Since you started primary school, school holidays have been a staple. The glorious last day of term, the even more glorious first day of holidays, and the gloriously horrible Sunday night feels on the final day of the school holiday period.
But this holiday period is a little different. Why? Because it’s the final one. Ever.
Of course, you might now be wondering how to best use this final holiday period in order to maximise your marks, and to best prepare for your end-of-year exams. Here are some of our thoughts.
1. Try to put the past in the past.
At this point, there’s nothing you can do about your internal performance throughout the year. And whether you’re happy with your marks or not, it’s probably best to, within reason, move them to the back of your mind if possible.
If you’re happy with your marks so far…
That’s awesome, and you should be chuffed with your performance! Getting through the year to this point with good marks is a genuinely great achievement.
However, here are some things to keep in mind.
Internal marks themselves really aren’t that important. Now, that’s not to say that they don’t matter – because they do – but raw marks aren’t really considered. What that means is that sitting on a 95% average by no means guarantees you a 95.00 ATAR. This is all a bit complicated, but you can read a bit more about how the system works here (for VCE) and here (for HSC).
With that in mind, the best thing you can do is to work on qualitative feedback. Try to work with your teachers to identify your weaker points, and then work hard on those points. Turn them into strengths.
You still have time to improve before exams. Genuinely. And the time between now and then really can make a difference. You’ve got this. 👊
If you’re not happy with your marks so far…
That sucks, and we’re sorry to hear it. Those feelings are totally valid and, naturally, you’re well and truly in your rights to feel whatever you do.
However, here are some things to keep in mind.
Internal marks themselves really aren’t that important. Now, that’s not to say that they don’t matter – because they do – but raw marks aren’t really considered. What that means is that it’s very fruitless to spend ages and ages being annoyed about that 15% you dropped on one of your assessments. This is all a bit complicated, but you can read a bit more about how the system works here (for VCE) and here (for HSC).
With that in mind, the best thing you can do is to work on qualitative feedback. Try to work with your teachers to identify your weaker points, and then work hard on those points. Turn them into strengths.
You still have time to improve before exams. Genuinely. And the time between now and then really can make a difference. You’ve got this. 👊
2. Hit up those practice questions.
There are heaps of ways you can study. Literally thousands. And if you feel as though your current study techniques aren’t that effective, it would probably make sense to mix it up and try something new.
But in general, completing practice questions and practice exams is one of the more popular study strategies before the exam period – and for good reason. Completing practice questions, and completing them well, is a really great way of preparing yourself for what’s to come.
So – what do we mean by “completing them well”?
Doing practice exams for the sake of it is pretty pointless; in all likelihood, you won’t get that much out of it. But if you’re meticulous in each exam, going through and marking them, working out where you went wrong, and working on those errors, that’s where the real improvement is likely to come.
There’s no good answer to the good ol’ question: “how many practice exams should I do?” It’s just not a helpful question, to be honest, because it depends so much on how you do them.
3. Start to get into the exam mindset.
Further to getting through the past papers, you can also prepare for exams in other ways. For example, you can look through the example timetable (here for VCE, here for HSC) and see when your exams will be. Then, you can be strategic in terms of the times you study for certain papers.
That is, if you have a maths exam at 4.00pm in the afternoon, it would make sense to practise that subject, where possible, at a similar time. If you’ve done all of your math exam revision early in the morning, and then have your actual exam in the mid-late afternoon, you might walk in to the exam hall with a completely different mindset to what you’ve been used to. And that might affect your marks.
It’s for this reason (and others) that staying up revising through the night might not be the most effective tactic available to you. Remember: your actual exams won’t be at 3.30am.
4. Don’t study 24/7.
You need to rest. Elite sportspeople don’t train 24/7 for the weeks before a grand final or huge event. That would be silly, because they’d be unnecessarily putting themselves at risk of injury or burnout. And the same holds true for your exams. If you try to go too hard, too early – or too hard for too long – you’ll have to face the consequences of doing so.
Instead, make sure you remain balanced in your approach. Continue doing the things you enjoy doing. Good preparation does not simply mean “start as much as you can!!11!!1!!!!!!one!!1!!” – it’s a lot more nuanced than that.
5. Soak it all up.
And finally, this period is really what you’ve been building toward for some decade. Whilst it might feel burdensome or stressful or whatever at the moment, it’s definitely a life experience. For the most part, you only go through Year 12 once – try to enjoy it if you can!
