Need some advice regarding getting feedback

[shaner]

Hey guys!

I've always heard that re-writes in English is very important as it allows you to refine your ideas and clear your expression. I get this but the problem is that I'm very anxious and I can't seem to do it. I want to, but when I get down to actually doing it I question my writing ability and the eventual feedback that it's pretty bad and needs soo many changes which leads me to thinking I'm hopeless and in the end I end up not actually doing the work which sucks.

So my question to you guys is how do you actually start your re-writes and work with the feedback when it's given back?

[hi.itsjessi]

Hihi!

Ok, first thing's first, you need to calm down. Potentially performing badly in your assessment, (especially one which you struggle in, from what I gather) does NOT mean your life is over, therefore you should't feel so suffocated. Unless you're a genius, chances are that your results will fluctuate and fall back down again through out the course of the HSC- and this applies to any subject, not just English! So take it from someone who's gone from sitting at rank 30 to now top 10 in maths, it's so much better to stuff up now, where you KNOW you can improve rather than in the actual HSC exam, am I right? 

So now that we've gotten that out of the way, what I like to do is to sit down and have a little re-read of my past responses. I take this time to really look into my writing and analyse, where I didn't get my marks, where I ACTUALLY attained marks and why my teacher / peers did't like certain aspects of my responses. With me, I tend to be a little verbose when I write my responses and if not, I tend to forget to link it back to the main ideas behind the stimulus / question. Don't think of this as time to bash yourself over why you may have gotten 9/15, what you want to be doing is understanding where you went wrong and try to be positive that you have a chance to really improve from your previous mark! I can understand that you feel intimidated by everything but think about it this way- if you do shit in an assessment, what's the point in bashing yourself over it? That wont change what's already happened, it's in the past, but what you can do, is improve yourself so that you attain better marks the next time around- something you can really influence!

Next thing I make a list of all the things that went wrong, and I make changes accordingly, to the response which I have already written for the assessment. This takes a while, but by perfecting this one particular response, what you have done, is create a response which can be moulded into any question that's thrown at you. If it was an essay, for example, that essay becomes a base for you to mould and work with when it comes to future assessments- you already know it's amazing because you made it that way; all you have to do is change the thesis around, make sure your evidence links back to your new thesis / question and you're set!

Last thing- I get people to check the essay which I have perfected. You can post it to the marking section of ATAR Notes where moderators, graduates and fellow students doomed to sit the HSC with us can view and give you more, really great feedback for your essay. From here, the cycle begins again! There's always something to improve and I don't think that's something to be scared of  Everyone on here is extremely kind and helpful- no one judges you because we can all agree that we're in this together, so it's better to be kind and support each other!

Grab your teachers to look through your responses again, grab students who you KNOW excel in English and ask them for their feedback (or even ask to look at their essay to see what they're doing and what's so unique about them), or if you're like me and you have cousins which have obtained a great ATAR, ask them for their feedback too! After I know I've done the best that I can with a particular response, from here, it's practising your responses. I take a look at past HSC questions and to the best of my ability, I think of how I would approach that particular question, using my perfected response to shape into it accordingly! See how it relates back to what I said previously? 

So all in all, don't feel so trapped when it comes to re-writing you responses, everybody always has something which they can improve on and right now, it's just a matter of making the most of your time! Believe in yourself and stay positive, the only thing you can really do is your best. Use your mistakes as a platform to become better because you don't stop learning until the last minutes before the HSC exam.

I honestly hope this helps, good luck friend!