Hey, Justin_L!
A warm welcome to the forums :D I'm super excited to read your journal and to see more of your involvement here!
Your priorities are looking great! In particular, I'd try and nail out whatever you can of your Major Works because the term will get busy again really quickly and getting ahead for those will be ideal. Even if you just make a clear action plan and get into a groove of doing a little each day, you'll find that it makes an enormous difference on how motivated you stay for the rest of the year.
I'd definitely also get a head start on your Module B prescribed text! It always makes me relieved to find students who are willing to get a head start on their texts because it makes life incredibly easier. Shakespeare's super lengthy and challenging in any circumstance but this module particularly demands you to know the text inside out. That being said, I wouldn't say reading Shakespeare is as bad as reading academic journals on JSTOR. I think both have value and merit to academic study and while I understand they're not really the most exhilarating things to do and perhaps aren't so in line with your future prospects, I'd be mindful about making statements like that just because there are people who probably enjoy both (like myself, funnily enough) or who aren't fortunate enough to have access to the learning resources you do.
Hey Angelina,
Thanks for the warm welcome! I'll definitely take a look at all those resources you linked, they look really helpful! About my comment about JSTOR and Shakespeare, I definitely wasn't intending to downplay the value of either, I agree that both are incredibly useful, just hard to understand sometimes. I'm really grateful that our school encourages us to study more complex texts and academic interpretations because they've definitely been useful in getting to understand things at a deeper level.
Hey Justin,
Keen to read your journal! :D What are you doing for your history extension major?
Heyo Justin! Bit late to the party- wanted to ask what they teach in Entertainment :) Is this more of film/tv stuff or theatre stuff or something completely different?
Hey Justin!
Your History Project topic sounds really interesting! I hope you can update us on more of it. And don't worry too much about your Maths exam, it's only one internal assessment out of all your subjects. Good luck for reaching your deadlines in week 3 :)
Well, your start to the term definitely sounds pretty hectic! It's good to hear that you've been managing your workload, despite time constraints and other difficulties. Good luck with all your upcoming assessments!
It's been a pretty bad week tbh. I have multiple assessments to prep for, but I just spent most of my time in bed looking at Tik Tok and youtube. I have no idea why I've suddenly just lost all motivation.
I'm really worried about my schoolwork though. I've just caught up on Maths Extension, but I'm at least 3 weeks behind in advanced (I never did catch up from online learning) and I haven't done a single practice response for Modern. Worst, I have no idea how to write my History Extension essay. I have a solid proposal, case studies, sources, but I just can't seem to put words on a page. Everything I write feels like I'm just rewording/summarising my historians.
It's been much better today though. I resolved to delete tik tok and caught up on a lot of my overdue homework. Libraries reopen tomorrow, and I'm planning to make full use of them - I am so done with learning from home. I also watched a few lectures by Richard Buckland about communication and security engineering today. He's an absolutely amazing professor with a lot of good insights into education and cybersecurity, and I'd highly recommend his content if you're interested in any of those fields.
Hey y'all,
It's been a pretty bad week tbh. I have multiple assessments to prep for, but I just spent most of my time in bed looking at tik tok and youtube. I have no idea why I've suddenly just lost all motivation.
I'm really worried about my schoolwork though. I've just caught up on Maths Extension, but I'm at least 3 weeks behind in advanced (I never did catch up from online learning) and I haven't done a single practice response for Modern. Worst, I have no idea how to write my History Extension essay. I have a solid proposal, case studies, sources, but I just can't seem to put words on a page. Everything I write feels like I'm just rewording/summarising my historians.
It's been much better today though. I resolved to delete tik tok and caught up on a lot of my overdue homework. Libraries reopen tomorrow, and I'm planning to make full use of them - I am so done with learning from home. I also watched a few lectures by Richard Buckland about communication and security engineering today. He's an absolutely amazing professor with a lot of good insights into education and cybersecurity, and I'd highly recommend his content if you're interested in any of those fields.
EDIT: Reworded my last comment to be closer to what I intended to say
Oh damn, that formatting came out much worse than I was expecting. I'll try and separate stuff using more colour, bold, and line breaks.
So, I have a couple of things I need to prepare for this holiday. I'm going to list them out in priority order so I can reference this later on.
Priority 1 (Assessments)
1. Software Major Work (Weighted)
2. History Extension Major Work (Weighted)
3. Maths Extension Half Yearly (Unweighted due to corona)
Priority 2 (Homework)
1. Read King Henry IV (Module B)
2. Polish up general notes for all subjects
3. Misc.
Anyways, this is just a general list to get my thoughts together, I'm obviously going to break this down into subtasks and all that tomorrow. I dread the thought of touching any of my major works so much because it just seems so massive, but it also makes the most sense since those are guaranteed to still be weighted. Luckly, they're both internally assessed so they haven't been impacted by the NESA's new rulings.
P.S. If anyone has any tips on understanding Shakespeare or on KHIV, hit me up because I find reading Shakespeare harder than reading actual academic publications.
snip
I have a list of ALL the work I have not done (you know, those times when you have a casual teacher and you get textbooks for the whole lesson), and that list is pretty substantial - not excessive, but not small either. I realised I was wasting my time by trying to tick off everything on that list, since I was just taking the attention off of what was currently going on in class.
I'm having the exact same problem with my History Project! I feel like I'm not even writing an essay - it just sounds like I'm summarising my research. Though I'm not behind on schoolwork, I would like to be further ahead for trials preparation, so I'm planning to spend more breaks in the library studying, and utilising all my free time to make sure I'm not cramming for trials.
oh dang man, lmaooo, i just realised your first post was in april! you fire bro, also, I took inspo from alice's format which was infact ur format ;D damn things got real meta real fast, jus want to say thanks! everything is so noice n pretty, i love it n hope you don't mind me also taking inspo from it n yeahhh, looking forward to reading more updates hehe
Hey y'all! Just wanted to give a quick update as a precursor to probably another big post tomorrow/later.
I'm listening to my old playlists I've built up over the past few years, and I'm being hit by massive waves of nostalgia. I'm not a particularly musical person, but I am a member of my schools crew, which means I've attended pretty much every single disco, talent show, or otherwise vaguely musical event. I've built up my music library painstakingly over the years, and so every single song is a throwback for me because I can remember the exact year and event where I first heard it.
Now that I'm almost halfway through Term 2 and received my HSC timetable, it's only now that I'm really grasping how final this all is. With all events cancelled, I'm probably never going to crew another disco. I'm not going to come to school on Saturdays to build props. To stay back after school and go on Maccas runs with the rest of the crew, then come back run sound for Night of Stars. To stay back til midnight bumping out lights and then heading to afters. I might keeping doing this sort of thing after, but it won't be this crew, or this school.
I don't know, I'm probably being irrational. But I've done these events every single year, without fail no matter what. I remember last year when I had an English assignment due during our musical week, and I ended up arriving home at 11, pulling an all nighter to get it done (My first!), handing it in the next day, and going back to calling cues that night with the help of some coffee.
Part of me wants to stay in high school forever, but the other part wants to just get this over and done with, to head off to Uni and start anew. Everything just feels wrong, because Term 2 shouldn't feel like the endgame but it somehow does. All of my hand ins and major works will be done by the end of this term, after which it'll be trials. I know that I'm romanticizing the past, and that's fine. When I look back, I'd like to look back without regret. I suppose that one of the key defining things of this year will be my atar, which will either make or break my year. Weird how my entire experience will be defined by one number. If I get a "good" number, it'll all have been "worth it", and I'll look back with satisfaction. If it's a "bad" number, I'll have looked back with regret, that I could have done more, spent less time procrastinating or on hobbies, etc etc. I know atar isn't the only option forward but it sure makes life a hell of a lot simpler if I just get my desired atar.
Although now that I mention it, I'm not sure whether I want to look back on the truth or on a romanticized version of the truth. I mean, we all know memories are unreliable. With no other evidence, how do I know that what I remember is an accurate depiction of the past? A journal like this only captures my thoughts at any given point in time, but can words truly convey all the work that has led to that moment? I'm probably going into 1984 territory here, but now that I think of it, how can you be sure that something really happened if not for your own memories? I'm sorry about going way off topic here but I'm going to check out the History Extension Discussion Thread or I don't know, there are so many things that need answering that I don't know and probably won't know the answer to.
I'm really sorry, this was suppose to be a quick update and not a brain dump but I'll hopefully be back later to edit this into something that makes sense.
Thanks Darcy! Lot's of good practical tips and advice in there, I might message you for a few questions later down the track if that's alright.
That's a really good point, there's so much that I "should" do and not enough time to do all of it. In terms of homework, our teachers are giving us sane amounts but it's can be difficult when you're studying for exams and you have to just go through a massive chunk of content at once. That's definitely a good tactic though, although a bit of a slippery slope for me since I've done this in the past and it's come back to bite me when we start building on previous content, especially in subjects like math.
Exactly!!!
haha, thanks fluffysama, sorry for all the meta I suppose studying metaphysical poetry for english got into me.
Thanks everyone, I really appreciate all the support! I have a math test tomorrow and I've sort of accepted that I'm sort of screwed but that seems to be a bit of a recurring theme for me and math. I've got so much stuff I want to write about but I'm going to be responsible, do some last minute math revision, and write about it tomorrow.SpoilerOne tangent I will go off on is that today, our cohort gathered at lunch to watch one of our classmates eat a whole chocolate mudcake and chug a 2L bottle of milk. I'm not sure if they were trying to replicate the chocolate cake scene from Matilda, but sometimes, moments like these make me question... everything.
justin bro, doode, man, bruv,
I love that spoiler,
the boys at my school did something similar but not as cool,
they smashed an apple with their head, 1v1 typa thing, was a highlight, defining moment in our school history
I finished my History Extension today!!! I cannot begin to describe the satisfaction I had when I signed off on that declaration sheet and handed my essay in. Quite fittingly, it was my very last assessment this term, and thus my last hand in assessment ever! It's all downhill from here, whoo!Congrat's on submitting your History Extension Major Work!
Now it's just finishing off the week and getting my holiday plans in order! There is so much to do, and so little time. I'd like to start working on some side projects, but I probably won't have the time. I've been looking into alternate entry programs like UNSW FEAS, since I'm a bit skeptical I can hit a 90+ ATAR with my current grades, especially my math. We shall see.Highly recommend applying to UNSW FEAS!! I have many friends who got into engineering through FEAS so it's a great opportunity for anyone even if they were confident in getting 90+ :) Although I will say, don't lost hope on that 90+ ATAR. A lot of students tend to be pleasantly surprised with their ATAR ;)
Hey y'all,
I finished my History Extension today!!! I cannot begin to describe the satisfaction I had when I signed off on that declaration sheet and handed my essay in. Quite fittingly, it was my very last assessment this term, and thus my last hand in assessment ever! It's all downhill from here, whoo!
Congrats on handing in your history extension major!! :D
Congrat's on submitting your History Extension Major Work!
Highly recommend applying to UNSW FEAS!! I have many friends who got into engineering through FEAS so it's a great opportunity for anyone even if they were confident in getting 90+ :) Although I will say, don't lost hope on that 90+ ATAR. A lot of students tend to be pleasantly surprised with their ATAR ;)
OH MY GOSH!!! I am so happy for you, congrats! That must feel AMAZING. Enjoy the rest of this week to mentally prepare for the studying ahead :(
Term 2 Review
A week into T2 holidays, I thought it's be helpful to review the past term and my progress so I can plan out what to focus on and what I have to prep for next term. Term 2 definitely didn't go how I wanted it to go, but I'm mostly satisfied with how I did. Our school refuses to give ranks, so I'm just going to guesstimate how I'm doing in each subject. While I like the idea behind it because it discourages petty competition over ranks, it also makes it a bit hard to tell how you're progressing.
English
To be honest I feel like I haven't learnt anything at all this year in English. All we really did this term was a "dramatic reading" of the play, as well our Craft of Writing task, which I'd pretty much drafted over the T1 holidays and only needed to polish up. Upside of that task is that I have a fairly polished Persuasive and Imaginative done, although my Discursives are still terrible. I'm hovering just below a A range level based off my marks, so I'd really like to change that around for trials. In terms of rank, I'm probably somewhere in the middle of our cohort.
In terms of trials, I think I might be slightly screwed considering the last time I handwrote an English essay was for Yr 11 Yearlies. That's really my fault, nothing I can say about that. Right now I think the best thing I can do is to start constructing quote tables for all of my texts, so that I can start building up modular paragraphs to mix and match later. It's super time consuming though, and hard to know where to even start. I've decided to group them thematically, which seems to be working well so far.
Maths
I've looked through my advanced paper, and I think I mostly went wrong in that in the beginning, I realized I forgot my calculator and panicked. I lost around the first ~5 minutes of the exam because I had to ask for permission to go out and get it, and then I came back flustered and ended up making lots of silly errors in the first few pages of the exam. I also didn't properly understand integration, which lost me a whole lot of marks. I think that if I had done the exam with a clear head and even a basic understanding of integration, I could have easily lifted my mark from a 30% to a 60%.
In terms of extension, I didn't get much of a chance to look at it and so I really can't say where I went wrong. I suppose it does make sense though, because the exam tested Trigonometry and Calculus, which have always been my weakest areas and couldn't have been remediated with any sort of last minute study. There is a massive amount of content I need to cover for trials, so I suppose the only thing I can do is crunch through as much as reasonable. I'm going to focus on the core skills like integration, so that I lose as few marks as possible on foundational content. Luckily, I'm doing 12 units so only 1 unit of math will be counted in my ATAR assuming I do well in all my other subjects.
History
History's been going well, I'm consistently getting high marks and I'm guessing I'm probably in the top 10 at our school for Modern. I'm mainly worried about Russia and the Soviet Union and the Arab Israeli conflict, since those are guaranteed essay responses and my weakest areas. I have a solid set of notes and readings from our teacher's powerpoints and handouts, so I'm going to focus on making detail tables and consolidating my knowledge, especially for the core study which was a while ago. I also need to revise all my content for extension, seeing as I haven't touched constructing history in over a term. Our teacher did say she'd go over the entire process how to formulate a history extension response next term which is quite reassuring.
Tech
Software and Entertainment are going well, we've finished all course content and it's such a small and highly skilled class that ranks are largely irrelevant. Just past papers from here out, although the thought of it is super tiring considering each paper is 3 hours. Even if I do the paper in sections, just the mere thought is tiring. Still, I'm quite optimistic.
Trials, Holiday, and Careers Stuff
I've been taking things easy for the past week, and taking advantage of a more laid back schedule. I think online learning has really helped for my self discipline and organisation, in that I've been able to keep up my regular day and sleep schedules more or less. I've been catching up on a lot of things that I didn't have the chance to properly watch or read through during the term, particularly some of Richard Buckland's videos. He has some really cool insights into education and computing, which gives a good insight into some of the courses I may want to do if I end up at UNSW.
On that note, I've been reconsidering a lot of my uni preferences. Originally, I wanted to study a combined Advanced Computing / International Security degree at ANU, but with the new fee changes and resurgence of covid, studying a double computing and humanities degree interstate doesn't make much sense with increased fees and the distinct possibility of a resurgence in travel restrictions, considering how covid is performing globally.
I haven't put together my UAC preferences yet, but I'm probably going to redo all of my planning on what unis I want to apply for. I have an ANU Early Entry application active right now, so I'm waiting to see how that pans out. I'm planning on applying to the next round of UNSW FEAS, now that I'm not sure if I want to go to ANU. I'm not sure how many rounds there actually are or how it affects my application, but I'd like to polish up my previous projects a bit so that I can talk about them.
Anyways, that's about it for now. There's so much to do and think about, and I've been keeping quite busy despite the laid back break. This turned into a massive info dump, and if you actually bothered to read the whole thing, my sincerest apologies. Hope you've all been well, and good luck for the new term!
EDIT: 50th post, and am now a "Forum Regular". Not sure if this is a good thing or not 🤔
Hey! Glad to hear you're doing well
i wanted to get into ANU TOOOOO!!! its me and Alice's dream uni!!! I hope if we all get in we can actually do a meet up or sum!! congrats on being "forum regular"!!
Hey! Seeing all the people starting or have started their trials this week, I just wanted to wish you all the best of luck! It's been a pleasure reading all your journals, and I'm sure you'll all smash it! I'm starting my trials tomorrow, but seeing every else going through the same thing has been reassuring in a weird sort of way since it's something that everyone has to go through, regardless of prepared you are. At this point, I feel like everything has been leading up to this whether we all realised this or not, and it really comes down to everything done throughout the year and while last minute things like quotes or details can boost you up, a fundamental understanding of the content will be the real driver.
See y'all on the other side!
Damn, that sounds strange but also really cool at the same time, fingers crossed we all get in! I think the early entry offers come out next Monday, so really hoping that goes well. hahaha I guess "forum regular' probably means I'm spending way too much time on the forums.
brooo hiiii
Its the first time I've met some one on the forum and been online at the exact same time, pretty wicked chicken nugget
same, procrastinating for english right now but I guess most people just lurk
Congrats on the ANU offer!!! I got an offer too, I only realised when my friends told me they got in as well HAHA
GOOD LUCK FOR MODERN AND YOUR NEXT EXAMS !!!
Congrats to you as well! Did you end up getting International Relations like you wanted?
End of trials update! I finished trials yesterday and it's weird, because I thought that it would feel like a huge relief that I'd finished but in all honestly, it just feels exceptionally anti-climatic and even a bit sad now that I'm realising there's so little time left of high school. 6 weeks left of T3, holidays, 1 week back then HSC!
On the upside, I've been doing some preliminary at the logistics of going to ANU and it actually seems pretty feasible which surprised me. I think I'll be eligible for Youth Allowance which will cover accommodation and the general cost of living, which I can supplement with part time or casual work while studying. I don't think I'll be eligible for any scholarships and so I'll probably try and get a job right after HSC to start saving up and becoming more independent in terms of money and living. There are still so many unknowns, I don't even know. I've accepted my degree offer but I'm going to hold off on my accommodation offer until I have a clearer picture of things.
While I'm getting that sorted, I'm going to spend the downtime after trials to keep applying for alternate entry at other unis and get my UAC application up as a backup, just to keep my options open. Doing trials have also made me realise how incomplete my notes are and really which subjects I'm strong and weak at, which is nice I suppose but a bit of a reality check. Uhh my writing speed is still pissing me off, I saw a powerpoint that said the expected length for a History Extension response is 8 pages but I only wrote around 3 and a bit and so I really need to find some way to work on that, and same for all my other essay subjects. How is it that there's still so much to do???
Thanks for reading, and I hope everyone else's trials have gone well! (And good luck if you're doing them/preparing to do them)!
Hey Justin, I finally got around to reading your journal and it's was so much fun!
AMAZING job on getting the early offer at ANU you're going to kill it ;D
Congrats on finishing your trials and I'm already looking forward to the next update!
Hey everyone,
Quick update to say that I've just gotten an early entry offer to ANU (Flexible Double in Advanced Computing and International Security)!!! My trials have been pretty bad so far so seeing that email this morning has been absolutely amazing! I still have to deal with all the paperwork and logistics in terms of accommodation and whether I'm going to put in a UAC application but I figure I'll get all that done after trials.
Back in terms of trials, my essay writing is really dragging me down, the best I can do is hit about 3 pages of exam paper in 40-60 minutes which really doesn't seem like enough to get enough depth. Luckily, my 3 hardest exams (English, Maths, and History Extension) were last week, and I have Modern tomorrow which is half short answer. I'm been pretty distracted today with looking into ANU but in general, I've been trying to revise as best I can but I don't think I'm getting the depth I'm needing for longer response question. At this point, I don't really have a choice but to just try my best. Luckily, it only gets easier from here for my last 3 exams.
Hope everyone else has been well and is smashing their trials!
ATAR results came out today - I'll let the marks speak for themselves:
Eng Adv: 85 (B5)
Entertainment: 93 (B6)
History Ext: 40 (E3)
Maths Adv: 83 (B5)
Modern: 89 (B5)
Software: 90 (B6)
T2 Week 1 Update
Hello, just wanted to check in with an end of week update this time making full use of colours, sizes, and headings.
So, first week of online learning done! Not gonna lie, that was so much more tiring than normal school. It was only 3 days though, which I'm glad for. Our school has mandated 40 minute periods with 20 minute breaks between each class, which really helps by letting you do a quick walk around, grabbing some food or water, and setting up for your next period. We're getting our new assessment schedule over the weekend, which will be great to get an idea of how the year's going to go. Luckily, I had all most of my half yearlies adjusted into hand ins, and so the only changes I have will be maths.
Maths Adv/Ext 1
Maths is pretty much entirely self directed learning now. I'm a bit behind, but we've been given lesson plans, notes, and worksheets to work through at our own pace, which I plan to catch up on over the weekend. We're currently covering integration and differential equations, which I find fairly hard. (But then again, I find most topics fairly hard)
English
We've been lucky enough to get zoom calls for English, and although the content is a bit slow, me and my friends setup a google doc where we chat and take notes during the call, which is really fun. Having a collaborative document really helps with motivation, attention, and just makes the class so much better because we can all cover for each other and get a full set of notes without having to be fully attentive the whole time.
We're currently on Module C and to be honest, I enjoyed the Common Module and Mod A a lot more. Discursives and imaginatives are fine, but I just can't seem to do persuasives. I don't know why, but I personally find it really difficult to argue something without reservation and with the purpose of persuading instead of informing.
Modern History
Modern has been really great and chill, we've been doing class zoom calls where our teacher just talks to us about apartheid. I'm sure work will ramp up once we return, but I'm glad for the easing in.
History Extension
Alright, so this is the one subject I'm really excited about and wanted to talk about.
Last night, I finalised my case study + question and emailed my teacher to get her opinion, and got a really positive response! I'm so happy right now because I was afraid that my project wasn't historigraphical enough, but my teacher gave me really good advice on how to approach each of my case studies and relate them to different aspects of constructing history. Now that I've gotten these checked and approved, I can start writing up a proposal and annotated sources for my assignment (these components are due week 3).
That's all for now! Hope you've all been safe and well, and thank you for reading!
EDIT: Random question - has anyone else found the past few days strangely cold? I've been wearing full winter uniform with my jersey, but I'm still feeling chilly