Ideal number of VCE subjects in Year 12?

[schmalex]

3 and a uni subject. and Aim to put one of them in your bottom two. Worked for me.

[Predator]

Wow doing four Year 12 subjects in Year 11 would be fairly busy.
The purpose of doing one or two in Year 11 is to get used to the study workload and the whole exam thing under different conditions as a method of prep for the year ahead.

I think doing 5 is the max you would want to do.
Any more than this you will be struggling and stressing over a heavy workload.
I don't know much about the uni enhancement stuff so I can't say how the workload works.

[dyaner]

I did seven in total for my VCE. It was two busy years. I did 2 in Year 11, normally I should be allowed to do 4 the year after. My school forbade me to do only 4 so I had to squish in another subject...

Ideally, if the system hasn't changed I would do about 4 and focus on those only 4 (English can be included in this).

[vexx]

4+uni subject, already done 2 in year 11, i would say is the best..

[vea]

IMO the 2+4 path is better than the 1+5. If you're going to do 5 in year 12, you should know which ones are going to be your top 4 and which ones are going to be the bottom 2.

[stonecold]

4+uni subject, already done 2 in year 11, i would say is the best..

+1

I was going to say the exact same thing. 

[Duck]

I feel like I didn't plan at all after reading all this. I did one in year 11 and did alright (not great) then 5 in year 12 and applied myself equally to all of them and got 99.00. I don't really think it matters all that much. If you are intelligent and study hard (and efficiently) then you will do well.

[luken93]

I did 1 last year, 4 + 1 Uni subject this year.

My 3/4 last year was a good insurance policy, but with a bit of luck it could hopefully be in my bottom 2 along with Uni Chem. I reckon it's worked out well, I can apply myself equally to my 4 this year, and if I do badly in one I still have an insurance policy to create a strong top 4, but if I do well in all 4 then I will have an even stronger ATAR

[horizon]

friend did:

4 in yr eleven and 3 in yr 12.

before he had even got into yr 12 he already had an atar of 96.

Which four subjects got him a 96 before year 12? WOW.

[thushan]

I would say to each their own - if you want to do more subjects because you are really interested in them, then I say go for it! You might say that the workload would be unnecessarily large, but you would have less of a workload than one might think because you would absorb the material easily if you like the subject. You would not need to study too hard to understand a concept if you are interested in it.

For example I'm doing 2 + 6 (if you count uni enhancement) but I like all of the subjects, and it'd be good to keep me busy and on my toes rather than idle. I considered dropping one, but I had no idea what I could drop, because I like all of my subjects.

[Pixon]

I would say to each their own - if you want to do more subjects because you are really interested in them, then I say go for it! You might say that the workload would be unnecessarily large, but you would have less of a workload than one might think because you would absorb the material easily if you like the subject. You would not need to study too hard to understand a concept if you are interested in it.

For example I'm doing 2 + 6 (if you count uni enhancement) but I like all of the subjects, and it'd be good to keep me busy and on my toes rather than idle. I considered dropping one, but I had no idea what I could drop, because I like all of my subjects.

I think this is partially true; the problem that arises is that students don't have the liberty to take up so many subjects purely out of enjoyment. Whilst for thushan, 6 subjects seems like a slight challenge that will keep him from being idle, most can't cope with the number of subjects. I know personally I would have loved to have taken Philosophy, but it's just not plausible to do 7 subjects in year 12 and despite my very keen interest, I couldn't have taken it up. Yes, it may be easier to absorb the material because you like the subject but it's still an added work load and unfortunately all vce subjects require a lot of work to get high scores no matter how smart you are. There's also the fact that a strong passion for a subject can quickly turn around with bad marks.
I think this is why the 1+5 is so common; it fulfills the max VCE subjects counted and 6 subjects is enough to keep people satisfied with their education without being too strenuous.

[thushan]

I would say to each their own - if you want to do more subjects because you are really interested in them, then I say go for it! You might say that the workload would be unnecessarily large, but you would have less of a workload than one might think because you would absorb the material easily if you like the subject. You would not need to study too hard to understand a concept if you are interested in it.

For example I'm doing 2 + 6 (if you count uni enhancement) but I like all of the subjects, and it'd be good to keep me busy and on my toes rather than idle. I considered dropping one, but I had no idea what I could drop, because I like all of my subjects.

I think this is partially true; the problem that arises is that students don't have the liberty to take up so many subjects purely out of enjoyment. Whilst for thushan, 6 subjects seems like a slight challenge that will keep him from being idle, most can't cope with the number of subjects. I know personally I would have loved to have taken Philosophy, but it's just not plausible to do 7 subjects in year 12 and despite my very keen interest, I couldn't have taken it up. Yes, it may be easier to absorb the material because you like the subject but it's still an added work load and unfortunately all vce subjects require a lot of work to get high scores no matter how smart you are. There's also the fact that a strong passion for a subject can quickly turn around with bad marks.
I think this is why the 1+5 is so common; it fulfills the max VCE subjects counted and 6 subjects is enough to keep people satisfied with their education without being too strenuous.

7 subjects in a year would have taken it way too far...
And it's only because I really like all my subjects that 6 subjects is doable. Otherwise I would never cope with the workload

[luken93]

Also depends on your school, I've seen some examples above of several schools who make students do 5 subs in year 12, while mine doesn't allow 2 3/4's in year 11.

Overall though, I think it really depends on how well you've done in your Year 11 3/4s as to how many you want to do. If you're happy for those scores to be in your top 4, well then you may be happy to do less, but if you feel you need more then you can do more

[EvangelionZeta]

I will say that PEGS might be an example of a school where it's just "normal" to do six subjects in year 12.  Don't know why nobody does a 3/4 in year 11, but seriously, they get a ridiculous number of high achievers.

[luken93]

I will say that PEGS might be an example of a school where it's just "normal" to do six subjects in year 12.  Don't know why nobody does a 3/4 in year 11, but seriously, they get a ridiculous number of high achievers.

I was gonna say, they always feature at the top of Total Scores in the Study Score Archive