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