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Author Topic: Zhen's VCE Journey  (Read 46887 times)

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zhen

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Zhen's VCE Journey
« on: August 23, 2017, 10:31:02 pm »
+22
Ok I'll start mine off with a short post, cause I really need to go to sleep, but I've noticed that I haven't posted in ages. Today I had a chemistry SAC and I went out of it feeling weird. In one of the NMR graphs, the formatting was dodgy, so I wasn't able to work out the splitting, but luckily the other information was enough. This year sadly I'm not content with how I've been going and I haven't been doing well. But, I realised that I'm ok with that, since I've learnt so many things in the process of failing and I've grown as a being because of it. Ok that's it for today, I'll try to update my journal later and I'll outline what's lead up to this point of the year.

K888

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Re: Zhen's VCE Journey
« Reply #1 on: August 23, 2017, 10:35:14 pm »
+5
This year sadly I'm not content with how I've been going and I haven't been doing well. But, I realised that I'm ok with that, since I've learnt so many things in the process of failing and I've grown as a being because of it.
What a great outlook to have! Props to you, zhen :)

Really glad to have you onboard with the journal, and I can't wait to read your updates and see how things pan out for the rest of the term and year! ;D

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Re: Zhen's VCE Journey
« Reply #2 on: August 24, 2017, 12:18:39 pm »
+4
Ok I'll start mine off with a short post, cause I really need to go to sleep, but I've noticed that I haven't posted in ages. Today I had a chemistry SAC and I went out of it feeling weird. In one of the NMR graphs, the formatting was dodgy, so I wasn't able to work out the splitting, but luckily the other information was enough. This year sadly I'm not content with how I've been going and I haven't been doing well. But, I realised that I'm ok with that, since I've learnt so many things in the process of failing and I've grown as a being because of it. Ok that's it for today, I'll try to update my journal later and I'll outline what's lead up to this point of the year.

Really interesting first entry, man. Can't wait to hear your perspectives as we progress through the rest of the year. :)

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zhen

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Re: Zhen's VCE Journey
« Reply #3 on: August 24, 2017, 05:46:30 pm »
+21
Outline of the events that have lead to now
Term 1
Start of term 1 was really slow and I had lots of time to just get into the rhythm of year 12. In term 1 I was pretty motivated like we all are in VCE and decided to go to the library basically every second or so day. In term 1 I started to get to know my teachers and I was in for a massive surprise towards the middle of term 1. At this time of the year, I was aiming to get high enough scores to get into medicine, because if I could get into medicine, I could get into basically any course.

Term 2
Term 2 was really stressful because I had SAC week in the last couple of weeks and it was always looming in the background. What made term 2 really special to me was that I started really bonding with lots of different people. Throughout VCE I strengthened my bonds with most of my existing friends and made a ton of new friends. I became a bit less shy and socially awkward. I began talking with heaps of people and greeting people in the corridoor and just began to become a more social person. This also was the time period when I began to have an obsession with comedy shows.

SACS
I'm guessing everyone is wondering how I felt about my SACs especially after my initial post. Overall, SACs have not been going well. I'll just use these emoticons to show how I felt about my SAC results

Chemistry
SAC 1  :) (this was a massive surprise as I thought I completely bombed out, since I rushed through the last 3 pages)
SAC 2  :-\ (I wasn't able to finish it properly because of time pressure. I was pretty sad afterwards, because I tried really hard for it)

Mathematical Methods
SAC 1  :) (I thought completely bombed this SAC, but turns out I did well above average and I'm pretty happy with it)
SAC 2  :) (I did really well on this one too. I felt like my teacher really helped me out for this)

English
SAC 1  :-\ (I tried really hard for this SAC and didn't get as high as I would have hoped)
SAC 2  :) (This was a creative oral presentation and I was really happy with my mark cause I'm not good at those)
SAC 3  :( (I'm really not happy about this mark because I put in the effort but my hard work wasn't rewarded)
SAC 4  :( (Again I'm not happy with this mark because I tried hard and my effort wasn't rewarded. This was an oral presentation and I'm bad at those, so that might explain why)

Specialist Mathematics
SAC 1  :-\ (I got an ok mark, but I wasn't happy with it)
SAC 2  :( (This was really my fault, because I didn't try hard enough for this SAC and I slacked off and paid the price)
SAC 3  :( (After SAC 2, I tried hard for this SAC but really made heaps of errors)

Physics
SAC 1  :) (It wasn't a really high mark but I was content because I'm not good at physics)
SAC 2  :( (I paid the price of slacking off a bit for physics)

As you can see, I'm not really happy with my current marks.

Challenges in VCE
This is the part where I rant about all the misfortunes I've had in VCE, so you can ignore this. I think the biggest challenge for me is overcoming the challenge posed by my teachers. This might be a bit controversial, since there are some teachers and educators in the forums so just a warning. I'll start with my biggest challenge, which is my English teacher. (enter rant mode) My English teacher constantly leaves class unannounced, without supervision, and has been spotted smoking cigarettes during class time (he typically leaves class about every couple of lessons for about 20 minutes but maybe longer). He outright refuses to answer questions and instead just says to read deeper into the book or for me to find it myself. He spends less than half of class time teaching and instead spends most of the time sitting in the front of the class staring at his laptop. He's also ridiculed and in my opinion bullied numerous students. He labels some students as babies mockingly and ridicules students that he deems as unintelligent or if someone says something that opposes his point of view. He's not open to criticism and views anything that opposes his views as incorrect. On top of this, he's an extremely harsh marker. My class generally averages a C or C+, whilst other classes average B or B+. I'll admit he's extremely knowledgable and intelligent, but he refuses to impart his knowledge upon his students. My teachers for specialist and physics are nice and knowlegdable people, but they overcomplicate things, mark really harshly and waste a lot of time going well beyond the course without first consolidating the fundamentals. My chemistry teacher is also a nice person but teaches way too fast and personally I don't like it when teachers teach off power points. He's been away for more than 4 weeks over the course of the year so far, which might be why he teaches fast, since he likes to be well ahead of the other classes whilst being away a lot. However, while I've been ranting on about my bad teachers, I have to acknowledge that my mathematical methods teacher is absolutely amazing. He teaches really well and makes the hardest things seem simple. He explains the reasoning behind everything without overcomplicating it. He's also really knowledgable and overall an amazing person. I feel like he's really helped me heaps for methods.

I nearly forgot, even though I complain about these challenges, I feel like I've learnt many things from this, like overcoming adversity and persevering through difficult circumstances.

Edit: I'll probably make shorter posts next time, since I really covered heaps of stuff in this post. Also forgot to mention what happened today.

24/9/2017
Had a SAC today which went really badly, but since everyone did badly, not all hope is lost. I also had a chemistry test today (not a SAC) which was pretty tiring because of the SAC yesterday. I also learnt how to swim over the past term (people who can't swim have to take swimming lessons) and I can finally swim a little bit without a kickboard or a lifejacket.
« Last Edit: August 24, 2017, 06:13:34 pm by zhen »

brenden

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Re: Zhen's VCE Journey
« Reply #4 on: August 24, 2017, 10:44:32 pm »
+6
This is the best thing I've ever seen.
✌️just do what makes you happy ✌️

zhen

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Re: Zhen's VCE Journey
« Reply #5 on: August 25, 2017, 09:02:54 pm »
+8
Omg kudos to you! That's great! Reminds me a bit about me, how last year I couldn't even make it to half the 25m pool without choking on water. Fast-forward, just swam today (roughly 2hrs ago) 3.5 km freestyle, so haha there's that! Keep at it!! You'll give yourself abs in the process and it's totally worth it because my breathing has become super relaxed and controlled since I started swimming hahaha Amazing what exercise can do tbh

Yea, I feel like the extra exercise makes me feel healthier and fitter. It's pretty amazing that you went from being unable to swim 25m to swimming 3.5km.  ;D

This is the best thing I've ever seen.

Thanks for the positive comment.  :)

25/9/2017
Ok I'll start talking about today. Today nothing really happened other than me receiving the chemistry test I did yesterday, which I feel neither happy or sad about, since it was a decent score but nothing exceptional. Throughout the day I felt tired, so I think I need to sleep earlier. I feel like the main highlight of today was methods, which was a really chill lesson. The main thing that annoyed me today was that my teacher for physics spent basically a whole period doing specialist maths and derivatives to prove something that we don't need to prove as VCE physics students. Nearly the whole period was him just doing algebra to derive a formula rather than helping us understand it. In my opinion that was a waste of a lesson, which really annoyed me. After school I went to the library and crammed out a decent chunk of work, so that was pretty good. Overall it was a normal day without anything really special happening. I should probably do a bit of study before I go to sleep.
« Last Edit: August 25, 2017, 09:04:34 pm by zhen »

Eric11267

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Re: Zhen's VCE Journey
« Reply #6 on: August 26, 2017, 01:45:22 pm »
+6
I'm really looking forward to following your VCE journey zhen! Keep up the good work mate.

zhen

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Re: Zhen's VCE Journey
« Reply #7 on: August 26, 2017, 10:30:52 pm »
+3
I'm really looking forward to following your VCE journey zhen! Keep up the good work mate.
So you're looking forward to reading me repeat the exact same things that I whine about everyday on the train home.

26/9/2017
Not much happened today. I did a decent chunk of specialist maths and went for a morning jog. But other than that, very little happened. It was quite an ordinary and uneventful day.

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Re: Zhen's VCE Journey
« Reply #8 on: August 26, 2017, 10:41:05 pm »
+2
hey zhen, i plan to choose the exact same subjects as you (except jap sl instead of chinese). any tips or certain challenges on the actual subjects and content as a whole so far?
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zhen

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Re: Zhen's VCE Journey
« Reply #9 on: August 26, 2017, 11:06:18 pm »
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hey zhen, i plan to choose the exact same subjects as you (except jap sl instead of chinese). any tips or certain challenges on the actual subjects and content as a whole so far?
Well personally I feel like one of the challenges of taking these subjects is the massive workload. Of course there are going to be some tricky topics in every subject like for chemistry lots of people don't like electrolytic cells. The problem with doing these competitive subjects especially specialist maths I feel is that students really need to know their subjects really well to do well, because most people that do specialist maths are good at maths. Also, note that languages generally has a massive workload. My biggest tip right now is to find your optimal way of studying or organising your time (trying out stuff like timetables, checklists, going to the library). In my opinion, lots of year 12 students struggle because of bad time management and I feel like if you have good study habits really early, you'll be way ahead of most year 12 students, since many year 12 students right now, including me, still waste time procrastinating.

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Re: Zhen's VCE Journey
« Reply #10 on: August 27, 2017, 02:46:55 pm »
+2
As someone who smashed my methods sacs last year and messed up the majority of spesh sacs this year, hopefully we both will still end up with great scores in spesh. Its a great relief to know I'm not alone.

The exams are still on their way and VCAA can still moderate our scores up!
« Last Edit: August 27, 2017, 02:54:04 pm by exit »
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Re: Zhen's VCE Journey
« Reply #11 on: August 27, 2017, 03:00:47 pm »
+2
I know it's been a while, but do you have any reflections on Chinese SL? ie: How did you feel during the oral exam?
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zhen

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Re: Zhen's VCE Journey
« Reply #12 on: August 27, 2017, 09:52:13 pm »
+6
As someone who smashed my methods sacs last year and messed up the majority of spesh sacs this year, hopefully we both will still end up with great scores in spesh. Its a great relief to know I'm not alone.

The exams are still on their way and VCAA can still moderate our scores up!

I'm really relying on my exam to lift up my specialist SACs. Hopefully we both ace those exams so that they can carry our study scores.

I know it's been a while, but do you have any reflections on Chinese SL? ie: How did you feel during the oral exam?
All I can say about the oral exam is to keep calm. Getting flustered is the worse thing you can do because then it makes it really easy for you to misunderstand the examiner's questions or stuff up your responses. I don't really have much else to say about Chinese other than try your hardest, since Chinese is a subject where you really need to do heaps of work

27/9/2017
Today, I went to English tutoring and that was pretty standard. I also did an ok amount of specialist work and methods work today after tutoring. I also found out that a group of students from my school are continuing to stalk my atarnotes account, which is pretty creepy. Other than that, I had a discussion with one of my friends about how high school has gone by so fast and how the bonds I've formed with many of my fellow classmates will probably break as I progress through the rest of my life, which is pretty sad.

K888

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Re: Zhen's VCE Journey
« Reply #13 on: August 27, 2017, 10:19:01 pm »
+3
Other than that, I had a discussion with one of my friends about how high school has gone by so fast and how the bonds I've formed with many of my fellow classmates will probably break as I progress through the rest of my life, which is pretty sad.
This was something I really struggled with during year 12, particularly towards the end of it.

But I guess the thing is, often, it's just the natural progression of things. It's such a cliché, but once you finish year 12, and start uni, you'll realise that there were a lot of people who you were only friends with because you saw them 5 times a week and had to talk to them. But yeah, it can be a hard thing to accept (I still struggle with it at times lol) for sure, that your life is moving on to a different stage, and that your relationships will change as you go along.

If you want to stay in contact with people, it will be worth the effort to stay in contact with them. And spend every moment you have left in year 12 treasuring your friendships and making memories :)

Eric11267

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Re: Zhen's VCE Journey
« Reply #14 on: August 27, 2017, 10:20:47 pm »
+1
I also found out that a group of students from my school are continuing to stalk my atarnotes account, which is pretty creepy. 

That does sound really creepy. Those guys must have some serious issues. I hope they haven't irked you too much though.