Finishing a subject before school starts

[kurrymuncher]

Does anyone have any experiences of finishing a subject before year 12 actually started. What are the advantages and disadvantages?

[ShadowSong]

I dont but I can guess some possible pros and cons for it.

Pro:
1. Ahead of the class, you would have more knowledge of what you are going to be taught
2. Will not need to concentrate as much in class and can do other subjects' work
3. Relearning the subject from the teacher would merely become refreshing your memory as you have already completed it.

Con:
1. You might become overconfident in your knowledge of the course and neglect to do any revision.
2. Your concentration in class will become mundane as you become less focused and bored of what the teacher is teaching as you know what is being taught already.
3. Your fellow students might start calling you a nerd and become pissed at you when they see you do not need to do the work set as you know it all already. The teacher might also become pissed at you as you try to take over the class and teach in a more efficient way rather than listen to the teacher's ramblings in a completely old fashioned method that is troublesome and impossible to understand.

Ignore the last con, I should be going to sleep, lol.

So yeh, thats all i have in this moment in time.

[NE2000]

It depends who you are really...that is, you have to judge it based on how much you know yourself and how you are going to respond to having done all the work in the holidays..

ShadowSong's first two cons are all problems with your response to being ahead of class. People calling you a nerd is something that you shouldn't care about but I dunno it depends on what's best for you.

[ShadowSong]

Indeed, it depends on what kind of person you are. The slack type? Or the hardworking type? Different people react to different situations and circumstances. I was listing the pros and cons as how I would percieve it.

Even so, many people do not like being called a 'nerd'. Even if some laugh it off, it sticks and becomes annoying. Many succumb to peer pressure and would try to dumb to themselves down to fit in. Alas, it is popular in Australia. The Tall Poppy Syndrome.

A problem in society where the majority is glorified in their averageness and where the ones ahead of the herd are shunned and pulled back into the fold. (Sage Voice, lols.)

[elle.123]

if you do end up doing that, you have to be careful that you don't burn out by the time you reach the exams

[Eriny]

Finishing the course during the holidays is good if you remain hardworking throughout the rest of the year as essentially, after learning the course all you'll be doing is revision and refinement. However, I for instance, wouldn't have had any chance whatsoever of learning the methods course entirely on my own, I would have needed some assistance. Also, it's very difficult to have the motivation to do a years worth of work over a few weeks.

If you do decide to finish the course, make sure it's one that you personally find relatively easy to understand. Take extremely good and detailed notes from your text book and do practice questions from your textbook to make sure that you are actually digesting all of the information. Read over all the notes you've made every day so that you don't forget what you have learned.

This is a very big task! You do get some benefit from it, but it certainly isn't required to get a 50 in the subjects. You need to also make sure you actually get a break these holidays too because you won't get another proper one until November.

[hard]

pppppppppppppppppppppppfffffffffffffffft seriously guys there is no point finishing the subject before school starts. Rather, get ahead in your subject (maybe 3 chapters) so that as your class move along, you will be revising in class while moving on at home. It's a much less strenuous workload and you get to relax a bit. don't be a fucking study zombie. it won't e worth it when you finish school.

[Glockmeister]

Bec sorta studied ahead of her cohort didn't she? She did pretty well so I hear.

[Mao]

Studying ahead is essential, but I am against finishing a subject before school starts. The textbook can only teach you so many things, and by all means it does not prepare you completely for what's in store. You may have the patience to listen in class in the first few weeks of the term, but believe me when I say that you will lose interest altogether in class, and miss out on a lot of important things that actually becomes useful.

Staying a month or two ahead of the class is recommended, but any more can be disastrous, unless you have self discipline at a magnitude of Chuck Norris.

[shinny]

...unless you have self discipline at a magnitude of Chuck Norris.

We all know that's impossible (nothing can be equal to Chuck Norris), so basically don't do it IMO. What I'd actually advise is to go over your unit 1/2 stuff and this'll probably help you more than anything, especially for subjects like Methods, Spesh and Chem. Both maths had stuff which was pretty much strictly unit 1/2 stuff in the exam this year (both of which screwed me over) and Chemistry is inherently based on unit 1/2 and you'll get quite confused if you lack the foundations. Just going over the covalent/ionic/metallic/dispersion/hydrogen bonding section will help you ALOT (which I ironically screwed up today on this forum <_<) in a lot of topics without you even realising. Things will just start to make sense if you understand these basic fundamentals of Chemistry which you don't relearn in units 3/4. I stayed with the class the entire year for all my subs, and well, I guess I did fine. But yes, going ahead does help a bit if you're willing to put in the work, but it's not essential to do well.

[NE2000]

...unless you have self discipline at a magnitude of Chuck Norris.

We all know that's impossible (nothing can be equal to Chuck Norris), so basically don't do it IMO. What I'd actually advise is to go over your unit 1/2 stuff and this'll probably help you more than anything, especially for subjects like Methods, Spesh and Chem. Both maths had stuff which was pretty much strictly unit 1/2 stuff in the exam this year (both of which screwed me over) and Chemistry is inherently based on unit 1/2 and you'll get quite confused if you lack the foundations. Just going over the covalent/ionic/metallic/dispersion/hydrogen bonding section will help you ALOT (which I ironically screwed up today on this forum <_<) in a lot of topics without you even realising. Things will just start to make sense if you understand these basic fundamentals of Chemistry which you don't relearn in units 3/4. I stayed with the class the entire year for all my subs, and well, I guess I did fine. But yes, going ahead does help a bit if you're willing to put in the work, but it's not essential to do well.

Do you know anyone in your MHS cohort that finished a subject before school started? How did they repsond to knowing everything already?

[Jeffree]

you won't finish a subject before school starts.

[/0]

you won't finish a subject before school starts.

yeah you can lol

[NE2000]

you won't finish a subject before school starts.

er...why not...

for a maths subject I would say doing all the questions from the textbook and understanding everything = finishing the subject before school starts

for a science subject it's a bit more vague I guess because there's a lot more theoretical knowledge to gain before you can attempt any questions.

and I don't think you ever finish English......you just get better at it

[hard]

...unless you have self discipline at a magnitude of Chuck Norris.

We all know that's impossible (nothing can be equal to Chuck Norris), so basically don't do it IMO. What I'd actually advise is to go over your unit 1/2 stuff and this'll probably help you more than anything, especially for subjects like Methods, Spesh and Chem. Both maths had stuff which was pretty much strictly unit 1/2 stuff in the exam this year (both of which screwed me over) and Chemistry is inherently based on unit 1/2 and you'll get quite confused if you lack the foundations. Just going over the covalent/ionic/metallic/dispersion/hydrogen bonding section will help you ALOT (which I ironically screwed up today on this forum <_<) in a lot of topics without you even realising. Things will just start to make sense if you understand these basic fundamentals of Chemistry which you don't relearn in units 3/4. I stayed with the class the entire year for all my subs, and well, I guess I did fine. But yes, going ahead does help a bit if you're willing to put in the work, but it's not essential to do well.

yer i hate that. It gets so boring re-learning units 1/2 crap but i might go back and look at the hydrogen, covalent dipole-dipole etc bondings. I kinda forgot about them.