ATAR Notes: Forum

VCE Stuff => Victorian Education Discussion => Topic started by: Joseph41 on December 01, 2017, 01:33:33 pm

Title: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: Joseph41 on December 01, 2017, 01:33:33 pm
(https://i.imgur.com/cPSHQS6.png)

We have hundreds and hundreds of university subject reviews (template largely taken from those threads), which help students select their subjects. It makes a whole heap of sense to have a place where past VCE students can review their VCE subjects - 1&2 and 3&4, it's all good!

(https://i.imgur.com/FJPw5Hp.png)
(Units 1&2 and Units 3&4)

Review Index
Current Totals
Arts Subject Reviews: 7
Business Studies Subject Reviews: 4
English Subject Reviews: 12
Health and Physical Education Subject Reviews: 6
Humanities Subject Reviews: 11
LOTE Subject Reviews: 3
Maths Subject Reviews: 13
Science Subject Reviews: 27
Technology Subject Reviews: 2

Total: 85 Reviews
Total: 42 Subjects Covered

(2) (3) etc. denote 2nd and 3rd reviews.

LOTE Subjects (3)
Technology Subjects (2)

This is a thread for subject reviews only.  If you have any questions, then please PM the member who wrote the review. The views expressed are those of the authors. Keep in mind that, despite best efforts, information provided may not be accurate.

We encourage you to review the subject(s) you have completed, even if someone else has already reviewed your subject(s). The more reviews we have, the more helpful this resource will be. Please do not name teachers or denigrate your school.

Please use the following template for subject reviews:

Code: [Select]
[b]Subject Name:[/b]

[b]Units:[/b] (Is it Units 1&2 or Units 3&4?)

[b]Workload:[/b]

[b]Assessment:[/b] (Outline the various assessments which make up the subject and how much each counts for)

[b]Exam Thoughts:[/b] (What's the structure? How hard was it?)

[b]Textbook Recommendation:[/b] (What did you use? How much did you use it?)

[b]Recommended Other Resources:[/b]

[b]Year of Completion:[/b]

[b]Rating:[/b]  out of 5

[b]Your Mark/Grade:[/b] (Optional)

[b]Comments:[/b] Give your overall opinion of the subject, content, assessment etc. and a recommendation, plus anything else which you feel is relevant.

Updated as of reply #85
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: K888 on December 01, 2017, 02:44:11 pm
Subject Name: History: Revolutions

Units: 3/4

Workload:
Such an arbitrary thing - really depends on how strong you are at the subject and what score you're aiming for as to how heavy the workload is.

It's probably higher than your regular subject, but still manageable if you stay on top of things.
Outside of class time (and when we didn't have a SAC), I'd try to regularly flip through the powerpoints I had (which was my method for memorising stuff) and do a cumulative few hours in a week - 2, maybe 3? Not too much. Regularly doing 30 minutes adds up, and it doesn't have to be super formal study - I often just explained stuff to my parents or whatever.
When it comes around to SAC time, I would say I almost doubled the amount of study I did, just because I smashed out practice questions and did more heavy study.

When it came to exam time, I'd say I was doing something Revs related (even if it was just thinking) for at least 1 hour each day in the 3-4 weeks prior, and increased that in the week or two before the exam.

If you pay attention in class, the workload isn't too bad. But you definitely need to do stuff outside of class. Also, if you're struggling to understand and memorise stuff, you're going to need to dedicate a bit more time to it. Time spent on the subject really pays off, though, and you'll be amazed at how much a small amount of effort can improve your marks.

Assessment:
I'd imagine that SACs would vary from school to school, but my class did 4 SACs (2 for each revolution), all emulating what we'd be doing on the exam. So (keeping in mind I did this with the old study design), the first SAC was 3 or 4 pointers (the 10 mark ER questions) for China - AOS1 (my first revolution), the second was a source analysis for China AOS2. For Russia, we did a source analysis for AOS1, and an essay for AOS2. Basically just helped us prepare for the exam by simulating similar conditions and questions in the SACs.

Exam Thoughts:
If you know your stuff and have done a fair bit of practice questions throughout the year, you'll be fine. Just need to keep a clear head.
It's a pretty close exam for timing, I was writing non-stop for basically all of it. So, make sure you're all good with time management.
I think VCAA are still working out the finer details for the exams with the new study design, but it seems like they're really expecting you to think deeply about stuff and not just regurgitate a pre-prepared response.
I was pretty lucky to do Revs in the last year of the study design, because I had a lot of relevant past exams at my disposal, and the exam itself was a pretty good one IMO.

In terms of actual structure, you write about the two revolutions you studied during the year - one revolution for section A, and the other for section B. Your teacher will generally have a preference and teach the class to do the exam in a specific way - eg: China for section A, and Russia for section B - but some leave it up to students to pick. I'd say know which revolution you're going to be doing for each section early, so you can refine your preparation and not have to do so much general stuff.

Under the new study design, the exam goes like:
Section A
- AOS1: source analysis
- AOS2: extended response
Section B
- AOS1: essay
- AOS2: source analysis

Textbook Recommendation:
China Rising & Reinventing Russia
I think these are the HTAV textbooks, and my school had a class set of them in the library so we could borrow them for the whole year and not have to buy them. Tbh, my teacher was really good and already incorporated a lot of the textbook and heaps of other resources into our powerpoints, etc. so I didn't have to use the textbooks that much. That being said, they're good at helping you learn what happened, and they provide a pretty balanced view of events.

Recommended Other Resources:
I didn't use any other resources, but my teacher provided us with a lot of practice questions that he'd written, which were incredibly useful.
Oh, and use the study design!! Make sure you're always referring back to it so you don't miss anything. I think people got stuck on the Alexandra Kollontai question for Russia in this year's exam, but she's clearly mentioned on the study design!

Year of Completion: 2015

Rating: 5 out of 5

Your Mark/Grade: 45 raw > 45.51 scaled

Comments:
I've said it heaps of times, but Revs was by far my favourite subject that I did during VCE. Across the state, I think it's sometimes taken as a bit of a bludge subject, but if you want to do well, you can't bludge it and need to put the effort in. Work out a system for remembering dates (I'd recommend mnemonics), make sure you learn the significance of events (and leaders), and learn how to answer questions the way VCAA want you to answer them. Try to get a good relationship with your teacher going, because it'll really help you succeed (but in the end, how you perform is all up to you!) and enjoy the subject more.

I think one of the reasons I loved Revs so much was I was learning stuff about the world that I hadn't ever covered at school before. I also felt it was a bit more relevant than some of the subjects you might commonly do in VCE.
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: Vaike on December 01, 2017, 03:04:32 pm
Subject Name: Biology

Units: 3/4

Workload: Relatively high, large amounts of content and questions that require very thorough understanding of concepts covered.

Assessment: Unit 3 and 4 SACS usually comprise of tests and labs, alongside an extended investigation.

Exam Thoughts: The biology exam consists of 40 multiple choice questions, and short answer section worth 80 marks. Personally, I think the exam aspect of VCE Biology is probably the area of the course that is least enjoyable, and could benefit from improvements. Many questions require extremely specific wording in their answers, and are often confusing as to how the marks are distributed. Biology exams always involve heavy amounts of interpretation of rather lengthy questions, which can also prove very difficult. Whilst a strong understanding of course content will help you excel in this subject, the structure of this assessment means that your ability to clearly interpret questions and concisely convey your understanding is just as important if you are aiming for high marks.

Textbook Recommendation: I honestly didn't rely on my textbooks too much throughout this subject. My school used Nelson, and I also purchased Nature of Biology. Both had shortcomings; the Nelson text often gave insufficient depth of explanation, whereas the Jacaranda Nature of Biology provided more information, but extremely large amounts of irrelevant information. Personally, I preferred NoB as the Nelson book just had too much missing, however bear in mind this is for the previous study design; I have not read the texts for the latest study design.

Recommended Other Resources: Google and ATAR Notes are your friends. Posting questions on the Biology question thread is a must; there are so many helpful posters who can give great explanations, and the amount of information online far exceeds most commercial resources. That being said, I did find the Biozone workbook quite useful, and would recommend picking it up.

Year of Completion: 2016

Rating: 5 out of 5

Your Mark/Grade: 45

Comments: I loved VCE Biology. Although there is a lot of content, most of it is extremely enjoyable *cough Human change over time*, and unlike most VCE subject, almost all aspects of the course tie neatly together in one way or another. As you continue through the course, you learn things that concepts that seamlessly integrate into past material, explaining things you may not have understood about them before. The course also has quite a broad focus, from fossils to genes, there is really a large array of fascinating topics to explore that help directly explain aspects of our everyday lives. If you can live with the wordy nature of the assessments, I can't recommend this subject highly enough.
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: Joseph41 on December 01, 2017, 03:14:46 pm
Subject Name: English Language.

Units: Units 3/4.

Workload:
I honestly don't think there's very much content in EngLang aside from the metalanguage (language used to describe language). You can find a list of metalanguage you need to know on pages 17 and 18 of the study design. This is the shit you really need to know well - so long as you can apply this to actual texts, you should be sweet, IMO.

Of course, there is still other content (see overview below), but I don't think it's a content-heavy subject. Naturally, that's not to say it's easy - quite the opposite, in my opinion.

Assessment:
Unit 3: 25%
Unit 4: 25%
Exam: 50%

SACs vary school-to-school, and can come in a range of formats (essay, analytical commentary, short-answer questions, folio of texts, investigative report, perhaps others). My school largely tried to simulate portions of the exam, which I think was beneficial.

Exam Thoughts:
There are three sections.

Section 1: short-answer questions relating to a provided text or texts.
Section 2: analytical commentary.
Section 3: essay.

I really recommend having a look at past EngLang exams to see the structure - or even these sample questions.

Textbook Recommendation:
We used Living Lingo, which I believe is still pretty common. We didn't really use it that much, though - perhaps once every few lessons we'd read something from it. I definitely don't think it's necessary to doing well in English Language, but it can help - particularly with metalanguage.

We also had a book called Mastering Advanced English, or something similar. It literally wasn't referenced a single time throughout the entire year haha.

Recommended Other Resources:
In general, EngLang isn't a subject that depends on textbooks. If you want to get a head start, I'd recommend flicking through Living Lingo, reading books like How Language Works (David Crystal), or checking out these free EngLang notes.

Perhaps one of the coolest things about English Language, though, is the fact that you have practically unlimited resources. Basically everything around you, you can use. The whole point of EngLang is to analyse language - why it's used, how it's used etc. As such, you can analyse newspaper articles, TV segments, chip packets, Tweets, online advertising, reports, death certificates. Literally anything with language, and that's a really cool thing. There might not be that many practice exams publicly available (which is frustrating), but you can make your own by using what you have around you.

I made habit of reading both major newspapers each day, and that served me well. I wasn't really interested in the stories, but I developed a passable ability to analyse language and how it was used by different people.

Some other potentially useful resources:
* Quotes and language examples for EngLang 2017+
* EngLang essay and analytical commentary submission and marking
* EngLang question thread

Year of Completion: 2012.

Rating: 4.5 out of 5.

Your Mark/Grade: 44 raw > 45.73 scaled.

Comments:
English Language is an amazing subject, and if you're interested in it, I really strongly recommend you pursue it. It shouldn't be called English Language - it should be called Linguistics, because that's fundamentally what it is. I went on to study Linguistics for four years at uni, which is something I probably wouldn't have done without EngLang - I owe it a lot.

I'm going to quote myself now to give a brief overview of what EngLang actually involves (both 1/2 and 3/4, in case anybody's considering doing the latter without having done the former):

Quote
Regarding what English Language actually is, here's a brief overview. For context, I went through English Language 1/2 and 3/4, and then went on to major in Linguistics at uni. The reason I say that is that English Language should really be called Linguistics, because that's what it is. For that reason, English Language is, perhaps, the most relevant subject of them all; language is all around us every single day.

English Language Units 1/2 (Year 11)
Unit 1
In Unit 1 AOS 1, you consider that nature of language, and what differentiates human communication systems from those of other animals. You look at how language results in meaning (super interesting IMO), how language is used for different purposes and in different ways (such as spoken, written, or signed), and how context impacts our language choices. You'll also be introduced to some "metalanguage" (language we use to talk about language): terms like morpheme and lexeme. This type of metalanguage is really important (particularly if you go on to study Linguistics), and is excellent if ever you want to teach English.

In Unit 1 AOS 2, the focus is mostly on language acquisition; that is, how we develop language proficiency. There are stages of child language acquisition, which you'll consider in some depth (again, super interesting). Development can vary between "subsystems" of language, too (basically, the five main areas of language) - and you'll learn about this in terms of phonology, morphology, lexicology, syntax and semantics. There'll further be discussion centred on differences between learning language as a child and an adult, and also differences between monolingualism, bilingualism and multi-lingualism. In an ever-globalised world, this last point is surely of particular importance.

Unit 2
IMO Unit 2 is absolutely fascinating. There's a big emphasis here on the nature of language change, and how English has developed as a language over time. In AOS 1, you look at the development of the language from Old English to contemporary English. This includes things like why the language changed, and what influence it's had on us as citizens. There's also a section on the relationship between English and other languages, and how they may have diverted from the same roots in the past. Further, there's a bunch of stuff on the concept of "Standard English" (very important in Linguistics), plus attitudes toward language, word addition and word loss.

Unit 2 AOS 2 sees more of a focus on the impact of language contact; that is, when languages "collide". Particularly relevant is how English is becoming one of if not the world's most dominant language, and the impact that that will have on us. You will also consider how new languages are formed, including pidgins and creoles. The relationship between language and culture is also considered, which, as you can imagine, is pretty important in today's world.

English Language Units 3/4 (Year 12)
Unit 3
Unit 3 is split in halves, with those halves basically considering informal and formal language. AOS 1 looks at informal language, including key characteristics, the impact of context, stylistic features, and how and why informal language is used.

AOS 2 is essentially the same, but for formal language.

Unit 4
Unit 4 AOS 1 looks more at language variation within the Australian context, including variation along geographical, national, regional and cultural axes. Standard and non-Standard English is again important, and you also consider the nature of accents.

Finally, Unit 4 AOS 2 considers the inherently intertwined (at least IMO) relationship between language and identities: both individual and group. Language variation is again a factor, this time due to personal factors (age, gender, occupation, interests, aspirations, education etc.). The concept of prestige also arises.

P.S. You can find a lot of this information in the English Language study design. :)
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: Bri MT on December 01, 2017, 03:43:18 pm
Subject Name: Chemistry

Units: (Is it Units 1/2 or Units 3/4?) 3/4

Workload:
Moderate.
I am a fast leaner, and found that I could stay ahead of the class fairly easy.
Putting in the effort to regularly revise information and complete past exam questions is rewarded well.

Much of the work involves learning processes for answering questions (eg. find the amount in mol, then multiply by enthalpy) and memorising content (especially for fuels). Unit 4 AoS 1 also requires problem solving.

A low scoring student will know some of the content and processes.
A medium scoring student will be familiar with most of the processes and content
An exemplar student will understand where the processes come from and the connections between concepts

Assessment: (Outline the various assessments which make up the subject and how much each counts for)
GA 1: Unit 3 SACs     16%
GA 2: Unit 4 SACs     24%
GA 3: Exam               60%
My SACs consisted of a combination of tests and prac write ups.
It is very important when completing a prac to understand what you are doing and why you are doing it. It is a good idea to revise both the topic being assessed and experimental methodology before a prac. During any experiment, you should conciously maintain awareness of how scientific methods apply to this task.

There are some experiments that are paticularly common for schools to use in their pracs. It would not hurt to look at these and make sure that you understand them.

One of the unit 4 SACs is a scientific poster.
Students are not rewarded for choosing difficult or complex experiments, so I strongly advise ALL students to pick an experiment that is fairly simple. The focus should be on showing your understanding of the scientific method, conventions, and understanding of how studied concepts are applicable to the experiment.

Students should organise their time to allow for research and (ideally) draft completion at home.

Exam Thoughts: (What's the structure? How hard was it?)
The exam is broken into section A (multiple choice) and section B (short answer). A data booklet is provided, and you should be familiar with its use and contents well before the exam. It is important to practice use of the equations in the data book numerous times, with particular attention being paid to the units used in each equation and constant.

Many students found this exam challenging, due to testing of content many students lack familiarity with, experimental design questions, and application questions.
I would advise future students to carefully read the examiners report for the research methods section.

Textbook Recommendation: (What did you use? How much did you use it?)
I used the Heinemann textbook, and found it to be a very useful resource. There were, however, some errors.
I regularly used this throughout the year, and found it easy to prelearn concepts with it.
In the lead up to exams it was only used to look up specific queries.

Recommended Other Resources:
I would strongly recommend a collection of past exam questions by topics.
 I had StudyOn due to it being on my school booklist, however I rarely used it as the online format was inconvenient for mathematical work and drawing diagrams.

Year of Completion: 2017
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: Vaike on December 01, 2017, 03:58:22 pm
Subject Name: Further Mathematics

Units: 3/4

Workload: I'd guess significantly below average workload for a VCE subject. The FM course is relatively shallow in content compared to most subjects, which alongside relatively straight forward concepts, results in a smaller workload than most other subjects. This however, does not mean you can neglect the subject completely, to do well requires large amounts of practice, as well as understanding every single concept inside and out.

Assessment:  Usually a SAC for each module so:
Unit 3:
Total contribution to study score: 20%

Unit 4:
Since schools can select from 4 modules; Matrices, Networks, Graphs and Relations and Geometry and Measurement, you may encounter a variety of SACs, but usually involve standard tests.
Total contribution to study score: 14%

Exams contribution to study score: 66% (33% each).

Tl;dr:
Exam Thoughts: Exams in Further Mathematics are largely predictable and usually don't throw up to many surprises.

Exam 1 consists of 40 multiple choice questions, and a CAS calculator and notes are permitted. The majority of these questions are straightforward, however it is common for VCAA to come up with one or two questions each year that really split the state. These difficult questions really assess understanding, which is why it is so crucial to have a firm understanding of the theory covered. 

Exam 2 consists of 60 short answer questions, and once again allows for a CAS calculator and a bound reference to be consulted. Once again, there usually aren't any particularly difficult questions that arise, however, it is imperative to be able to really understand what the question is asking. Due to the relatively repetitive nature of these exams, doing practice exams and really making sure you learn from them is key to success. 

Textbook Recommendation: I used the Nelson Unit 3/4 textbook. Apart from the horrendous web application, the textbook was largely okay, and honestly, most textbooks should be fine. However, don't spend too long on or get too hung up over textbook questions; they should be used to gain an understanding and familiarity with concepts only, of which should be honed and refined using exam questions (preferentially VCAA ones at that).

Recommended Other Resources: I do not think external references for Further are very necessary; personally I just watched a few YouTube videos about some of the more difficult topics and found that sufficient. However, I did find making a bound reference was super helpful and honestly I'd regard it as a must do, not so much for consultation during an exam, but for consolidating knowledge and understanding.

Year of Completion: 2016

Rating: 4 out of 5

Your Mark/Grade: 50

Comments: From what I can gather, Further Mathematics is perhaps the most misunderstood subject in the entire VCE curriculum. Simply put, many students fail to acknowledge the hidden complexities and do not approach the subject in the same manner they would with others, regarding it as a 'bludge' or an 'easy subject'. Whilst this isn't necessarily false, the relatively shallow nature of the subject goes both ways, making it both accessible to a large demographic, but also intensely competitive at the high end. It is really important to put in a consistent effort throughout the year, and to make sure you thoroughly understand the concepts.

That being said, I still enjoyed my time with Further. Having a subject that's concepts weren't too daunting was nice, especially in year 11, and the relatively lower time investment required was a welcome bonus too. Many of the concepts covered are also actually useful in real life, particularly financial math, and I still find myself using these concepts quite regularly. Perhaps my favourite thing about this subject though, is that it rewards effort. Simply put, if you a prepared to work hard, you should be rewarded well, irrespective of academic abilities. Whilst the intense competition at 45+ does mean there is an element of luck involved when shooting for very top end scores, if you work well throughout the year you can minimize the 'amount of luck' required, and really set yourself up for a good score.

Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: K888 on December 01, 2017, 04:15:59 pm
Subject Name: French

Units: 3/4

Workload:
Pretty chill for most of the year, it just ramps up as you approach the oral exam.
I probably did quick vocab stuff on quizlet for 10-15 minutes every second or third night, but aside from that didn't have to do much, aside from set homework - we'd usually get at least one thing each class, which probably took no more than 30 minutes max.

As you approach the oral exam, you'll probably be spending several hours per week (cumulatively) on your detailed study and general preparation. You'll do a lot in class, but also probably have to do stuff at home. Really, it's up to you how much time you want to spend on it, though. You'll have to do research, make sure you know your texts well, and have good answers to the questions your teacher provides.

I'd say you should also try to do 15 minutes of oral practice every week, even if it's just with a friend.

Assessment:
I recall doing 1 listening SAC, 2 writing SACs, and 2 speaking SACs, I think. One of the speaking SACs was essentially a mock oral, but just covered the detailed study.

The listening and writing SACs were kind of related to the topics we were covering in class, but aside from the vocab you learn from that topic being helpful in the writing SAC, the fact that it's on a particular topic isn't that relevant. It's all just testing your language skills.

Exam Thoughts:
Oral exam structure:
- You walk in, sit down, say your student number, say hello to the examiners, etc.
- General discussion - 7 minutes - you'll probably get asked about school, your family, pets, what you plan to do once year 12 is finished, whether you have a job or not, and that sort of stuff. They might throw in a weird question or two to see how you are at thinking on your feet, but it's all pretty swell as long as you've practiced and have confidence in yourself
- Detailed study - you do an introduction of your detailed study for up to 1 minute, then answer questions/discuss for 7 minutes. You'll get asked about your texts, the links between them, and other stuff, which I've detailed here. Make sure you know your specific topic well, but also the broader context of the detailed study. Because the examiners don't know your specific topic *that* well, you'll probably get asked questions that are more general than ones you may have been asked in mock orals you've done with your teacher.

Written exam structure:
- Listening - three texts, two of which you respond to in English, one of which you respond to in French. You can listen to past listening tasks on the VCAA website to get an idea of speed - I found them to be a bit slower than what I was used to from in-class listening tasks. Make sure you practice listening tasks throughout the year so that you have good technique - i.e. not checking dictionaries whilst the task is playing, jotting down dot points, listening for key words, etc.
- Reading - again, pretty straightforward. I always found it quicker to read the question, then look through the text to find my answer, but some people read the text first. Highlighters are really helpful. Sometimes, you'll just be unlucky and get a dud reading task - the one on buildings last year (2016) was a bit odd - but most are fine.
- Writing - ~300 words, you get 5 prompts (which will specify varying text types you have to use) and have to write on one of them. Pretty straightforward.

As long as you're reasonably competent at French, the exam timing is fine. Don't get caught up spending ages on your writing, and you should be able to finish a bit early. Make sure you respond in the correct language - you'd be surprised how many people make this mistake, particularly in the reading section.

Textbook Recommendation:
I think the textbook we used was Elan or something like that. Used it frequently, and I'd imagine any textbook you use for French is something you'll use frequently, so would recommend buying the prescribed textbook.

Recommended Other Resources:
I think a lot of people use Schaum, which is a grammar book thing. I used it a bit and wasn't really that into it, but some people love it. So, if you want the extra practice and will commit to using it, then I'd probably say get it.
Otherwise, using Quizlet for vocab is great, and ask your teacher for practice discussion questions.

Year of Completion: 2016

Rating: 3.5 out of 5
My enjoyment was mainly affected by a poor relationship with my teacher, I think the subject itself is fine, and being able to speak a second language is great.

Your Mark/Grade: 37 raw > 46.63 scaled

Comments:
I think doing a LOTE makes for a good change to the grind of your other subjects. It doesn't really require huge amounts of work, you just have to consistently do a small amount across the whole year. It's not a subject that you can really "cram" for - the effort you've put in for however many years you've been studying French for is what counts. So does natural ability.
Honestly, confidence is probably one of the main things. The people that ace French are confident. I did well in my SACs during the year because I was confident in my ability. You need to be able to show composure.

Scoring can really screw you over, though. I was rank 1 the whole year, full marked both writing SACs and got A+'s for the other ones. I aced my mock orals, and knew my topic really well. But, when I got to the oral - I got asked dud questions that didn't let me show off all my knowledge. Like, I was getting asked questions that didn't even link to my topic (I did the consequences of resistance during WW2 for the French, and one of the questions I got asked was who I thought were the important women in France in WW2). It was really disappointing, and tbh, I'm still a bit disappointed haha. Was mostly disappointed because I was good at French, and I didn't feel like I got the chance to properly show off the effort I'd put in for 6 years.
Got A+ A+ A for a 37 (comparatively, I got A A+ A for a 39 in Bio). So yeah, be warned - things can go wrong.

A final note: you will improve so much in your abilities over the course of the year. So if you're struggling at the start - don't stress! By the end of the year, provided you haven't just bludged the subject, you should be pretty proficient at French.
I've heard someone say being able to score 35+ generally means you're heading towards fluency, but not too sure about whether that's true or not.
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: Vaike on December 01, 2017, 04:35:59 pm
Subject Name: Physics

Units: 3/4

Workload: About average workload for a VCE subject. I found the workload to be significantly less than both Biology and Chemistry due to the reduced amount of sheer content to remember. 

Assessment:

Most assessments involve a test or prac report of some sort. There is also an extended investigation/scientific poster SAC, requiring a focus upon two continuous independent variables. Students are not marked on the 'difficulty' of their experiment, so I thoroughly suggest doing something simple and avoiding unnecessary stress. 

Exam Thoughts: The physics exam is composed of 20 multiple choice questions, and a short answer section worth 110 marks, with a double sided A3 reference sheet permitted. I found this examination to be rather odd in relation to other VCE exams; very similar questions are repeated year after year, questions are often ordered sequentially in the order you will have learned them, and questions almost never combine different areas of the course together. As a result, the exam often feels methodical and familiar, and quite frankly boring at times due to the repetitive nature of the questions is the collision inelastic or elastic justify your response . Examiners reports are often unclear and lacking in detail which is not appreciated, and questions asked do not involve much math or critical thinking.

Textbook Recommendation: Heinemann 3/4. Read both this and the Jacaranda book. Whilst neither are great, I would recommend the Heinemann book over the Jacaranda, it is significantly better in that it more clearly explains most concepts without excessive and irrelevant detail.

Recommended Other Resources: YouTube videos are a must for physics. I didn't find any notes or Checkpoints to be very useful, whereas online videos often go into more detail, explaining concepts thoroughly, allowing for a deeper understanding of some of the mind boggling concepts covered. 

Year of Completion: 2017

Rating: 3.5 out of 5

Your Mark/Grade: 46

Comments: I really wish I could have given physics a higher rating because I thoroughly enjoyed it, as much as biology which I gave a 5. The concepts covered are amazing; learning about special relativity, electromagnetism and wave particle duality truly and permanently altered the way I view the world, and were so much fun to learn. VCAA have done a really good job with this new study design of making the content more engaging than in the past. Because of these simply incredible concepts, I'd really recommend considering undertaking this subject.

However, whilst the lack of mathematics in the course, alongside the repetitive exam structure make the subject more accessible, they also greatly limit the scope of the course. It is really weird, and not in a good way, how different the VCE Physics exam is to the other science subjects; the repetitive nature and lack of questions requiring a deep understanding making practice a dull experience, which in addition with the absence of any kind of math that isn't basic, poorly represents the study of physics in my view, and is quite disappointing.

So whilst I thoroughly enjoyed learning the content of VCE Physics, it could have been even more interesting. I would recommend it to anyone interested in physics or challenging their understanding of the world, however as a subject, it could be greatly improved if it the exam style was changed to be more inline with other science subjects, as well as introducing more math to allow for deeper exploration of various concepts.
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: Vaike on December 01, 2017, 08:00:04 pm
Subject Name: Chemistry

Units: 3/4

Workload: From my experiences, the workload for Chemistry was the highest of all the science subjects, due to not only the large, broad range of content to cover, but also due to the tricky exam questions that require a really thorough understanding. However, I didn't find any of this work laborious, as the content was engaging, and the questions varied enough to keep me thinking on my feet.

Assessment:
Most assessments involve a test or prac report of some sort. There is also an extended investigation/scientific poster SAC. Students are not marked on the 'difficulty' of their experiment, so I thoroughly suggest doing something simple and avoiding unnecessary stress, I may have made said mistake this year (whoops, don't waste time trying to do a back titration). The focus of Chemistry has shifted quite heavily towards practical work and understanding scientific experiments, so make sure to work at this throughout the year.

Exam Thoughts: Unlike the physics examinations, the chemistry exams always throw up a surprise with some unusual and difficult questions. The exam consists of 30 multiple choice questions and 90 short answer marks, many of which rely on the use of an accompanying data booklet provided in the examination. This years exam was quite different to past years, involving relatively little stoich, with a larger focus on assessing content knowledge and experimental design, which I found quite difficult. In my experience, and through looking at graded distributions, VCE chemistry typically has a more difficult exam than physics and biology, having a lower percentage required for an A+ cutoff. However, that being said, I also think it is the most enjoyable exam, due to its variation in question topics, and particularly well thought out questions.

Textbook Recommendation: I highly recommend getting your hands on Heinemann 3/4; it's probably the best VCE textbook I've used for any subject, although there are some errors. Explains most concepts in adequate detail, and is significantly better than the Jacaranda textbook. That being said, it doesn't cover everything as well as I hoped, hence I'd recommend googling stuff when you feel the text isn't fully covering a topic.

Recommended Other Resources: Online videos and websites are great resources. One of my favourite websites to use was molview, which was helpful for figuring out the structures and names of pretty much any molecule you could think of. I also found Checkpoints useful for chemistry; as they had some interesting original questions.

Year of Completion: 2017

Rating: 4 out of 5

Your Mark/Grade: 50

Comments: Chemistry was a really great experience for me, and a really interesting subject to have studied. Be warned, if you're aiming to score well this subject is extremely deep and quite difficult, requiring the combination of extensive content knowledge with an ability to think critically in applying learned concepts to unfamiliar situations. If you like solving problems and doing puzzles, you should definitely have a look at this subject. Whilst at times, it does feel a bit repetitive and a bit of a marathon because there is so much content, the intricate nature of the topics keeps it engaging and interesting for the most part. I also really appreciated how different topics were intertwined in many questions, allowing you to draw upon knowledge from various areas of the course to draw conclusions, something of which physics lacks. However, the practicals I had to do were dreary and uninspired; not too different to pracs carried out in earlier years of schooling, but this will of course vary depending on your school.

If you are planning to only do one science subject for the purpose of a university prerequitsite, I would steer clear of chemistry. I found it to be the most difficult of the three, placing a larger emphasis on good scientific practice and experimental design, which may me more difficult to grasp due to limited exposure if you're only undertaking a single science subject. Additionally, chemistry is often considered the 'central science'; large parts of the course are made easier through an understanding of physics (such as electrochemistry)  and biology (such as metabolism and enzymes), and frankly, I found the concepts in the other two subjects to be more interesting.

However, in combination with those subjects, chemistry shines, and I'd highly recommend anyone taking either biology or physics to seriously consider taking chemistry too, alongside those who enjoy mathematics and puzzles, as some of the chem questions will really leave you with that rewarding 'aha' moment after you finally figure them out.
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: Syndicate on December 01, 2017, 08:17:55 pm
Subject Name: Specialist Mathematics

Units: 3/4

Workload: moderate (usually there is 1 application task for Unit 3, and 2-3 modelling tasks for Unit 4). It is quite easy to keep up-to-date with the class.

Assessment: The Unit 3 Application Task is worth 17% of your study score, whist the modelling tasks (all of them) are also worth 17% of your study score. There are two exams, exam 1 (non-calculator), which runs for 1 hour and 15 minutes (inc. 15 minute reading time), which is worth 22% of your study score, and exam 2 (calculator allowed), which runs for 2 hours and 15 minutes (inc. 15 minute reading time), which is worth 44% of your study score. Whilst exam 1 usually has 9-12 questions, exam 2 has 20 multiple choice questions, and 4-6 application questions (which has a few "sub-questions" as well)

Summary:
- GA1 (Unit 3 and 4 SACs): 34%
- GA2 (Exam 1): 22%
- GA3 (Exam 2): 44%

Exam Thoughts: Usually students tend to do well on exam 1 (non-calculator) as it is shorter, and has less applications in contrast to exam 2 due to the fact that the calculator is allowed (If you haven't started exam revision, you might not believe me for now). The fact that the calculator is allowed, VCAA can also test you on your "calculator knowledge", which can be cruel in some stages. Like any other subject, the exam usually starts with easier questions, and as you reach the end, it increases in difficulty as well. The exams also tend to focus primarily on calculus (there is usually an implicit differentiation and a separable differential equation question every year). I am sure that VCAA will also add in a statistics/ probability question into the exams every years from now on.

Textbook Recommendation: Cambridge Specialist Maths 3/4. In my opinion it is the best textbook out there, and I would say it covers the content quite well. I completed most of the questions from this textbook (although I did find some of the questions were unnecessary)

Recommended Other Resources: For exam revision, I competed a lot of exams, and I would say Heffernan, Neap and MAV were the best ones. You should be able to get practice exams from your maths teachers.

Year of Completion: 2017

Rating:  4 out of 5

Your Mark/Grade: 43

Comments: Honestly, specialist maths is not as hard as you think it is. The difficulty of specialist has been over-rated for years, and it is easier than an "average" maths students perceives it to be (If you are in doubt, just go ahead with it, and drop it if things don't go well for you). The new study design (the current one, 2016-...) also has statistical interference in it (which is quite new). Although it is a bit boring to learn at first (especially if you are like me, and hate how vague probability can be...), you should be able to start enjoying it before exam revision starts (it is really easy to learn in my opinion). If you are doing specialist ONLY for scaling purposes, I think that might not be a good idea, as you may find it difficult and spend most of your study time learning specialist.

If you have any questions regarding Specialist, feel free to message me!  :)

Edit: updated the mark
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: Vaike on December 01, 2017, 08:48:16 pm
Subject Name: English

Units: 3/4
Workload: Extremely variable, depending on how comfortable you feel with the subject and what you're aiming to get out of the subject. For me, I spent much more time on English than any other subject, so I'd say the workload is extremely high. However, I know other who haven't spent nearly as long on it and as still done very well, so it's hard to judge I guess.

Assessment:
Surprise, most English assessments involve writing an essay under time conditions. Unit 3 involves a text response essay, an argument analysis essay and a creative piece, of which should be closely related to a text chosen by your school. Unit 4 involves an oral presentation, alongside a comparative text response essay.


Exam Thoughts: The exam involves writing an argument analysis, text response and comparative text response essay in 3 hours, worth 10 marks each. Yikes. I never, ever felt ready for any of my SACs or the English exam. I didn't do a single practice exam under timed conditions other than what our school made us do, as I honestly couldn't take sitting down for 3 hours writing essays. Despite that, I still managed to almost complete my exam. The English exam was for me, the biggest hurdle in my VCE experience. However, I think it is important to realise that even if you haven't been able to fully complete and practice before the exam, pressure does wonders to how fast you can write; so trust that on the day you'll be able to get it done.

Textbook Recommendation: N/A, didn't use any sort of textbook.

Recommended Other Resources: Lauren's ATAR Notes VCE English notes are a must in my opinion. They were super helpful, and I relied on them throughout the entire year. I found text guides useful at times, especially so for texts that are difficult to follow or interpret. However, I think the most important 'resource' you can get access to is your teacher, and your peers. Even if you don't get along with your teacher, try to find someone you can get to mark your work and share ideas with, whether it be a past teacher (what I did) or another English teacher from your school; the knowledge and support they can provide is invaluable.

Year of Completion: 2017

Rating:  3.5 out of 5

Your Mark/Grade: 45

Comments: English was a love/hate relationship for me. I hated actually writing essays formally, especially under timed conditions, and was glad to finish and know I'd never need write one again. However, I did love exploring the texts, discussing their ideas with others, identifying themes and symbolic meanings and such. Despite feeling a bit overwhelmed at first, I ended up enjoying the comparative section the most; it was liberating being granted a little more freedom by the broader prompts presented in this section, that always allowed for not only a discussion of the text, but the meanings behind them as well. Drawing similarities and differences between the two was also and extremely rewarding experience. Analysing  argument however I found extremely tedious, repetitive and inspiring; I absolutely despised having to write these essays.

Overall, everyone I have talked to has had a different experience with English, and I do believe that a large part getting the most out of this subject requires you to really invest yourself into it. The themes covered in the texts are often relevant to everyday life and are intriguing to discuss and reflect upon, although I don't think essay writing is a particularly comprehensive way to examine a student's understanding and analysing arguments should be destroyed and never touched by VCAA again.
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: Vaike on December 01, 2017, 09:13:09 pm
Subject Name: Mathematical Methods

Units: 3/4

Workload: Above average. That 1/2 Methods covers the majority of 3/4 significantly reduces the amount of work required for the later, as a large portion of the course is focused on revising previously covered topics from 1/2. That being said, getting as much practice and exposure as possible is imperative to success.

Assessment:
Can involve application and modelling tasks, alongside exam style like tests, depending on the school. 

Exam Thoughts: VCE Methods involves an Exam 1, a 40 mark short answer, technology and note free exam that runs for one hour with fifteen minutes reading time, and an Exam 2, including 20 multiple choice questions and 60 short answer marks, where a CAS calculator and a bound reference is permitted.

Methods exams are hard. Whilst a fair section of the exam may be relatively simple, VCAA are experts at weaving in subtle tricks, and writing very difficult and confusing Exam 2 questions. Despite most of the mathematics being relatively straightforward, it can be troublesome to identify the correct 'method' to solve some of these later questions, particularly under the stressful time conditions of the exam.

Textbook Recommendation: I used Cambridge 3/4 and would recommend it. I would not recommend doing every question, as some were irrelevant or wrong, but I would suggest using it to gain an foundational understanding, of which may be refined through completing practice exam questions.

Recommended Other Resources: Didn't find myself using too many additional resources outside what my teacher provided. Checkpoints was okay, but you can get almost all the questions in it from VCAA exams, so I wouldn't spend my money on it.

Year of Completion: 2017

Rating: 3 out of 5

Your Mark/Grade: 43

Comments: I didn't enjoy unit 3/4 Methods very much. While I can't really fault the subject for something objectively wrong with it, I wasn't a fan of it being similar in content to units 1/2 without much else added, it almost just felt like more of the same. I also didn't really enjoy most of the topics, mainly functions (so many boring graphs) and the limited calculus explored, however, I did quite enjoy probability and statistics as something a little bit different. Again, most of this is just personal preference rather than substantiated criticism, but my lack of interest in these areas made it difficult for me to invest myself into the subject, and hence spent limited time completing practice exams and revising more difficult questions, which I do regret not doing.

In isolation, I think I would have found Methods enjoyable, but in combination with Specialist, which contained topics I was much more interested in learning, it was difficult to motivate myself to spend as much time as I should have on the former.
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: Vaike on December 01, 2017, 09:43:36 pm
Subject Name: Specialist Mathematics

Units: 3/4

Workload: Significantly above average. I found that a large amount of practice was required to understand and become fluent with the concepts covered, which were often also rather, complex  8)

Assessment:
Can involve application and modelling tasks, alongside exam style like tests, depending on the school. 

Exam Thoughts: Exam 1 is composed of 8-12 short response questions, is technology and note free, and runs for one hour, with fifteen minutes reading time. Exam 2 is composed of 20 multiple choice questions, with 4-6 short answer questions tallying 60 marks. A CAS calculator is permitted, as is a bound reference, and the exam takes place over two hours, with fifteen minutes reading time.

Whereas the Methods examination can have some crazy hard final questions, the majority of the difficulty in Specialist exams I found came from time. Whilst their are undoubtedly difficult questions in both, I found those in Specialist to be more straight forward; in that it was easier to identify what the question was asking. That said, the questions are perhaps more varied than methods, and are certainly fun yet challenging to tackle. However, there is also constant time pressure, so using reading time effectively and learning to work efficiently are critical to success.

Textbook Recommendation: I used Cambridge 3/4 and would recommend it. I would not recommend doing every question, as some were irrelevant or wrong, but I would suggest using it to gain an foundational understanding of the concepts, of which may be refined through completing practice exam questions.

Recommended Other Resources: Doing as many practice exam questions as possible is important, to both consolidate content knowledge and gain familiarity with exam type questions. Other than that, I didn't rely on too many external resources.

Year of Completion: 2017

Rating: 5 out of 5

Your Mark/Grade: 43

Comments: I really, really enjoyed learning spec. From vectors and dynamics, to complex numbers and more advanced calculus such as volumes of revolution, the topics covered throughout the course were all distinct and interesting, although initially difficult. In spite of bottling the exam, of which is insanely competitive, taking this subject introduced me to large parts of mathematics I'd never seen before, and what I loved most, was that almost all of it had clear links to real world use and application. Whether it was using differential equations to model growth/decay, vectors, kinematics and dynamics to model linear motion, or statistics to analyse samples, learning these concepts and being able to apply them really captured my attention, and the satisfaction from mastering a concept was perhaps the most rewarding out of any subject I took.

Not having done units 1/2 did make it more difficult, so I'd really recommend taking these units first. Despite at many points feeling a bit lost and overwhelmed, I do believe it was well worth the effort. Hence, to anyone interested in learning how useful and beautiful math can be in modelling the world around us, or anyone simply interested in taking any sort of engineering course, this subject is a joy and I wholeheartedly recommend it.

Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: j1879 on December 01, 2017, 10:16:08 pm
Subject Name: Economics

Units: Units 3/4

Workload: Moderate (in saying this, I knew students who found the subject very hard, and others who found the subject to be less so - really depends on the basic understanding you have of the economy and the nature of commerce).

Assessment: Economics SACs usually take the form of tests and short-answer questions. Generally, the tests include multiple choice, short-answer, and long-answer (this is usually an evaluate question worth 6 or 10 marks). My Economics SACs ran for 55 minutes in total, including 5 minutes of reading time.

The assessments are weighted as follows:
GA1 (Unit 3 SACs): 25% of study score
GA2 (Unit 4 SACs):25% of study score
GA3 (Exam): 50% of study score

Exam Thoughts: The 2017 Economics exam ran for 2 hours and 15 minutes. Similarly to the SACs I completed, the exam consisted of a multiple choice section, a short-answer section, and a long-answer section. The exam itself was okay in terms of content, but it's important to note for anyone looking into doing the subject that a knowledge of events in the economy in the past two years is vital to your exam.

Textbook Recommendation: My class utilised Economic Fundamentals in Australia by MacGregor and Salla. A good textbook with valuable insight, albeit a few typos in places.

Recommended Other Resources: Again, read through articles from commerce-focused sources (e.g. the Financial Review, the Economist - if you can get Plain English Economics that's really good to read; if not, statements from the RBA are intuitive, if biased towards optimism).

Year of Completion: 2017

Rating: 4 out of 5

Comments: Recommended for those who are interested in any kind of commerce subject - just remember that the basic building blocks (e.g. an understanding of AD and AS and how they interact, the assumption of rationality, current economic trends, and the knowledge that everything is not ceteris paribus) are really really important for the development of your skills later on in Economics. When you put the work in, it's a rewarding subject and useful in real-life situations too.
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: rainbowsparkles15 on December 05, 2017, 06:05:11 pm
Subject Name:
Biology

Units: (Is it Units 1/2 or Units 3/4?)
3/4 (Completed in year 11)

Workload:
Quite content heavy but manageable as most areas of the course links together. Some concepts are initially challenging to tackle but if you have a love for sciences the workload doesn't seem too heavy at all!
It always depends on how much effort you personally want to put in but to do well, revision is necessary every few days (practise questions, summarising, watching videos etc.)

Assessment: (Outline the various assessments which make up the subject and how much each counts for)
GA1- U3 16% (My school did 2 sacs)
GA2- U4 24% (My school did 3 sacs, one of which was the experimental design poster)
GA3- Exam 60%

Exam Thoughts: (What's the structure? How hard was it?)
There is one biology exam consisting of 120 marks, 40 multiple choice and 80 short answer (typically about 11/12 multi-part questions). This years exam was the first of the new study design and while most of the same concepts were examined, they were tested in different ways to previous years and more interpretation and inferring was required. There is now a heavy emphasis on the importance of experimental design and it's no longer enough to be able to design an experiment, we also need to analyse the reliability of investigations and draw valid conclusions. Straightforward content can be tested through the examiners asking questions related to a given experiment so it is crucial than you are able to comprehend and identify key parts of a question. It is not enough to be confident in the content alone, you must also be able to put on your biological brain and relate theory to an unknown situation and then get your point across clearly to the examiners (tough, I know! But definitely possible with some practise and passion). Another thing to keep in mind is that this subject isn't about memorizing, it's about understanding and when you understand what you're learning,  it becomes a whole lot easier.

Textbook Recommendation: (What did you use? How much did you use it?)
My school used the Heinemann Biology 2 textbook. I've heard others say that Nature of Biology is better but I had no complaints. I made a summary of each chapter throughout the year using my textbook and this summary book was one of the best resources as the final exam came around. My only concern is that there is a lot of information in the textbook that will enhance your learning but isn't essential so it is important to have your study design close by as you move through each chapter to make sure you've got a deep understanding of the relevant points

Recommended Other Resources:
I'd first like to stress than it isn't essential to buy every resource available in order to achieve the best mark! (I did this being a year 11 and it was so not required) I purchased a range of resources but the best of all was the summary book I had created myself. If your school offers Edrolo it is a great resource but if not, there are so many YouTube videos out there that do an equally amazing job at helping you understand that tricky content. I recommend the Amoeba Sisters when you are first learning content for a very simplified and understandable summary to get you started. Khan Academy is also fantastic.

I also attended the TSFX headstart lecture but found it hard to absorb so much information in advance so I rather revision lectures to quickly review content, however the TSFX notes were great! I also purchased the A+ biol notes and ATAR notes summary notes book and preferred the latter as it was in more colloquial, digestible language so was easier to quickly read through. Unpopular opinion, but I'm not a fan of checkpoints as they distort the difficulty of exams when you actually go to do them. Looking back, I would have used external company tests??

I also cannot overstate how useful the ATAR notes community is and I wish I had started using it earlier! For biology in particular there are so many members happy to help you understand concepts and refine your answers as well as an abundance of notes. It's also so rewarding and helpful to answer other peoples questions and definitely strengthens your own understanding 

Year of Completion:
2017

Rating:  out of 5
5

Your Mark/Grade: (Optional)
Will let you know on December 15!

Comments: Give your overall opinion of the subject, content, assessment etc. and a recommendation, plus anything else which you feel is relevant.
Don't be scared off by the rumors of biology being impossibly hard, heavy in content and boring!! The 3/4 biology course is fascinating and strengthened my love of science and I cannot recommend it more. It isn't a subject you can slack off in but if you are prepared to put in effort (again, a manageable amount) the rewards are definitely worth it- I cannot recommend it more. Feel free to pm me with any questions (particularly if you're a year 11) and best of luck !

Edit: Typo
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: courtney2502 on December 05, 2017, 09:05:44 pm
Subject name: History Revolutions

Units: 3&4

Workload: Possibly one of the most vigorous subjects in VCE content wise. It's definitely a subject that you cannot bludge, nor just focus on memorising statistics, dates and quotes. It's a subject in which you must understand the complexity behind significant peoples, ideologies and events, and you must be able to identify and understand how everything relates to each other, as well as being able to support your answers with a suficient amount of evidence. Constant revision is necessary throughout the whole year if you want to do well in Revolutions.

Assessment: My school did it in a different order to what I presume most schools did as we focused on Section B first, but our first Outcome was an Essay of the Causes of one Revolution (Russia in my case). The second Outcome was on the Consequences of that same revolution which was a source analysis. The third outcome was for the Causes of the second revolution (China in my case) which was also a source analysis, and the final one was about the consequences of that same revolution, which was two extended response questions.

Unit 3 and 4 is worth 25% each (50% altogether) and the exam is worth 50% of the overall grade.

Exam Thoughts: It was a 2 hour exam with 4 sections weighted 20 marks each (overall out of 80 marks, and 30 minutes was dedicated to each section).
Section A had two parts - a source analysis and two extended response questions.
Section B also had two parts - an essay and a source analysis.
The hardest part I believe is managing your time efficiently- you need to be able to move on from an uncompleted section if you don't finish it in the time dedicated to it in order to ensure you don't cost yourself marks in other sections. As well as this, going into the exam, you need to know both revolutions inside out, as well as accurate evidence - you cannot just make these up. You have 15 minutes of reading time, in which you really should be planning in your head the order of which parts of the exam you would do first (I recommend numbering them from 1 to 4 - 1 being the one you're most confident in and 4 being the least, and doing it in that order, as you may be able to finish sections you're confident in earlier and give yourself more time in your weakest sections.)

VCAA is bound to throw something at you in the exam that is miniscule and possibly wasn't extensively covered (for me, that was Section B of Russia being all about women - that really threw me) so I suggest making sure that you cover every single aspect of the study design in as much detail as you can possibly muster.

Textbook Recommendation: My school used Analysing the Russian Revolution by Richard Malone and China Rising by Tom Ryan. These were the only books we used in class and I found them to be very beneficial, moreso the structure of the Russian textbook rather than the Chinese one.

Recommended other resources: This was my Year 12 subject in Year 11 so honestly, I didn't realise any other resources were available until the month before exams. I purchased the ATARNotes History Revolutions book which I loved as it condensed all the information down into basic summaries which was useful if you already had a grasp of the complexities behind the events. It also had boxes for quotes and statistics which I found very useful. I also made Quizlet's for memorising facts, quotes, dates etc. and that was very effective and I did not forget any facts that I had memorised. I also recommend getting Checkpoints - I did not do so as it was too late, but my friend had a copy for the French Revolution and I also thought that would be very useful.

Year of Completion: 2017

Rating: 3.5/5

Your mark/grade: 35! A, A, B+

Comments: If you're looking to do this subject, I recommend doing it in Year 11 rather than Year 12 so that you can invest as much time as possible into this subject as that is definitely required to do well. Otherwise, if you love History, I also recommend doing it, however I slightly can't stand the thought of taking another History class in my life, so if you want to learn about the Revolutions, perhaps documentaries and research in your own time so it doesn't destroy any slight love you have for History. Don't be thrown off by this though, it still is quite a rewarding and very interesting subject and I always looked forward to the classes!

Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: Joseph41 on December 08, 2017, 11:53:46 am
Disclaimer: did VCD in 2012, study design has changed, and is changing again in 2018. Take with a grain of salt.

Subject Name: Visual Communication Design

Units: Units 3/4

Workload:
Heavy. Perhaps surprisingly so. Basically all of my subjects were content-heavy, but I by far and away spent the most time on VCD - and it ended up being my poorest study score.

The thing with VCD - perhaps even more than other subjects - is that you're never really finished. There isn't that much content to remember, but there's no real reason you couldn't add an extra page, design or annotation to your folio, y'know? There's no real "end" - you're basically just confined by time. So yeah, don't be fooled into thinking that VCD is a "bludge" subject. If you want to do well, you'll have to invest time.

Assessment:
For me - and this is stretching my memory a bit - I believe it was a 50/50 split between coursework and the exam. Coursework included both theoretical SACs and two folios (roughly, one in semester one, one in semester two). For 2018 and beyond, the assessment split is as follows:

Unit 3 assessment: 25%
SAT (Unit 3-4): 40%
End of year exam: 35%

So, it looks a little different. I'd recommend reading through the study design for 2018+ if interested.

Exam Thoughts:
Broadly, my advice is to not neglect the exam. It's easy to do, because you focus so much on practical stuff throughout the year, and there realistically aren't very many resources available to use. But work with your teachers as closely as possible; the exam can end up being quite important (as above, it will contribute 35% in 2018+).

The biggest challenge for me in the exam was timing. I'm pretty comfortable rendering designs, for example, but they take me a long time. I hadn't really practised doing renderings or other designs much under time pressure, and that's going to be a huge thing with VCD. You might walk out of the exam disheartened because you feel like you didn't get your best work on paper, but don't worry - I think pretty much everybody will be in the same boat.

Typically, exams to this point have been a combination of prac and theory, so it's important to take in relevant materials to use. You can find past exams and examination reports here.

Textbook Recommendation:
I had a textbook, but honestly don't know which one it was. Regardless, we used it very irregularly.

Recommended Other Resources:
One of the best things you can do, I think, is to just design and analyse designs in your down time. For example, try to link design elements/principles to ads you see on TV, in the newspaper or on billboards. Think about why those elements/principles have been used in relation to the target audience and the like.

Otherwise, you can read a little more about my VCD experience here.

Year of Completion: 2012

Rating: 4.25 out of 5

Your Mark/Grade: 44 raw > 42.25 scaled

Comments:
If you're looking for a subject simply to fill the gaps, do not pick VCD.
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: TheBigC on December 13, 2017, 12:24:21 am
Subject Name: Biology

Units: Units 3/4

Workload:
Biology is a content-heavy subject. It is entirely conceptual-based and assesses students' abilities to explain - often - complicated concepts in a concise manner. Biology requires that you study and revise material on an almost-daily basis to ensure perfected understanding and continual ability to recall different facts and figures. This may sound tiring, but let me re-assure you, these aren't just 'any' facts and figures, these are some of the most exciting and interesting, sometimes even extraordinary aspects of life and about how the biological world around us 'ticks'. Overtime however, as you perform this level of continuous revision, a more complex understanding is able to be acquired, thereby linking all the seemingly different and dispersed concepts into small cohesive groups (i.e. Unit 3 is all about proteins and their functioning within the human body....) making the subject itself less 'rote' and more understanding-based.

Assessment:
The SACs ultimately account for 40% of one's study score, with the exam contributing the remaining 60%.

Unit 3: (16% of total score)
Different schools do different assessments, however I can describe the SACs that I had sat for:
SAC 1: Practical SAC involving an investigation of enzyme activity
SAC 2: Photosynthesis and Cellular Respiration Test
SAC 3: Immunity Test
SAC 4: Extended Practical Investigation (some schools will so this in unit 4).

Unit 4: (24% of total score)
SAC 1: Two large components of evolution were described in an article and a written, essay-like, response had to be constructed to answer 3 very broad questions.
SAC 2: Biotechnology Test.

Exam Thoughts:
This examination was out of a total of 120 marks:
- 40 marks for multiple choice
- 80 marks for short answer
The exam itself was not too difficult for those with whom prepared well, however, I did find the time constraint to be of the greatest difficulty, whereby only barely finishing on time (I am usually quite fast too....)
I would recommend to students that are planning on taking Biology as a course in 2018 to focus largely on experimental design questions and various application questions throughout their studies as these will - most definitely - be on your end-of-year examination. Unfortunately, many resources lack these questions (I will address which resources do not lack these below).

Textbook Recommendation:
I used many, many texts:
- Jacaranda Nature of Biology 2
- Heinemann Biology 2
- Nelson Biology Units 3&4
- Campbell Biology
The texts I used most were Nature of Biology and Heinemann Biology 2... Nelson was horrific and one of the worst, most shallow texts that I had. If you are willing to spend the money, indeed purchase it as some information is decent and not found in other textbooks, however, everything else is useless, misleading or sometimes even plain incorrect. I mainly used Campbell Biology as a reference to deepen my understanding of different concepts and to clarify any ambiguities.

Recommended Other Resources:
- Biozone workbook (my goodness this was AMAZING).
- NEAP smartstudy guides (exams + questions)
- ExamPro Biology
- A+ notes (these were awesome)
- (DURING EXAM REVISION): TSFX lecture notes were the best compilations I had even encountered. These were so damn useful.
- VCE Checkpoints is essential as well..... (great way to test yourself on each area of study)

Year of Completion:
2017

Rating: 6 out of 5 (haha)

Your Mark/Grade:
Not Available (results are due Dec 15th)

Comments:
This was such an amazing subject and honestly, I had a fantastic time studying it.
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: bdgonz on December 13, 2017, 04:08:26 pm
Subject Name: Health and Human Development

Units: Units 3&4

Workload: HHD is regarded as quite a content heavy subject, so if you struggle with memorising, it may not be your forte. However, even though definitions must be memorised almost word perfect (for full marks), HHD has become (and is becoming) far more about applying your health-related knowledge. Furthermore, if you read over your notes and revise even once a week, remembering content for the end of year exam should not be as daunting as it is made out to be.

Assessment:
Unit 3 SACS (25%): Australia's health
Unit 4 SACS (25%): Global health
Exam: 50%

Note: The study design is changing for 2018, so this structure may not be the same

Exam Thoughts: The exam is 100 marks and is comprised of multiple part questions from both Unit 3 and 4. There will usually be one or two pure definition questions, one 6 marker. The examiners will always throw in a few curveballs to try to distinguish the good students from the great students, so be prepared for that. It should be noted that HHD is regarded as an 'easy' subject, and because of this there is very very strict exam marking. I lost marks on my exams on questions that I had memorised from the textbook.

Textbook Recommendation: I used the Key Concepts Unit 3&4 Textbook (with the gumboots on the front), but this textbook can no longer be used for 2018. I used my textbook a lot, but I slightly regret it. I wasn't aware of the utter importance of the study design, and unfortunately memorised a lot of un-examinable information. The study design is your best friend. Obviously use a textbook, but structure your notes to the study design dot point (to ensure you are completely prepared for the exam).

Recommended Other Resources: Usually HHD lectures are quite good, because it exposes you to different ways of answering questions. Try to go to lectures that are run by examiners! Buying notes is okay, but I believe making your own from multiple resources is far more valuable.

Year of Completion: 2016

Rating:  4 out of 5 (was occasionally a bit dry, but not often!)

Your Mark/Grade: 42 raw

Comments: I repeat again, THE STUDY DESIGN IS CHANGING! A lot is likely to stay the same, but parts are certainly changing. I found HHD to be a fun, interesting subject and an overall good choice for one of my Year 11 3/4s (I think it prepared me for this year). Good luck!

Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: Joseph41 on December 15, 2017, 03:13:59 pm
Subject Name: Health & Human Development

Units: 3/4

Workload:
To do pretty well? Perhaps not as much as other subjects (of course, this is all subjective). To do really well? A fair bit (again, subjective). Like, I feel I probably could have scored 40+ with a fair bit less effort, but with a subject like this one, I think going the extra metaphorical mile tends to pay off.

Assessment:
Honestly just going to go off memory here. I'm pretty sure it was 25% for Unit 3 SACs, 25% for Unit 4 SACs, and 50% for the end-of-year exam. The study design is changing (again) in 2018, though - I suggest checking it out here. By the look of the new study design, assessment comprises:

* Unit 3 SACs: 25%
* Unit 4 SACs: 25%
* End-of-year exam: 50%

So I don't think much if anything has changed.

For me, SACs pretty much simulated the exam - so short answer and mid-length questions, typically between one and six marks. This is probably my preferred form of assessment - I think it suits me best - and it was also good practice for the exam. What it meant is that I could develop effective study techniques throughout the year for that particular assessment type.

Exam Thoughts:
You can find past HHD exams and examination reports here. As you'll see, these traditionally include 1-6 mark questions, potentially covering the entire course.

To me, the trick to HHD is a) learning the content (relatively straightforward - just requires consistency), and b) learning answer structures. More than any of my other subjects, I found HHD to be formulaic. That is, answering different question types in certain ways tended to be a sure way of getting full marks. Working off the examination reports linked above is a great step toward this - they're truly an undervalued resource.

Otherwise, timing is a big thing in the exam (and to a lesser extent, SACs throughout the year). I think I finished with like four seconds left in the exam, and that was pretty stressful. I really, really recommend working on timing throughout the year, and developing a quick (but legible) writing style.

Textbook Recommendation:
Honestly, I reckon they're all pretty similar. I used mine mostly to form summaries (see below), and occasionally the chapter review questions.

Recommended Other Resources:
I'd just smash out as many practice questions during the year, and practice exams at the end of it. Don't be afraid to re-do questions, would be some of my best advice. If you do a question and get like 5/6 on it, come back to it later on. Keep answering questions until you get 100% on them (work with your teacher if they're willing).

Same thing with practice exams at the end of the year. Just keep working at it until you're nailing your responses.

Year of Completion: 2012

Rating: 4 out of 5

Your Mark/Grade: 50 raw > 50 scaled

Comments:
Overall, I enjoyed HHD 3/4. I didn't do HHD 1/2, so was taking a bit of a risk - it was either this or Extension Philosophy. No regrets (although uni Philosophy is sweet, for anybody playing along at home).

There's a fair bit of content. Sometimes it's dry, sometimes it's interesting (obviously IMO). None of it is particularly groundbreaking, but it's a good subject.

To do well, I think dedication throughout the year is key. If you leave revision until exclusively the end of the year, you're going to be playing catch-up, and that's not what you want. My study technique:

1. Pay attention in class. Take notes.
2. Pay attention in class. Complete practice questions.
3. For independent revision, make summaries of key concepts. Then summarise those summaries. Then summaries those summaries. Try to condense entire parts of the course into one page of notes (doing so really makes you think about what's important).
4. Closer to the exam, another technique I used was simply going through each dot point on the study design, and writing as much as I knew about that concept. If I could write a lot, sweet - it was a confidence booster. If not, I knew I had to work on that particular dot point.
5. Work out what questions are really asking. As above, IMO HHD is formulaic in this sense.
6. Get people to test you before SACs and the exam. I found that if I could explain something verbally, I could also do it in writing (my written communication tends to be better than my oral communication). Using the above-mentioned one-page summaries is a great tool for this.
7. Pay attention in class.
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: bdgonz on December 18, 2017, 12:07:55 am
Subject Name: Psychology

Units: 3/4

Workload: Moderate to heavy. Psychology inevitably has a lot of content that must be memorised, but to do really well you must be able to apply this knowledge and think quite quickly on the spot. To be successful in the exam (40+) you should know the content extremely well, and have lots of practice applying the knowledge. The recent study design change in 2017 has focused on making the questions more about applying knowledge as compared to spewing out memorised content (however, this is still a part of the course).

Assessment:
Unit 3 - Worth 16% and comprised of:
SAC 1: The Nervous System and Stress
SAC 2: Learning and Memory

Unit 3 - Worth 24% and comprised of:
SAC 1: Sleep and Consciousness
SAC 2: Mental Health and Phobias
SAC 3: Research methods

End-of-year exam: 60% (very important!)

Exam Thoughts: The exam is made up of Section A (50 multiple choice questions) and Section B (70 short answer questions, including one 10 mark extended response question).

This is a change in 2017, as previously (2016 and before) there has been Section A (65 multiple choices), Section B (60 short answer marks) and a Section C Research Scenario (15 marks).

This year I found the exam quite simple, easy and straightforward. The multiple choices were relatively easy and the short-answer questions were relatively predictable. In the exam there is likely to be a question about a 'Scientific Poster' question and a 'Media Study' question, as these must also be done during your SAC work. Psychology is a subject where you can prepare to an extent, but after a certain point, your score will be reflective on how resilient and adaptive you can be in the exam. For me, I was forced to make up a question about caffeine antagonists and bullshit a 5 mark conclusion question. Adaptivity is essential! 

Textbook Recommendation: My school actually didn't use a textbook. Our teacher got us to watch Edrolo videos before we came into class, and then we used powerpoints she created to learn the content. Not having a textbook can be daunting, but I found it actually less stressful (as there was no need to be overwhelmed by piles and piles of information).

However if your school uses a textbook, I recommend structuring notes using study-design dot points, and double checking with teachers if all the information is relevant.

Recommended Other Resources: Edrolo is great (but not everything is entirely correct). Makes class feel like a revision lesson.

Year of Completion: 2017

Rating:  5 out of 5, absolutely loved this subject. All the information was super duper interesting.

Your Mark/Grade: 45 Raw (scaled to 44.5)

Comments: Psychology has been my all-time favourite subject of VCE. I thought it was HHD, but after doing Psych I realised that HHD gets the silver medal. All of the content from stress to memory to sleep to mental health to research methods is interesting and fascinating. My friends and I especially loved applying our Psychology knowledge to real life situations (especially reinforcement and punishment). I must mention that my Psych teacher was INCREDIBLE, and that she took 3 of our Year 12 classes. The other Psych teacher was nowhere near as good, and a lot of those students hated the subject. However, if you are passionate and driven and interested in the science of the human mind; Psych is for you!

Hope this helps  :D :D
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: ellellen on December 22, 2017, 03:32:07 pm
Subject Name: Media

Units: 3/4

Workload: For your SACs there isn't too much content, a lot involves memorisation but it isn't too hard. The SAT (your film, photography, etc) however, involves a lot lot lot of work, and will probably take up most of your time for quite a few weeks.

For my SAT I made a short film. This was a long process that involved creating a folio that demonstrated your thought process in coming up with your idea, and explained your creative choices. This took weeks and weeks to create. Then you need to go through the process of drafting, scripting, storyboarding, finding actors and locations, filming over several weeks, doing reshoots, then editing, THEN putting all of this into your folio too. This took sosososo long, but luckily you'll have most of the term 2 holidays to do your filming. Of course, putting together your SAT is heaps of fun, and you get to be in charge of every aspect of what you produce, and I loved doing it so much. But, just be aware that it is a very time consuming process, and for me, it took up a lot more time than studying for any SAC for any subject (although it was worth a lot more than any single SAC too, so fair). Ultimately, despite the hard work, the SAT will be the most enjoyable and rewarding assessment task you'll ever undertake!

Assessment:
- 3 SACs throughout the year, worth a total of 20%
- SAT (School-assessed task) worth 40%
- Two hour exam worth 40%

Exam Thoughts:
*Disclaimer: the study design is changing from next year, so this is what my exam was like, but yours might be slightly different!!!!*

The exam is split into three sections; each one assessing the content of a different one of your three SACs. It might be different next year but for me these sections were:
1. Narrative
2. Media Texts and Society's Values
3. Media Influence and Regulation

Each section was weighted pretty much evenly; the exam was out of 65 marks so one section is usually worth a couple marks more than the others. Each section had a number of short answer and extended response questions.

The exam is pretty straightforward, however one slight difficulty I found was with how some questions are structured. For example, in Narrative, you study two different texts. A question on the exam might say something like "referring to one of your media texts, answer this question _________" and then the next question says "using your other text, answer this very different question __________" and you need to weigh up which text you think suits which question better, and which you have more examples for! This was hard for me because I am very indecisive! Other than that, the exam wasn't too difficult, and if you did well on the SACs, the exam is really just like all your SACs put together in one.

Textbook Recommendation: I used Heinemann Media, which was the same textbook used for 1/2 Media. It is nice for teaching about some film and photography techniques but isn't very useful for the SACs or exam.

Recommended Other Resources: YOUR FILMS/ TV SHOWS/ OTHER TEXTS. Watch them all before the year starts, watch them throughout the year, know them back to front. These are your most valuable resources. It's also pretty useful to read analyses of your texts on random blogs and websites, which might mention a certain point about your texts that is useful for your assessment!

Year of Completion: 2015

Rating:  4 out of 5

Your Mark/Grade: 44 raw > 42.6 scaled

Comments:
Overall I loved media, particularly the SAT. Our teacher also chose really good texts for us. For Narrative we looked at Children of Men (2006) and The Hunger Games (2012). These films were pretty good, but after watching them each 10+ times in one year, I became so sick of them!
For Society's Values we looked at how gender was represented in a variety of different texts, comparing texts from the 1960s, 1990s, and 2010s. These texts were: The Flintstones, The Jetsons, The Simpsons, Step by Step, and Modern Family. Section three does not involve any specific media texts.

I recommend media if you're interested in filmmaking, watching movies, analysing films and tv shows, and learning about different theories of how the media operates!

Also take a peak here at the study design for next year: http://www.vcaa.vic.edu.au/Documents/vce/media/MediaSD_2018.pdf

Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: Quantum44 on December 27, 2017, 05:17:48 pm
Subject Name: Biology

Units: 3/4

Workload:
The workload of biology varies quite a bit depending on whether you are doing it as a sole 3/4 in year 11, or with many other subjects, and what score you are aiming for. I was hoping for a score well into the 40s, and since I did biology as a my only 3/4 in year 11, I put in a lot of consistent work throughout the year and smashed out the practice exams at the end of the year. If you are looking for high marks, I’d recommend 6-8 hours of work a week working through the course by writing notes and doing practice questions, increasing this amount considerably before SACs. In terms of practice exams, I’d definitely say 40 is the golden number for biology, however it really depends on your learning style and I’m sure there are people who have achieved study scores of 50 by doing many fewer practice exams, or far more.

Assessment:
I did biology when the previous study design was used, so we had 10 SACs. Fortunately, VCAA have decided to be less brutal with this new study design and I believe there are now 5 SACs each contributing 8% to your overall study score. However I am not very familiar with the new study design so you should definitely check the VCAA website for the fine details.

Exam Thoughts:
The exam is structured around two sections:
- Multiple Choice: 40 marks
- Short Answer: 80 marks

- Reading time: 15 mins
- Writing time: 150 mins

In my opinion, you should be aiming for a mark per minute for multiple choice. The questions are generally straight forward and just test your knowledge of the content. Then use 90 minutes for short answer, as these make up the bulk of the exam and test knowledge of content, ability to apply concepts to unseen problems, and how you can convey your answer in a fluent and concise manner. Finally, you should aim to leave 20 minutes at the end to check over the exam, mostly focused on reading over your responses to the short answer questions.

Textbook Recommendation:
I used the Nature of Biology, which, despite being known as the most comprehensive textbook for VCE biology, wasn’t particularly helpful. It included far too much useless information and glossed over important areas of the study design. On a whole, it left me confused as to what VCAA focus on when assessing the study design.

Recommended Other Resources:
Connect Education notes are a really good, high quality resource and also give solid exam advice as they are made by people who actually know the VCE system very well. Didn’t really use anything else although I’d recommend NEAP smart study questions as a good alternative to checkpoints if you are planning on doing lots of past exams at the end of the year.

Year of Completion: 2016

Rating:  5 out of 5

Your Mark/Grade: 45

Comments: Biology is a great subject, particularly if you love science and want to pursue a career in a biological area medicine or just want a taste of VCE in year 11. Looking back on VCE, it’s probably the most fun I’ve had at school as it really felt like I was learning something interesting and tangible while getting an overview of how life works. I haven’t gone into a great amount of detail in this review but I’ll leave links to my biology resources below if you want some more tips and tricks.

How to get 40+ in VCE Biology
Improving Expression in VCE Biology
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: cookiedream on December 28, 2017, 12:21:56 pm
Subject Name: English Language

Units: 3/4

Workload:
Didn't find it to be much, personally, other than the metalanguage. The study design has all the terms that you need to know for the exam, and you shouldn't learn beyond this (particularly since there's a risk that the examiner might not know the new term). I put in the work throughout the year, with writing practice paragraphs and answers to short answer questions mostly - rarely full essays. Definitely went to the teacher often for feedback, though I'm not sure whether that counts as workload ahaha.

Assessment:
Unit 3: 25%
Unit 4: 25%
Exam: 50%

My school had six SACs, three for each unit. For every unit, there was one SAC for each of the three sections of the exam: Short Answer (Section A), Analytical Commentary (Section B) and Essay (Section C).

Exam Thoughts:

Section A: Short Answer (15 marks)
Based on the transcript denoted as 'Text 1'. You get around 4-6 questions with marks varying from 1 mark to 6 marks. They're very centred around your ability to recognise and correctly use metalanguage (e.g "Identify the social purpose of the text" [1 mark] - you need to know what "social purpose" means). Here, you also need to be very specific to the given text, ensuring that your answers are not generic and that you use line numbers.

Section B: Analytical Commentary (30 marks - actually out of 15 but then doubled)
Based on the transcript denoted as 'Text 2'. Also has a great emphasis on metalanguage and text specificity, except you can decide what exactly to talk about. You can structure your paragraphs in terms of subsystem, in terms of sociolinguistic variables, in terms of identities, etc. etc. No conclusion required - I certainly didn't write one!

Section C: Essay (30 marks - actually out of 15 but then doubled)
At the end of the exam booklet, you're given three pages. Each page has a set of stimuli (around 3-4, or maybe even 5) and at the bottom of the page, there's a statement/question which you need to discuss/show how/agree/disagree, etc. Greater emphasis on your retention of linguistic concepts (e.g. taboo, Standard English, Australian English, individual and group identities) and how you're able to talk about them. Structure is important here, with an introduction, 3-4 body paragraphs and conclusion necessary. Metalanguage is a bonus but there isn't as much focus put on it as in the previous two sections.

Overall, I thought this year's exam was kinda easy...but I was scared to admit this coming out of the exam room. The short answer questions were really straightforward, where you can easily interpret the mark allocations. The analytical commentary involved a written text, so there was no need to go into the specifics of turn-taking/topic management as well as prosodic features and phonological features - as you would if it was a spoken conversation. The very first essay topic suited me very well (something about social groups/change...? I forgot), whilst most people I know chose the second topic (which was about PC, euphemisms, etc.). The last essay topic was kinda weird, where it asked you to discuss Standard English, which was definitely my weak point!

Textbook Recommendation: (What did you use? How much did you use it?)
'Living Lingo' was the main textbook my school used. I sometimes read it and annotated pages on topics which I had greater trouble with (particularly PC and doublespeak), but other than that I barely used it.

Recommended Other Resources:
I also used Kirsten Fox's 'English Language Exam Guide' to help my SACs and for Section A practice during exam revision. 'English Language for Senior Students: A guide to Metalanguage', also by Kirsten Fox, is a really helpful resource which explains in-depth different metalanguage terms, with good examples, and different concepts listed in the study design. Since Units 1/2, I've also used 'The Complete Guide to English Usage for Australian Students' by Margaret Ramsay as another resource for metalanguage. 

Year of Completion: 2017

Rating: 5 out of 5

Your Mark/Grade: 49 raw > 49.45 scaled

Comments:
Really enjoyed Eng Lang!! Although it's quite difficult, it's a great subject which I found really fun, highly applicable to real life and easy to study for. Don't think I would've enjoyed the other Englishes as much, hence not have done as well in them. The content really made me think of the kind of language we use in different situations, particularly the speech of politicians when they're in public as opposed to a private domain. Personally, I found the assessments to be quite reliant on structure, which I liked since there's almost a set way in which you can write (not as much for Section C though, which is why I didn't do as well in my essay SACs lol). I highly recommend this subject for anyone who enjoys learning about the wonders of the language we use and take advantage of on a day-to-day basis, and those who don't mind memorisation of the metalanguage (some found it to be really dry and boring) and those who don't mind a bit of structure.
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: nice! on January 24, 2018, 05:05:58 pm
Subject Name: Legal Studies

Units: 3/4

Workload:
Moderate. Legal studies is majorly a content subject, but it's not as much content as, say, bio. The workload mainly consists of reading the textbook and completing questions from it, doing regular prac exam questions, and making content summaries. Although you must memorise case studies as well as principles of government and more, you must also be able to apply this knowledge to questions considering the strengths and weaknesses of different aspects of the legal system in evaluation questions, which can be done through past exam questions.

Assessment:
Unit 3: 25%
Unit 4: 25%
Exam: 50%

Exam Thoughts:
The exam essentially can be split into short answer and extended response questions, and consists of 70 marks, with 15 minutes reading time and 2 hours writing time. The exam increases in difficulty as it goes. It begins with short 2 mark questions such as identifying and explaining one criminal sanction, and leads to larger analytical questions, including analyses of the legal system. For these questions, students must draw on not only their memory, but critical thinking in how to answer. The final question on the exam is the dreaded 10-marker, which usually draws upon two different areas of study and requires either a comparison, evaluation, or both.

Students who do well in the exam tend to not just memorise content to answer the short 2-4 mark questions, but also have considered many aspects of different mechanisms within the legal system including the difficulties one may face when using the legal system in terms of its Fairness, Accessibility, and Timely nature (FAT). To earn full marks on such questions, students must address each of these elements, and how they are or are not achieved.

You should aim to get the first questions out of the way as fast as you can in order to give yourself more time to give a detailed response to larger questions. Also, during reading time I would recommend skimming the exam, and focusing on the larger questions and brainstorming paragraphs in your head. As soon as writing time starts, jotting down a plan is VERY beneficial so that you can start writing straight away when you go to the analytical questions.

To score well in your answers on the exam it is imperative to use the stem of the question. You must use the stem in your response to show that you understand what the question is asking, and to make a more coherent answer. Every paragraph should link back to the stem, similar to in English when you would write a linking sentence at the end of each paragraph. You could also use the stem to begin a paragraph. For example, if the question is:
"The Commonwealth Constitution protects Australians through express rights.
Evaluate the extent of this protection."
, you should aim to begin your paragraphs with a variation of "One way in which the Commonwealth Constitution protects Australians through express rights is..."

Textbook Recommendation:
Justice and Outcomes- used heavily at the start of the year as I had not completed units 1/2 and thus needed to really learn the basics of legal studies. However, it also very useful as a glossary, as well as for case studies (specifically the 1967 referendum). The questions do not all need to be completed but you can just decide which questions are worth doing. Very helpful in terms of giving extra information to make an answer more detailed.

Recommended Other Resources:
CPAP- AMAZING !!!! Used CPAP study guide religiously due to the concise and easy to understand information. Exam tips were extremely helpful to understand what errors to avoid according to past examination reports. There are many tables showing comparisons and strengths and weaknesses within the legal system which definitely assist more visual learners, and can easily be built into paragraphs. The mini exams at the end of each area of study are so so so helpful, and extremely good SAC revision, especially as there are sample answers/ a marking scheme at the back.

Year of Completion: 2017

Rating: 4 out of 5

Your Mark/Grade: 46 raw (scaled to 46.12)

Comments:
Legal studies is a really interesting and informative subject !! I would recommend to everyone as I think everyone should be aware of how the government and courts operate, how legislation is passed, and how one may be able to access dispute resolution. The content really isn't hard to learn and understand as long as you do the basic work, and is actually fun to study for once you get to the exam period ! After doing legal studies, I enjoyed it so much I ended up putting Law as my first preference for uni, which I had not even considered beforehand  :)
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: Joseph41 on March 02, 2018, 12:10:07 pm
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: Joseph41 on March 02, 2018, 01:01:09 pm
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: sonnyangel on March 26, 2018, 05:45:56 pm
Subject Name: Visual Communication Design



Units: 3/4



Workload:
There isn't much content in general, however, the folio requires a lot of time and effort. Creating one is a lengthy process but it can also be really rewarding, especially if you like your brief. Overall, I found the workload quite manageable; I occasionally spent more time on VCD than my other subjects but it was nice to have a creative outlet and be able to spend time on things that are more time-consuming than difficult.
 
Assessment:
+ 3 SACs (25%)
-       Mini folio
-       2 written SACs
+ School Assessed Task (folio) (40%)

+ End-of-year exam (35%)
*NOTE: The study design will be changing in 2018 so it may be different!



Exam Thoughts:
The biggest issue with the exam for most people is time management. While the questions are of easy/reasonable difficulty, finishing in time whilst still being satisfied with the quality of your work is somewhat a challenge. I liked to separate the types of questions into 5 categories: theory, case studies, technical drawing, rendering, and design.
Theory questions are the ones that outright test your knowledge of content. These usually concern the topics of elements, principles, and typography. Case study questions are similar to the ones asked in your written SACs. They involve questions about a real or made-up product/company and you will either be required to analyse the designs or answer questions about the design industry in relation to the design/example provided. Technical drawings are some of the harder questions and these usually involve perspective drawings or orthogonal drawings. Technically, they could also be floorplans and elevations but I've personally never heard of VCAA asking for these kinds of drawings. Rendering requires you to render an object and make it look 3D. This is one of the most time-consuming questions. Design questions involve creating something that meets the brief provided. These are usually in the communication field, however last year, it was in the industrial field.
Overall, my method of tackling the time constraints was to answer the types of questions in a specific order. I typically went with this order: theory - case studies - technical drawing - rendering - design.

Textbook Recommendation:
I used the Nelson Visual Communication Design textbook (Third Edition). I found it helpful for theory as I didn’t do Units 1 & 2 but overall, I don’t think the textbook was absolutely necessary.



Recommended Other Resources:
Go to Top Designs and take lots and lots and lots of pictures. Having examples of what you’re supposed to do is super helpful since there isn’t a specific format you have to follow and occasionally, you’ll find that you’re unsure about how to start.
This is a link to a sample folio (https://emmascreations.wordpress.com/2011/06/29/year-12-unit-4-visual-communication-design-folio/).
For theory, the Edrolo guy is helpful if your school offers it. Also, the pinned posts on the VCD board are good too!

Year of Completion: 2017



Rating:  5 out of 5



Your Mark/Grade: 46 raw (scaled to 44.98)



Comments:
I really enjoyed VCD and it was my favourite subject all year! I think it’s really important to make a brief you’re excited about because the folio takes a long time and if you don’t like the requirements of your brief, you won’t want to work on it. It might also be helpful to be your own target audience so that way you know you’ll be interested in what you’re designing!
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: mzhao on March 26, 2018, 11:25:24 pm
Hey guys, here's a review on something a bit different.

Subject Name: Algorithmics (HESS)

Units: 3/4

Workload:
I felt that the workload was moderate to heavy. Unlike other subjects such as Methods or English, the content covered in Algorithmics is completely new, and shares little overlap with content taught in previous years of school. Furthermore, I found some of the content very challenging, especially the topics in U4 AOS3, which explore the much broader idea of computing through several thought experiments and philosophical arguments. While the conclusions they reach are fascinating, I spent, quite literally, weeks to grasp some of the logic behind those arguments. These two reasons combined made me feel that although the number of concepts taught are far fewer compared to other subjects like Biology, the difficulty of the content impacted the workload, and will impact you especially if you aim to master all of it.

Assessment:
Unit 3 - School Assessed Tasks worth 20%, comprised of:
- a small number of folio tasks which require you to explore the use of Data Types and/or employ design patterns to construct different algorithms.
- a project in which you present a solution to a real world problem by abstracting aspects of the problem, representing them using Data Types, writing up an algorithm in pseudocode, and presenting a short report detailing and justifying the design choices of your solution.
- a written report which evaluates the strengths and weaknesses of a sample solution to a real world problem.

Unit 4 - School Assessed Tasks worth 20%, which includes:
- a formal mathematical analysis of a given algorithm which solves a problem.
- the construction of an improved algorithm which solves the same problem, along with written analysis and justification for your solution.
- a report on the universality of computation and algorithms.

Exam - 20 marks Multiple Choice, 80 marks Short Answer, worth 60%

Exam Thoughts:
The content of the exam was a bit of a surprise once I opened the booklet. Back when I studied the subject in 2016, which was only the second year it had been around, there wasn't much information regarding the types of questions VCAA like to ask. The only guide we had was the 2015 exam, which mainly tested the theory and mathematics behind algorithms. The 2016 exam was very different, as many of the short answer questions asked us to apply our knowledge to construct algorithms to solve a variety of problems. Though I was more comfortable with writing algorithms compared to explaining the theoretical concepts studied in the subject, I was a bit sad that my emphasis on revision for the latter did not pay dividends in the exam.

Textbook Recommendation:
We were given access to a digital textbook on Alexandria Repository from Monash Uni which we used occasionally. I thought it provided only a basic and brief explanation of the content.
I preferred reading content from more advanced, university level textbooks. While they provided detailed explanations of concepts along with bonuses such as proofs for algorithms, the risk is, of course, wasting time studying content outside the scope of VCE Algorithmics.

Recommended Other Resources:
I enjoyed many videos on YouTube which gave clear explanations along with the intuition behind the standard algorithms you are required to learn in Algorithmics, such as Dijkstra's, Floyd-Warshall and Prim's.

Year of Completion: 2016

Rating: 5 out of 5

Your Mark/Grade: 48 (~49.2 scaled)

Comments:
Algorithmics is a unique subject, and offers a refreshing change from the bland textbook questions you receive in other classes. Because a large portion of the course relates to creating algorithms, I feel that prior experience with programming would help ease the workload, mainly for the start of Unit 3, when the fundamental ideas in programming are taught. However, don't let a lack of programming experience deter you! Almost none of the course requires you to write code in a specific programming language. If you are interested in problem solving and the ideas of computation, this subject will give you a good taste of the rapidly expanding field of algorithmics.
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: hums_student on April 09, 2018, 12:45:55 pm
No one has done Chinese yet so here we go:

Subject Name: Chinese (SLA)

Units: 3/4

Workload: Relatively high

Assessment:
UNIT 3: 3 SACS (25% of study score in total)
  - Sac 1: creative writing (12.5%)
  - Sac 2: listening
  - Sac 3: oral
UNIT 4: 2 SACS (25% of study score in total)
  - Sac 1: reading comprehension and translation
  - Sac 2: listening and reading comprehension


Exam Thoughts:
Exam 1 – Oral (15 minutes)
Oral is split into 2 parts: General Conversation (7 minutes) and Detail Study (8 minutes)
For GC the two examiners take turns asking you questions relating to the following five aspects:
1. Yourself and your family
2. School (incl. subjects you do)
3. Friends / pets
4. Extracurricular activities/work
5. Future plans (uni, area of work etc)

For DS, you first spend one minute introducing your topic which must include:
- Introduction of your topic (very briefly, 1-2 sentences max)
- Which areas did you focus on (3-4 areas of focus)
- What sources did you use in research (3-5 sources)
- Why did you pick the topic? (optional. Very briefly if you choose to do it)

Examiners then take turns asking questions relating to your detail study.

Exam 2 – Written (2 hours + 15 minutes reading)
Written examination is split into 4* parts:
   1. Listening (2 questions, first question answered in English, second in Chinese)
   2. Reading Comprehension (2 questions, first question answered in English, second in Chinese)
   3. Translation (2 questions, both to be answered in English)
   4. Writing (you get 5 topics of 5 different text types, choose one to answer)

Textbook Recommendation:
I used the textbook written by Xinjingshan. Personally did not find it very helpful especially for writing, as the sample essays were all too short and well below the word limit. I would recommend getting resources off past students (eg. high scoring past SACs, essays etc) instead of relying on textbooks.

Recommended Other Resources:
See above.
Also, other PEOPLE are very good resources! I was able to get full marks for listening, and nearly full marks for oral because I spent the weeks leading up to the exam finding as many Chinese people as I can to talk to. I’m sure this applies to other LOTE subjects as well, just find someone and TALK to them. They don’t have to be a VCAA examiner, just have a conversation with them and try to always answer in full sentences.

Year of Completion: 2017

Rating:  3.5 out of 5

Your Mark/Grade: 35 (43 scaled) (97/100 Oral Exam)
GA1: A         GA2: A+        GA3: A

Comments:
I doubt I’m qualified to give advice for reading and writing, since I completely messed them up for the exam. But I got nearly full marks for oral so here’s some advice for that:

-   For your DS, choose a topic that hasn’t been done a trillion times. My original topic for DS was Chinese cuisine, which gets done by at least a hundred kids every year. I later changed it to the Chinese Education Mission of 1872 (cos I’m also a history geek) which has never been done before, so the examiners are automatically more interested.

-   Get as much info as possible, even if they seem irrelevant. For my DS on the CEM one of the students later became the father of railroad, and just for fun I researched the technologies behind railroad construction back in the early 1900s. Examiner ended up asking me a similar question for the exam.

-   Stay calm and act natural. Sounds clichéd, but I cannot stress this enough. Remember: you only go through this ONCE, but the examiners have to do this EVERYDAY for HOURS. So don’t be afraid to be expressive, laugh, even make jokes, do anything to make the examiners feel comfortable. If you make it an enjoyable experience for them, they’re more likely to give you a good score.

-   If you make a mistake, correct yourself immediately. You actually get marked on this. If you said something that didn’t make sense, laugh and quickly correct yourself. Don’t sit there awkwardly and don’t act worried.

-   Make your DS personal to you. You WILL be asked ‘why did you choose this topic?’, make sure to provide a personal / interesting reason (do NOT say because someone told you to, someone you know did it before, etc).

-   HAVE GOOD MANNERS!! No, you don’t get marked on it, but it leaves a good impression. Smile and say hi when you walk in, say thank you before you leave and remember to push your chair in.

-   Also, a general advice which definitely helped me, have some basic knowledge of Chinese history, politics, and geography, and how they influenced present day Chinese society and culture.

Good luck to anyone doing Chinese!

/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/

*Note: Study design changing in 2019, written exam will no longer include translation.

EDIT: Just to add, don't be afraid to lie during the oral exam. I BS'ed my way through half of my DS questions because I didn't know the answer. That's another reason why you should choose a topic that hasn't been done before, doing common topics will make it harder for you to get away with lying, since the examiners would know the topic really well.
One of my examiners asked me to name some famous people from the Chinese Education Mission, I named the 3 that I knew and their achievements, then she asked me "Apart from them, are there any other people that you know?"
Me (internally): F***! I only learnt those three
So I said the first Chinese name to come to mind (my own) and said some random achievement, and got away with it. 8)
Basically, just sound super confident.

EDIT 2: For oral you are not allowed to tell the examiners your name or school. If you're asked to introduce your school, make sure that there's not enough information for the examiners to figure out or have a general idea of what school you're from.
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: sarangiya on April 10, 2018, 10:32:55 pm
Subject Name: Japanese SL

Units: 3/4

Workload: Quite high.

Assessment:
Unit 3 (GA1, 25% overall)
Outcome 1: 500ji personal/imaginative written piece (40% of GA1, 10% overall)
Outcome 2: Listening test (20% of GA1, 5% overall)
Outcome 3: Role-play oral task (40% of GA1, 10% overall)

Unit 4 (GA2, 25% overall)
Outcome 1: Reading test (20% of GA2, 5% overall)
Outcome 2: 600ji informative/persuasive/evaluative written piece (40% of GA2, 10% overall)
Outcome 3: Interview/oral task (40% of GA2, 10% overall)

Examinations (GA3, 50% overall)
Oral examination (15 minutes, 32.5% of GA3, 12.5% overall)
Written examination (2 hours, 67.5% of GA3, 37.5% overall)

Exam Thoughts:
Oral examination
Conversation (7 minutes)
The conversation half of the oral examination involves two assessors asking you questions about yourself. The idea is that since it is about you and your life, you should be able to reply without any "prior knowledge". Of course, people usually do prepare for this section by creating 'topic areas' and thinking of possible questions. These might include your family and home life, your hobbies, your job, your school/studies, your interests, aspirations and anything else you give as fodder. It is important to have rote-learned responses because it allows you to show off your skills, but it is also necessary to have flexibility to respond to unfamiliar questions well.

Look, to be honest, it's relatively difficult. There's the whole Japanese ability aspect but there's also a performance ability aspect to it. For those who have confidence and perhaps experience in interviews, public speaking settings or other similar situations, it might not be too bad. But well, I guess it is how it sounds - speaking in a foreign language to scary-looking strangers is hard.
Discussion (8 minutes)
Throughout the term you are meant to research a specific topic related to modern or traditional Japanese culture/language with reference to texts/research. This is 'presented' as a discussion with the same two interviewers - the first minute is used to introduce your topic and restrict the domain of the discussion. This of course is also somewhat pre-prepared, and your examiners will expect more rote-learned responses. However, a key aspect of the discussion is evaluation (i.e your thoughts as a global citizen). This could be asked for in a more spontaneous way.

I did find the discussion harder than general conversation. Not only is there the same challenges that GC has, but there is also the importance of remembering what you have studied well and actually research deep enough to make a sophisticated case.
Overall, despite not contributing so much to the study score, the oral examination never fails to be a difficult and stress-invoking part of this subject. But I do think that if you can gain confidence and content in your progress, it can be lots of fun. (Also - make it fun!! The assessors will appreciate it and so will you).

Written examination
Listening and responding
PART A: Respond in English
This section will have two or three spoken texts. Each text is repeated twice. One text is likely easier but will have a small detail to trip people up. The other might be abruptly harder (sometimes in formal register, higher tempo, whatever) in which the key is to extract key phrases and accurately translate details and gist of the text. This section can be notoriously difficult for lower-performing students. All in all, the key is to translate accurately.
PART B: Respond in Japanese
There will be one or two texts, repeated twice. One might be shorter, and one longer. This section is difficult in general - speed and vocabulary knowledge are probably most important. The one mark I lost was in this section even though listening was my strength. The aim of this section is to notetake effectively, and to answer to questions as accurately as possible. Word-for-word dictation is no exaggeration.
Reading and responding
PART A: Respond in English
One or two texts. One is usually short, one longer. The point here is to translate accurately (even moreso than listening). Of course, identifying the correct part is necessary to so comprehension is important, obviously. This part isn't so difficult in my opinion. It will be difficult for people who have little experience in translation and do it sloppily (forgetting words, using ambiguous phrases, paraphrasing etc.).
PART B: Respond in Japanese
One or two texts, supposedly of a higher difficulty. The key here is to identify the correct things to use in the text (comprehension) and structure your responses correctly. I don't think this part is that hard either. Sometimes there are things to trip people up on, but I think it is easier than Part A purely because it can be a clever cut-and-paste job.
Writing in Japanese
Ah, the dreaded essay. You choose from 5 stimuli that are usually different text types and topics. It is obviously in Japanese, but does not have to be as long as what is provided on genkouyoushi. I do believe I used most of it though. I think this is one of the hardest sections but I'm not sure how lenient the marking is. Also, to debunk a myth: you do not have to do imaginative to get full marks. I only ever did evaluative, personal or informative and got 15/15 on the exam (for evaluative, I think it was).
Ironically, people don't seem to put as much work into the written exam even though it is weighted more than anything else. It's not easy and there are many skills that need to be improved - not just knowledge, skills. But once it clicks, I really think improvement can follow easily.

Textbook Recommendation:
I did not use any textbooks for Japanese in any of these years I did it. They work for some people. I think our school used "Kookoo Seikatsu" but I never bothered buying it.
I'd go to a library, give one a read and decide if it works for you.
Also, our school provided print outs and booklets so I don't even think we used the textbook in Year 12 unless it was homework (which I didn't do).

Recommended Other Resources:
People. It baffles me that people think you can learn a language without actually using it for what is was intended. Find a penpal online, host an overseas exchange student, go to language swaps, get a tutor - whatever. I can guarantee that your language ability will just skyrocket somehow.

Year of Completion: 2015, then 2016 (lol)

Rating:  4 out of 5
Look, any LOTE subject is pretty grim. Not many people enjoy them, and to be honest I didn't enjoy it much at the time either. But the more you decide to embrace it, the more you enjoy it. I think it is well worth the effort and hundreds of time more useful and fun than any other VCE subject (talk about biased!).

Your Mark/Grade: 42 (48.2 scaled) in 2015, followed by 50 (52 scaled) in 2016.

Comments:
LOTE subjects are difficult, arduous and the competition is fierce. Japanese isn't even the worst out of them. The oral examination is gross, listening is anxiety-inducing, and you will likely go red and pass out at some point because you just can't get the sentence out. But fear not, Japanese and many other LOTE subjects are super rewarding, super interesting, and an absolute asset to your life. If you have any sort of passion for Japanese, I say 'just do it'. The effort is worth it - and you might not even find it that bad. (Honestly, most people just exaggerate). And again, if you make it fun, it really, really is. Good luck!
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: TooLazy on June 06, 2018, 08:36:05 pm
Subject: Chemistry

Units: 3/4

Workload: decent

Assessment: exam and sacs

Exam Thoughts: too much theory in new SD

Textbook Recommendation: jac plus
Recommended Other Resources: khan academy

Year of Completion: last year

Rating: 0.5  out of 5

Your Mark/Grade: 30

Comments: boring and painful subject. extremely depressing, would not recommend.
 the exam was more cooked than a sativa/indica hybrid.
- honest review
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: Elsa//768 on August 12, 2018, 10:04:40 pm
Subject Name: Biology

Units:  Unit 1/2

Workload: Moderate

Assessment: For my class we changed teachers for three times so the tasks were quite unorganised... From my memory we did around four assessment tasks? Please refer to the study design for details

Exam Thoughts:  I didn't do a VCAA exam since I did unit1/2. I got 97% on my end of year exam last year. It was easier than I expected.

Textbook Recommendation:  We used Jacaranda Nature of Biology. I didn't rely on it too much since it contained quite a lot of fluff. Normally I just used it to create condensed notes for each chapter.

Recommended Other Resources: JacPLUS and Khan Academy

Year of Completion: 2017

Rating:   4.5 out of 5 (because I really LIKE this subject)

Your Mark/Grade: 97% for my end-of-year exam

Comments: Biology was very intimidating for me when I first started because it was extremely content heavy. However, it is actually very useful and I grew to like it a lot because it helps me to understand myself and the world around me better. After all, Biology is not just about memorising, it is the study of life.
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: Elsa//768 on August 12, 2018, 10:19:30 pm
Subject Name: Twentieth Century History

Units: Units 1/2

Workload: LOW

Assessment: We did two outcomes for each unit. There was also an internal exam and end-of-year exam.

Exam Thoughts: The exams my school held were quite fair. The final exam contained an essay, a source analysis and a short answer question.

Textbook Recommendation: For Unit1, we used Between the Wars. For Unit 2, our teacher prepared study materials for us and I can't really tell which textbook they were from... I didn't rely too much on them.

Recommended Other Resources: YouTube!

Year of Completion: 2017

Rating:  5 out of 5

Your Mark/Grade: I got full marks for my end-of-year exam. I received A for both units.

Comments: I did chose History by myself because I liked it, and honestly unit 1 and 2 had quite low workload (so much lower than I even expected). The content covered was very relevant (Civil Rights Movement, terrorism, etc) and interesting, and even though I do not remember all the dates now, the lessons I took from History are still valid and they helped me to develop critical thinking.
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: hums_student on November 26, 2018, 10:13:49 pm
Think it's time to revive this thread.

Subject Name: Ancient History

Units: 3/4

Workload: From personal experience, it was the subject with the highest workload for me. There is a lot of reading and essay writing involved.

Assessment:
Each school does SACs differently, however this is how they’re generally conducted (with Greece and Rome as examples):
Unit 3
AOS 1 – Features of Ancient Greece [SAC: Source analysis, worth 12.5%]
AOS 2 – The Peloponnesian War [SAC: Essay, worth 12.5%]
Unit 4
AOS 1 – Features of Ancient Rome [SAC: Source analysis, worth 12.5%]
AOS 2 – The Fall of the Roman Republic [SAC: Essay, worth 12.5%]

Exam Thoughts:
Total weighting: 50%
Number of Sections: 3 (choose 2 to complete)
Length: 2 hours + 15 minutes reading time

The exam is split into Egypt, Greece, and Rome – you choose the two you studied. Each civilisation has a source analysis (worth 4~5 + 5~6 + 10 marks) and an essay (worth 20 marks). The whole exam is out of 80 marks.

Textbook Recommendation:
HTAV has textbooks for Rome and Greece. I never bought them, but from a borrowed copy of the Rome textbook, I found it pretty useless. It went through some very important events in a couple of brief pages (All three Punic Wars were covered in one chapter). Would not recommend.

I recommend checking out the textbooks written by historian Pamela Bradley (she has textbooks for all three civilisations). They go way beyond the course and do not follow the study design, however content-wise they’re incredibly useful.

Recommended Other Resources:
HSC’s Ancient History resources and Pamela Bradley’s textbooks are a good place to start.
It’s also worth checking out the books by these historians:
Primary
Plutarch
Herodotus
Thucydides
Pericles
Xenophon
Livy
Appian
Caesar
Cicero
Secondary
Pamela Bradley
Thomas Martin
Paul Cartledge
Donald Kagan
Mary Beard
David Gwynn
Tom Holland No, he’s not the dude that played Spiderman
Richard Miles
Tim Cornell
Barry Staruss

Year of Completion: 2018

Rating: 5 out of 5

Your Mark/Grade: 44 (A+, A+, A+)

Comments: History’s a really rewarding subject, however it’s also extremely content-heavy and the amount of extra reading and essay writing you have to do exceeds subjects like English and Lit. It was by far the subject I spent the most time and energy on, however I found it to be useful in improving my writing ability, not just for history but for other subjects as well.
So, if you’re planning to choose history. Well done, I see you’re an intellectual. Just be warned that the workload will be quite high, however in the long run it would be incredibly rewarding, both in VCE and beyond.
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: hums_student on November 26, 2018, 10:33:42 pm
Subject Name: Literature

Units: 3/4

Workload:
I think there’s a bit of a misconception about literature having an incredibly high workload. While it’s definitely not “chill”, I found the workload to be quite manageable – there’s little content to learn, as long as you grasp the requirements for essays then you’re pretty much set.

Assessment:
Literature has four Areas of Study and has five SACs. Assessments are worth 50% of your final study score.
Unit 3
SAC 1 – Adaptations and Transformations [worth 12.5%]
SAC 2 – Creative Response [worth 12.5%]
Unit 4
SAC 3 – Literary Perspectives [worth 12.5%]
SAC 4 – Close Passage Analysis [worth 6.25%]
SAC 5 – Close Passage Analysis [worth 6.25%]

Exam Thoughts:
Total worth: 50%
Number of Sections: 2
Length: 2 hours + 15 minutes reading time

SECTION A – Literary Perspectives
This section requires you to write an essay responding to a given prompt. You must use one lens or perspective in your response (eg. Feminist, Marxist, queer, psychoanalytic, postcolonial etc). It should roughly be around 1000 words.
Note that for this section, you only have ONE prompt, so that's the topic you HAVE to write on. There's no choice of prompts like you have in English.

SECTION B – Close Passage Analysis
You are given 3 excerpts from the same text or collection, and are required to closely analyse the texts, linking any connections you make. You're allowed to write in whatever format you wish, and talk about whatever you like (within reason). Roughly 1000 words.

Each essay is 20 marks each, and the entire exam is out of 40.

Textbook Recommendation:
My school used the textbook ‘Literature for Senior Students’. I did not use the textbook and survived the year fine without it.

To be honest, I would not recommend ANY textbook for literature. The only ‘content’ you need to learn is the plot and historical context of your texts, which can easily be found for free online, or through thoroughly analysing your texts.

Recommended Other Resources:
HIGH SCORING ESSAYS FROM PAST STUDENTS!!
Never, EVER, underestimate the power of sample essays. Print out as many as you can, staple them together, and BAM – that’s your Holy Bible for the rest of the year. Read them every day, more than once if possible. Analyse their structure, wording, and use them in your own essays.

Also, read critical work. In your final exam, only one text will actually require knowledge of critics, however it doesn’t hurt to read some for others too.

Year of Completion: 2018

Rating: 4 out of 5

Your Mark/Grade: 47 (A+, A+, A+)

Comments:
Being absolutely honest here, lit is a relatively ‘chill’ subject if you know what is required of you. It does seem incredibly difficult (and dull) at first, and the temptation to drop out is pretty strong (our cohort dropped from 23 to 8.) The reason? Lit is quite different from year 7~10 English. Once I realised that, lit was a breeze.

Personally I found the essay-writing skills you learn in lit helpful for other hums subjects, so I would highly recommend choosing lit if you are also choosing other heavily writing-based subjects like history.

Also, VCE literature offers a much higher degree of freedom than English. You’re allowed to write in whatever structure you wished for essays, you can analyse from whatever perspective you feel comfortable with. I would definitely recommend lit to anyone who enjoys reading, writing, and thinking without being constrained by a strict criteria.
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: hums_student on November 26, 2018, 10:54:37 pm
Subject Name: Global Politics

Units: 3/4

Workload:
It really depends on what you’re aiming for. Global was my bludge, hence I found the workload to be relatively low. I would imagine that it would be a lot higher for someone aiming for a study score in the 40s.

Assessment:
Each school does SACs differently, however generally you have four SACs – one for each Area of Study. SACs are worth 50% of your final study score.

Unit 3
AOS 1 – Global Actors [SAC: 12.5%]
AOS 2 – Power in the Asia-Pacific [SAC: 12.5%]
Unit 4
AOS 1 – Ethical Issues and Debates [SAC: 12.5%]
AOS 2 – Global Crisis and Conflict [SAC: 12.5%]

Exam Thoughts:
Total worth: 50%
Number of Sections: 2
Length: 2 hours + 15 minutes reading time

SECTION A – Short Answer
In this section you will respond to short-answer questions that are worth anywhere from 2 to 8 marks. They are organised into areas of study (2 pages of questions per AOS).
Questions with 4 marks or less generally ask you to define and/or provide examples. The higher weighting questions would ask you to explain, evaluate, analyse, etc.
Section A is worth 60 marks.

SECTION B – Extended Response
You are given a choice of four prompts (one from each AOS) and you are to choose one to respond to. Worth 20 marks.

The whole exam is out of 80.

Textbook Recommendation:
My school used the textbook by SEV, written specifically to the study design. Personally I found the textbook to be incredibly useful, and I relied on it quite heavily throughout the year.

Recommended Other Resources:
Watch the news, or read the newspaper if you’re old fashioned (like me).
You never know what could pop up on the exam, so it’s best to have a wide knowledge of recent news stories just in case you need to use them in a case study.
If you ever need to quote from a source, try to use a relatively neutral source such as World Bank, UNICEF, etc. Try not to use a news source.

Year of Completion: 2018

Rating: 3.5 out of 5

Your Mark/Grade: 39 (A, A, A+)

Comments: In my opinion, I think global is the perfect ‘bludge’ subject (unless you really love it, then don’t bludge it). Politics is something everyone has to learn about sooner or later, whether you like it or not. It’s arguably the most useful and applicable VCE subject of all. The content isn’t difficult as long as you keep up with the news, it’s not as content heavy nor is it as heavily writing-based as other hums subjects, and the scaling is pretty good (highest scaling hums subject ;))

In short: If you need a bludge subject that isn’t too difficult, scales well, and is useful post-VCE, global politics is the one to go for.
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: Elsa//768 on November 27, 2018, 11:02:38 am
Subject Name:
History: Revolutions

Units: (Is it Units 1/2 or Units 3/4?)
Unit 3/4

Workload:
The workload of revolutions is definitely much more compared to unit1/2. but the actual amount of work you do really depends on whether you want to perform well. For me, I knew that Revolutions was one of the hardest humanities subject so I took it really seriously. With that being said, the workload was still manageable.

Assessment: (Outline the various assessments which make up the subject and how much each counts for)
The SACs makes up 50% of the study score, while the exam accounts for the other 50%.
For our school, there were 4 SACs, including an essay, two source analysis and a short answer question.

Exam Thoughts: (What's the structure? How hard was it?)
The exam is divided into two parts as we have studied two revolutions. Part 1 includes a source analysis and two short answer questions, while part 2 includes an essay and a source analysis.
I personally think it is an alright exam considering I did not feel surprised by any of the questions. That being said, it is possible that I am being overly confident here *cough cough*

Textbook Recommendation: (What did you use? How much did you use it?)
The textbooks we used included Malone's Russian Revolution and Tom Ryan's China Rising.

Recommended Other Resources:
Not really...

Year of Completion:
2018

Rating:  out of 5
4.5

Your Mark/Grade: (Optional)
SAC1: 100%
SAC2: 100%
SAC3: 90%
SAC4: 98%
Exam: unknown yet/ hoping that I didn't stuff up

Comments: Give your overall opinion of the subject, content, assessment etc. and a recommendation, plus anything else which you feel is relevant.
Revolutions is one of my favourite subjects because I believe that it is important to learn more about the past so we can reflect on current events in a more practical and logical way. What made the subject even greater was that I had an amazing teacher and my classmates were nice as well. Doing revolutions as a yr11 also meant that I was able to talk to the 'scary' yr 12s. I ended up befriending one yr12 and she is an amazing friend. All in all, the subject requires much passion and persistence, but if you are willing to work hard for it, you will be great!
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: PhoenixxFire on November 27, 2018, 04:04:46 pm
Subject Name: Environmental Science

Units: 1/2

Workload:
Moderate. There's a fair bit of content but not as much as some other sciences. It's a bit of a mix of understanding concepts as well as remembering things.

Assessment:
5 SACs (including an experiment) and an end of year exam.

Exam Thoughts:
It was a mix of multiple choice and short answer. I don't think it was particularly hard, but obviously it varies between schools. I don't think I studied for it at all.

Textbook Recommendation:
Monitoring Environmental Systems - Environment education Victoria. This is the only textbook available for the subject.

Recommended Other Resources:
There are no other resources available for this subject. Information on some topics can be found via google, but they often go into far more detail than the course requires.

Year of Completion: 2017

Rating: 3 out of 5

Your Mark/Grade:
SAC average 88%
Exam: 69%

Comments:
Enviro is fairly hard to cram for because of the amount of content, you're better off doing small amounts of revision regularly rather than leaving it to the last minute. Due to the lack of resources available, depending on the your teacher, you may have to find proper explanations for anything the confuses you yourself, which can be difficult. Whilst I loved the topics in this subject, I struggled to learn about them within the scope of VCE.
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: PhoenixxFire on November 27, 2018, 04:47:35 pm
Subject Name: Environmental Science

Units: 3/4

Workload: Fairly low workload if you just want to pass, if you want to do well then you have to put in a fair bit of work due to the lack of resources and ambiguity of some sections of the study design.

Assessment:
SAC 1: Mix of multiple choice and short answer. Test format. (U3 AOS 1)

SAC 2: Case study. We were given an environment case study and questions relating to sustainability principles. All questions had to be answered in context. (U3 AOS 2)

SAC 3: Multiple choice and short answer. Test format. (U4 AOS 1)

SAC 4: Essay format. We were given prompts and had to write a research report on climate change. (U4 AOS 2)

SAC 5: Scientific Investigation. For the test component we were given a multi page table with varying headings and asked to fill in the boxes, which served as a plan for an experimental report. We later wrote this information into a poster. (U4 AOS 3)

SACs are worth 10% each, the exam is worth 50% of your Study score.

Exam Thoughts:
30 marks multiple choice, 90 marks of short answer. There is generally one long question worth 6 marks where you are required to evaluate a proposal (that is described in the exam) with reference to sustainability principles.

It was not as hard as I was expecting, it was fairly straightforward and similar to the 2017 exam.

Textbook Recommendation:
Issues of sustainability - Environment Education Victoria. This is the only textbook available.

I did all of the questions in the book because this was set as homework. The questions were review questions and did not require understanding of concepts or evaluating as is required in the exam. Lots of the suggested answers in the book are written poorly and are seemingly just slaps of text copied from the textbook without answering the actual question.

Recommended Other Resources:
Environment Education Victoria runs a lecture. The lecture cost this year was $40, or you could buy a recording also for $40. I did neither. EEV also sells trial exams, but I think they have to be purchased by a school, I did not have access to any of them.
These are the only resources available for VCE Enviro.

Year of Completion: 2018

Rating:
Content: 4/5
Class: 2/5

I enjoyed the content but I did not at all enjoy the way we learnt it, it was very boring and tedious. This will vary depending on your school.

Your Mark/Grade:
SAC 1: 78%
SAC 2: 82%
SAC 3: 92%
SAC 4: 83%
SAC 5 (Investigation): 97%
Study Score: 43

Comments:
The content is far more interesting when applied in a practical way rather than in a classroom. There is a fair bit of memorisation involved if you don't have an opportunity to actually apply your learning. If you have to opportunity to do practical activities (e.g. using quadrats or monitoring water quality) make the most of them, it makes the subject far more interesting.
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: PhoenixxFire on December 04, 2018, 09:00:03 pm
Subject Name: Outdoor and Environmental studies (AKA Outdoor Ed, OES)

Units: 3/4

Workload:
Low. Very low. There isn't much content that needs to be learnt for this subject, a lot of the difficulty comes from learning about the content with enough specificity to accurately answer questions and learning how to answer questions in the level of detail required.

Assessment:
(This probably won't be an accurate reflection of the assessments that you'll do - the study design states that a reflection on outdoor experiences is required but I never did it and some of my assessments did not match the format required by VCAA)
I can't remember enough detail to describe what we did on each SAC. There were no multiple choice (and there are none on the exam). We did 5 SACs in total (two on U3 AOS2). Most of them were structured short answer questions, we also did one which was a report/case study. We were given a criteria sheet (but no actual questions) and required to write about a specific environment that we had studied.

Each area of study is worth 12.5% of the study score, the exam is worth 50%

Exam Thoughts:
The exam is mostly short answer questions along with some extended response. There is no multiple choice. It is fairly straightforward however it can be hard to judge how much depth an answer requires, and you may run out of time if you go into too much detail in your responses.

Textbook Recommendation:
Outdoor and Environmental Studies VCE 1-4 by Nelson. This is the only textbook available. I did not find it particularly useful as it does not go into the level of detail that you are required to know and does not cover specific environments which you are required to learn about. It serves as a good preliminary source of information, however you must use other sources too.

Recommended Other Resources:
The only other resource that exists is a checkpoints book. I bought it but I didn't really use it much. It has the same problem that will face you when you start looking at examiners reports -- The answers are unlikely to be on the same environment that you have chosen to study which makes it incredibly hard to mark your answers. It can be a useful source of information about specific environments (as can examiners reports) if you read the answers relevant to your environment.

Year of Completion: 2018

Rating: 4 out of 5

Your Mark/Grade:
SAC 1: 82%
SAC 2: 82%
SAC 3: Unknown
SAC 4: 92%
SAC 5: Unknown
Study score: 35
(my teacher wasn't very good at giving us feedback)

Comments:
I joined this class (having not done 1/2) for the camps, I really enjoyed the camps so in that sense it was successful. The academic side of it was very lacking however. If you want to learn more about the environment then do environmental science. This subject briefly explores the way humans interact with nature however it does not go into as much depth as I would have liked (that could vary between schools though).

The low workload due to the small study design means that it is possible to do minimal work for this subject and cram for it if necessary.
I'd recommend making notes on your environment as you learn about it. Make sure your notes are specific to your environment! Examiners reports are useful for finding this information - Almost all of my information on my environments came from examiners reports (the 2016 one is especially useful).

If all else fails, write about erosion - Outdoor ed proverb
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: PhoenixxFire on December 05, 2018, 05:06:48 pm
Subject Name: General math

Units: 1/2

Workload:
Low. I did pretty much all of my work during class time and stayed (mostly) up to date. Aside from some last minute cramming, there wasn't any need to spend extra time on it.

Assessment:
SAC 1: Linear equations and graphs
SAC 2: Matrices
SAC 3: Finance
SAC 4: Number patterns and logarithms
SAC 5: Univariate and bivariate statistics

Exam Thoughts:
It was very straightforward, there were no unexpected questions. So long as you had done practice questions beforehand then it was easy.

Textbook Recommendation:
Cambridge general math textbook. I think I probably ended up doing almost all of the relevant questions.

Recommended Other Resources:
Don't really need any. If you're having trouble with a topic then an explanation can usually be found online or from your teacher. Additional textbooks/notes aren't needed.

Year of Completion: 2017

Rating: 4 out of 5

Your Mark/Grade:
SACs: ~88%
Exam: 94%

Comments:
The questions get repetitive and they can be a bit tedious to do, however completing lots of practice questions helps prepare for SACs due to the limited variety of questions that can be asked. It can also be boring though. The content is not very hard, however it is easy to lose marks from silly mistakes. If you want a challenge then this is not the subject for you, if you just want to do a math or satisfy pre-requisites then general might be a good choice.
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: PhoenixxFire on December 06, 2018, 12:42:29 pm
Subject Name: Psychology

Units: 1/2

Workload:
Depends on the school and how hard you want to try. I found that the workload was greater at the start of the year, I went into the class expecting to have to put in lots of work and so that's what I did. However, homework was rarely checked and I got really slack with completing it towards the end of the year. I'd say you should be doing a bit of work outside of class, but you don't need to be doing heaps.

Assessment:
SAC 1: Multi choice and short answer on the nature of psychology and research methods
SAC 2: Scientific research report on context and visual perception
SAC 3: Research investigation & report on a specific mental illness
Exam (U1): Multiple choice, short answer, and extended response.
SAC 4: Media analysis (shawshank redemption).
SAC 5: Short answer and extended response test on attitudes and factors that affect behaviour
SAC 6: Multiple choice and short answer test on theories of intelligence and personality
Exam (U2): Multiple choice, short answer, and extended response.

Exam Thoughts:
The exams were a mix of multiple choice, short answer and extended response. It was fairly similar to the type of questions seen on SACs and so long as you had studied for them, they were fairly easy.

Textbook Recommendation:
I used the jacaranda textbook, however it has since changed because I did the old study design.

Recommended Other Resources:
The only other resource I used was youtube - specifically for videos on research methods because I frequently found myself needing another explanation. I also used youtube to find out about other interesting psychological experiments, not because I needed to, just because it was interesting haha.

Year of Completion: 2015 (old study design)

Rating: 4 out of 5

Your Mark/Grade:
U1 SACs: ~91%
U1 exam: 92%
U2 SACs: ~90%
U2 exam: 91%

Comments:
I really liked psych - there were some bits that got a bit boring (research methods), however I found most of the content really interesting. I actually spent a lot of time in this subject just learning about the content rather than studying specifically for the test. The study design has changed since I did it, but I definitely found that looking for how the theory related to past experiments helped with memorising it. I'm sure my family got sick of me telling them about all sorts of weird experiments that have been conducted haha.
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: PhoenixxFire on December 06, 2018, 07:52:58 pm
Subject Name: Psychology

Units: 3/4

Workload:
I didn't do much work, but I was constantly being told to do more work. The workload will vary between schools, my school didn't set much homework and even when they did hardly anyone (including me) did the homework. I ended up with a private study block in second semester so I did end up doing more work in this subject towards the end of the year. Throughout the entire year I didn't do much (any) work outside of school. Even over the September holidays I hardly did any. Having said all that, I did this subject in year 10 and I didn't really know what I was doing - definitely should have done more work than I did.

Assessment: (Outline the various assessments which make up the subject and how much each counts for)
SAC 1: Multiple choice, short answer, and extended response. Tested knowledge of sleep and states of consciousness.
SAC 2: Visual presentation (annotated poster) on brain and nervous system.
SAC 3: Research investigation (ERA) on memory
SAC 4: Short answer test on learning
SAC 5: Multiple choice and short answer test on mental health, stress, and research methods
SAC 6: Visual presentation (poster) on phobias

Exam Thoughts:
I didn't find it particularly hard despite not studying much. There were a range of difficulty in the questions so even if you didn't know the content particularly well you could still answer most of it.

Textbook Recommendation:
I had the Jacaranda psychology textbook (for the old study design). I read most of it over the summer holidays because I was bored but we didn't use it that much in class - more like once a week rather than every lesson.

Recommended Other Resources:
My teacher recorded youtube videos of herself explaining the content. I didn't buy any resources for this subject.

Year of Completion: 2016 (old study design)

Rating: 4 out of 5

Your Mark/Grade: (Optional)
U3 SACs: ~89%
U4 SACs: ~77%
Study score: 37

Comments:
The subject itself was interesting however there was quite a bit of memorisation involved which I found quite boring - still loved it overall though! Cramming for psych is probably a bad idea as there's a fair bit of content, it would be easier to study the content throughout the year instead of leaving it to the last minute.
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: 2130 on December 16, 2018, 07:09:40 pm
Subject Name: Chemistry

Units: Units 3/4

Workload:
I found the workload to be a bit above average. Often homework worksheets, exercises from the textbook and/or note taking tasks were set for homework. With approaching SACs, my class and I undertook various revision exercises and resources that were made easily accessible by the school, allowing for thorough revision thus a heavier load of work during these periods.

Assessment:
I recall SACs being in the form of practical investigations with write ups, a poster and as tests. I believe they followed the weighting according to the VCE study design.

Exam Thoughts:
I was pretty hyped for the exam, had been studying a fair amount throughout the year by using past exam resources. Found the exam to be alright, although it did seem longer than usual and mid-way through I was questioning if I was actually going to finish (typical exam nerves?), but I did finish with a fair amount of time left to look over answers. The exam didn't contain as many tricky questions as compared to the 2017 exam, and I left confident that I had performed my best :)

Textbook Recommendation:
Our school used the Heinemann textbook for both units 1/2 and 3/4. Hence I have no other textbooks to compare it to but would definitely recommend it. We only used it for some parts of the course as our teacher had provided us with excellent notes that explained the information and concepts in a much easier manner. The textbook has a lot of information, and may require careful reading at times to fully understand some of the more complicated concepts.

Recommended Other Resources:
Our school was also provided with ConnectApp and Connect Education Chemistry Units 3/4 books that were superb. I would highly recommend the book for concise explanations and methods for answering some of the trickier questions within the course. The online ConnectApp was also great as it provided you videos explaining the course which was broken down into topics. The online questions were perfect to refine the accuracy of your knowledge as Connect Education provided responses to all of the possible answers for the multi-choice questions.

Year of Completion: 2018

Rating: 5 out of 5

Your Mark/Grade: 48

Comments:
Starting Year 12 Chemistry with only average marks in the previous year, I found that as the year progressed, not only my love for the subject but my ability to  understand the concepts and apply the learnt knowledge greatly increase. Furthermore, like Biology which I completed in the prior year, the content of the course was always relevant within our lives. In fact, the content allowed us to understand the future directions of energy production such as fuel cells! Also have to say, having a teacher who continually provided extra resources in class and out of class and who was devoted to ensuring the best results for his students significantly helped me throughout the course! Highly recommend!
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: addict on December 16, 2018, 08:18:36 pm
Subject Name: English (EAL)

Units: 3/4
Workload: if you are fluent in English, you may well find this your chillest subject

Assessment:
Unit 3 (25% of study score, 100 marks): listening task (20), creative or analytical text response (40), persuasive oral (40)
Unit 4 (25% of study score, 100 marks): argument and language analysis with reading comprehension (40), comparative text analysis (60)
Exam (50% of study score, 100 marks): Section A: two listening tasks (20); Section B: analytical text response (40); Section C: argument and language analysis (20) with reading comprehension (20)

Exam Thoughts: Time management is everything. While everyone does it differently, certainly keep in mind that your exam under the new study design is very different to the mainstream exam. Some of you will be able to afford to spend more than an hour on each essay. Due to the very limited size of school EAL cohorts in comparison to mainstream ones, your SAC rankings could potentially be more important than your exam performance, so ensure you get all the help you need throughout the year.

Textbook Recommendation: I would recommend against taking quotes and ideas off study guides. Use them only as a quick read to refresh your memory of the plot or for brainstorming lists of themes. Otherwise, your own ideas are likely to be much deeper and more original.

Recommended Other Resources: The course is somewhat similar to the mainstream course, so any English language analysis resources might come in handy. Depending on if you pick an EAL text for text response (I did Invictus), you could find yourself struggling to find specific, detailed single text resources as well, but any text guides for the paired text studies can be helpful to an extent. I'd say pearson and insight text guides are some of the better ones. The listening task would be the hardest section of the exam to find practice material for. Don't neglect it, but don't stress either since the rest of the cohort will find themselves in the same situation. Make sure you make good use of your teacher and your peers. Bug your teacher to write you new listening tasks. Listen to Radio National in your free time (strongly recommended!). Get an EAL study group and take turns writing up original listening tasks from random excerpts.

Year of Completion: 2018

Rating: 5 out of 5. Jonty Jenkins was wayyy too harsh.

Your Mark/Grade: 50

Comments: I thoroughly enjoyed this course. The variety of EAL learning activities is something you don't get in Literature (I studied Units 1/2). When you need motivation, just remember that EAL will probably be the biggest blessing to your ATAR. You write on 1 text in your final exam while others write on 3. While it could feel repetitive at times, you will find that the more you engage with your text, the more you love it. It will literally become part of your soul. You won't have to work nearly as hard as the mainstream kids, and so will have a lot more time for your other subjects. You are scored against a significantly less competitive cohort, and yet you will get scaled up. So take it easy and enjoy!
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: Yertle the Turtle on January 09, 2019, 12:38:24 am
Subject Name: Physics

Units: Units 3/4

Workload: It wasn't an easy course, and we did start to run out of time towards the end, but if you were to deliberately try to work hard and fast it would be much better in terms of workload. If you were to work harder than me you might find the course easier.

Assessment: From memory the exam makes up 60%, Unit 3 makes 20% and Unit 4 20%
In Unit 3 there is a SAC on circular and planar motion and a SAC on Fields.
In Unit 4 there is a Practical Investigation SAC, a SAC on Relativity and a SAC on Transformers. Overall the U3 SACs are each worth the same, I think, and the U4 SACs worth the same as each other.

Exam Thoughts: The exam consists of 30 multiple choice questions, followed by a mix of multiple part questions, covering all the individual topics. The last couple of questions are on a practical investigation/experiment to test your understanding of the scientific method, testing knowledge of how an experiment should be written up. There is also an increasing number of purely conceptual questions, as the examiners try to eliminate those who can press buttons and get answers. These questions tend to be 3-5 marks asking you to explain concepts in specific ways, and these do tend to be the most challenging parts of the exam, making up about 50% these days. The exam wasn't easy, but it wasn't too bad I thought.

Textbook Recommendation: We used the Heinemann textbook, and I found it to be really useful and good at explaining things. There were certain things that I think it didn't explain very well (such as standing waves) but on the whole I found it good, and used it for study throughout the year.

Recommended Other Resources: I used Edrolo more with Physics than with anything else, but generally I didn't find it very useful. More useful was Khan Academy in some areas, and other YouTube channels such as Veritasium were great at explaining difficult concepts. Checkpoints was also quite useful, just in highlighting areas that need more work.

Year of Completion: 2018

Rating: 5 out of 5

Your Mark/Grade: 40

Comments: Personally I loved Physics, probably tying with Chem as my favourite subject, and my top scoring subject. There were definitely some tough areas, particularly special relativity and the section on light, but these I found intriguing, and therefore interesting. The motion section was interesting as well, since you could see it in real life, which helped to make it enjoyable.
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: Yertle the Turtle on January 09, 2019, 01:01:52 am
Subject Name: Texts and Traditions (Gospel of Luke)

Units: Unit 3/4

Workload: There is a huge amount of content to get through in the amount of time that you have. You have to study all of the 9 special passages and 8 themes in at least some amount of detail because otherwise the exam can throw you multiple curveballs. This means that for me it had the most raw information of any subject that I did, and I had to work hard on it. Due to scaling, it didn't end up in my top 4, but I did put more work into it than most of my subjects.

Assessment: 50% of the SS is from U 3/4, and 50% from the exam. In Unit 3 there is one SAC about background to the book of Luke, and one exegesis SAC, and in Unit 4 there is one exegesis SAC and one SAC on a change of belief or idea by a later faith, and how the set text affected this change in that faith.

Exam Thoughts: It was by far the hardest exam I have ever done. There are three parts to the exam, each worth equal amounts: 1. Extended response 2. Essay 3. Exegesis. Put together, you have to write nearly as much as an English exam, in 2 hours, which is insane. Basically the reading time is crucial, because you have to write almost non-stop from then on. The total exam is worth 90 marks. 30 marks for the exegesis, 30 for the essay, and 10 each for the 3 extended responses. You get to choose 2 out of 3 extended response questions, with one that is compulsory concerning the last SAC on a religious idea or belief that has been altered by a faith. You then get to choose your essay question and exegesis passage out of 3 options, so with good preparation, it is harder to get completely thrown by these 2 sections than by the extended response. I was lucky, with one of the extended response questions being the same as one in my trial exam, but it is really easy for these to throw you out.

Textbook Recommendation: There is no such thing as a proper textbook for T&T, but we used Goosen's introduction to Luke and France's commentary. I never looked at them, as I found I could get my quotes from elsewhere.

Recommended Other Resources: Bock's commentary of Luke is full and packed with information, but it is very dense, and therefore to extract that information is very difficult in ways that are usable. I found that using the PPT slides that my teacher gave us was the best way to filter all the commentaries down to usable quotes and ideas.

Year of Completion: 2018

Rating: 4 out of 5

Your Mark/Grade: 40

Comments: It was not an easy subject, there being huge amounts of information to learn, and the exam being a little too "hit-and-miss" for my liking, but overall I enjoyed the subject, and as I already knew more of the background to the book of Luke than anyone in the class (possibly including the teacher) it wasn't too hard. Being in the smallest non-language subject in the state (<300 students) can be tough, as the study scores can be seriously altered by only a few students. I'm not sure if any T&T students will see this, but if they do, I hope it helps.
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: Yertle the Turtle on January 10, 2019, 05:42:27 am
Subject Name: Chemistry

Units: Units 3/4

Workload: Besides Texts and Traditions, Chemistry was my most full on subject. The textbook tells you everything. It is thick. There is a massive amount of content to get through in the year, and in the end we didn't really finish the food chemistry section. There are a lot of different concepts that the course covers, and it is not the easiest subject either, as many of the concepts need to be just learned.

Assessment: The exam is worth 60% of the SS, while U3&4 SACs are a total of 20% for each unit. Unit 3 has a SAC on Fuels one on Electrochemistry and one on Reactions, Equilibria and Chemical Processes, while Unit 4 has a Practical Investigation SAC, and a SAC on Food Chemistry.

Exam Thoughts: Like Physics, they are trying to bring in 'explanation' style questions, stressing fundamental concept understanding rather
than highly skilled button-mashing. This means that about 40% of the exam is explanation of concepts in 3-5 mark questions. The last question of the exam (in 2018) was the perfect example of this, as it asked a fairly open-ended question about the human metabolism of fats, and a fairly abstract question about whether shredded or chopped coconut would have a higher GI value. These questions, as well as the growing section on practical investigation technique and process, really threw lots of students. Basically the exam is made up of 20 (or 30? I forget) multichoice questions, which are about 50-50 simple calculations and concept understanding. Then there are 100 marks worth of questions, that are a mixture of all the different sections, most questions containing some simple calculations and some deeper explanations. It wasn't really too hard, but I messed it up due to still recovering from a cold (I know, right?! Take care of your health, guys!)

Also, knowing how to use your Data Booklet is key. They will ask you questions that can only be answered by the data booklet, and using it efficiently is important, so get used to it during the year.

Textbook Recommendation: I used the Heinemann textbook, and it was great. I used it a lot, basically didn't have to use anything else, even crammed the evening before the exam from it, and I'm pretty sure that cramming saved me ~5 marks on the exam. It was really comprehensive and explained things really well. I did have the advantage of a really good teacher though, so...

Recommended Other Resources: I really didn't use much besides the textbook, but Checkpoints was good, except for its terrible layout. I didn't use Edrolo at all, though I probably should have. I found that the textbook did a really good job overall, though occasional YouTube videos were useful to explain certain concepts or to show real-world connections to academic concepts (watch a video on thermite melting through a car, it's so satisfying).

Year of Completion: 2018

Rating: 5 out of 5

Your Mark/Grade: 37

Comments: Chemistry really gave Physics a run for its money as my favourite subject. It wasn't as hard as I expected and I felt I could see a lot of practical applications. Like Physics, it helped me to understand a lot of things about the world that I had always been puzzled by, so I really enjoyed it a lot. I was also lucky to have a great Chemistry teacher who helped it to be interesting for me. I would say that in this subject cramming was surprisingly helpful, the night before the exam, as I suddenly understood 2 concepts that we hadn't specifically covered in class, and which there were several questions on in the exam. I would recommend the subject to anyone with an enquiring mind. However, I will say that a 37 was a big disappointment, as I expected over 40 :'(
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: Yertle the Turtle on January 13, 2019, 05:20:53 am
Subject Name: Maths Methods

Units: Units 3/4

Workload: There is a lot of content to get through in Methods, and this means that you have to work fairly hard in order to get through everything properly. Personally I didn't work very hard throughout the year, certainly not as hard as I should have. If you stay on top of the work, the workload isn't too bad, but the word of warning is that it is far too easy to get a little behind, and in a subject like Methods that is not where you want to be.

Assessment: Exam 1 is worth 22% of the SS, Exam 2 is worth 44%, with the SACs being worth 33% total. I had a SAC on Functions and Relations, one on Circular Functions, on one Calculus, one on Probability and the last one was actually the trial exam, each worth 10%, and on the whole, the only one that really screwed me over was the probability one. Probability is not an easy topic, there are so many similar concepts that you have to be able to tell apart.

Exam Thoughts: The 2018 exam (particularly Exam 1) was quite controversial. I personally found Exam 1 to be not too bad (I got an A+). Basically Exam 1 was easy for Q1-6, Q7 was the hard one for me, finding the point of a line closest to the origin, but I didn't find Q8-9 as hard as most people seemed to. It required quite a bit of thought though, so I didn't quite finish Q9. On the whole though I was happy with that one, having no calculator made the questions mathematically more simple.
It was Exam 2 that really screwed me over, particularly the multiple choice section. I failed to manage my time well, and ended up feeling terrible at the end, with lots of blank questions (ended up a B), and that B probably made a serious difference to my SS, with an A for SACs and an A+ for Exam 1 (as well as 34/35 in the Maths section of the GAT). In hindsight I would give a big tip: allocate time for each multiple choice question, and use that time to either find the answer or at least cut 1-3 possible answers. I found that I spent far too long in deep calculations, and this left me with nowhere near enough time for the extended response. Don't make the same mistake. I would say that being completely healthy is really important, as I was struggling with a cold throughout the exam period, and it really hit hard in Methods Exam 2. I didn't push hard enough to crush it earlier on in the year, and it hung on until the exam period, which was really bad. Take care of yourself, guys.

Textbook Recommendation: I used the Cambridge textbook, and found it to be pretty good at explaining things mostly. I felt like probability in particular was really well explained, while integration was not explained nearly as well. On the whole, I really used the textbook more than the teacher to learn the subject, and it worked fairly well, so I'd have to really recommend this book.

Recommended Other Resources: Edrolo, Checkpoints and Khan Academy were the only other resources I really used, and of these the most useful was KA, followed by Checkpoints. KA explained very effectively any difficult concepts, while the Checkpoints book was good at showing areas that need more focus.

Year of Completion: 2018

Rating: (sin(pi/6))*8 out of 5

Your Mark/Grade: 35

Comments: I personally enjoyed Methods quite a lot, the content is quite interesting and something I think is important is that I can see the applications in the real world throughout the course. On the whole I found the calculus part the most interesting, and personally I really disliked the probability part. I was quite disappointed with a 35, but I guess part of it was my fault (work hard and take care of your health guys). On the whole I had a pretty good year in Methods, and would fully recommend it to anyone with any good mathematical ability.
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: Yertle the Turtle on January 14, 2019, 04:48:20 am
Subject Name: Specialist Maths

Units: Units 3/4

Workload: I wasn't really a normal case, doing Spesh by distance, so this probably won't apply to many people. I was doing it by distance, as well as having a 6 subject Yr 12 load, so Spesh was where I really let it slide, didn't really work hard, and used my "free" (Spesh) periods for other study or down time. I also started the year late because DECV (the distance school) mucked up my reenrollment, so I really was quite behind, and spent the whole year trying (not very hard) to catch up. If I had been doing it properly I think I would have found that to get a really thorough grasp of the concepts you would need to work fairly hard, but not as hard as some content-heavy subjects like Bio, or even Methods.

Assessment: Exam 1 is worth 22% of the total SS, Exam 2 is worth 44% and the SACs (I had only 3) worth 33%. I had a SAC on Functions and Relations, including *all* the trig functions, one SAC on Calculus (differentiation, integration and diff. equations) and one on Mechanics and Probability. Of the three the easiest was the one on Mechanics (from Physics) and Probability, which is surprisingly easy at Spesh level, and by far the hardest (41% level hard) was the Calculus one. I will say that I was almost too sick to be at school on the day of the Calculus SAC, but I don't think it changed too much, except that I just wrote a little and spent almost 1 1/2 hours sitting staring at a paper that my brain just couldn't cope with. Stay healthy, everyone!

Exam Thoughts: The exam is in 2 parts, Exam 1 and Exam 2, and in Exam 1 (short answer questions, 1hr) you are allowed nothing except basic stationery. In Exam 2 (multiple choice and extended response questions, 2hrs) you are allowed both a bound book of notes, and your CAS calculator. I personally found the exam a little easier than I had expected (I still left lots of questions blank and got a D+ on Exam 1) and given how the rest of the year had gone I was aiming pretty low by the time the exam came, but Exam 2 actually wasn't too bad. I have been finding since it finished that I suddenly have an epiphany on how a certain question should have been answered, but really in the Spesh exam I just cut my losses, and tried to do as well as possible. It's not easy stuff, but if you focus on the stuff you can do, you can do better than by bashing your head against the things you can't do.

Textbook Recommendation: I used the Cambridge textbook, and given that I didn't have a teacher or official classes, and hardly gave Spesh any time throughout the year, I think that it must be pretty good at explaining things. I found it to be generally pretty good at explaining things, nearly used it in the exam, and then, on not using it, came across a question that my bound book couldn't answer and that I know I would have found easy if I just had a certain example in the textbook. I would strongly recommend it as the textbook to use.

Recommended Other Resources: I found Khan Academy to be really useful for anything that I really didn't get from just reading the textbook, but the Edrolo I used was terrible. I really didn't find that it helped or explained things well, the presenter was cringey, and so all in all I really didn't like it. Not having a teacher around to explain things limited my learning in things such as Differential Equations, and for these things KA did a great job (though not as good as a physical teacher) of explaining enough for me to cram sufficiently to pass, so I would fully recommend it.

Year of Completion: 2018

Rating: 3.5 out of 5

Your Mark/Grade: 26

Comments: Look, the main reason why I didn't do well at Spesh was the layout of the year. Getting behind at the start, not catching up, and having the 6 subject load really meant that Spesh wasn't great for me, and in hindsight I should have done Methods a year early, and had a 5 subject Year 12, but that is the past, so let it go. Honestly I enjoyed the content in Spesh, (not the pressure) especially as I could often see really useful future applications, something that I really think is important in any subject (I feel like I've said this before). I personally didn't enjoy the Diff Equations section, probably because it was the toughest section and I didn't have a teacher to explain it to me at the start, whereas the Kinematics and Dynamics sections were really easy and interesting because of the links to Physics, which I love. I do close the year feeling disappointed in myself for screwing over what could easily have been a subject in my top 4 if I had just put more work in, but I didn't have anyone pressuring me into working, or to explain things to me, so in some ways I'm pretty happy with the score. Since the exam I've been having these annoying flashbacks, seeing the questions that were on there and going "I suddenly understand how to do this", and while I'm happy that I now understand the concepts, it is a little annoying to know that I could have improved my marks so easily.

Note: I did Spesh by distance, and my experience was terrible. The teachers rarely contacted me, and the resources they sent were generally pretty useless. Once I was told that to get an S for the Unit I had to submit a certain amount of overdue work by a certain date, less than a week away. Within 10 minutes of receiving this notification, I had sent a response asking help for the question I was stuck on (something I should have done several days before). A day before the work was due, my Methods teacher suddenly understood that there was a typo in the question, and I was able to send in the work. 2 weeks after the deadline, they sent me an explanation of how the question works, so if I had waited for them I would have missed the deadline, as they took 3 weeks to get me a response!  >:(  >:( Other people may have had other experiences with DECV, but mine were extremely bad, so much so that I really cannot recommend any course with them.
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: Yertle the Turtle on January 14, 2019, 05:11:26 am
Subject Name: English

Units: Units 3/4

Workload: Light. Very light if you are me and don't care + have really good memory, or if you happen to be a genius at English. If not, if you are a STEM person (also like me) you will find it tough, particularly the reason for doing it. I hardly worked in the entire year, only handing in the absolute minimum of work at all times (1 essay a month), and for my ability, the SS really reflects this fact. I could have done better if I had worked harder, but I chose not to.

Assessment: The exam is worth 50% of the mark, with the Unit 3 SACs and the Unit 4 SACs worth 25% each. I think that we had 5 SACs: One AA, one TR, one CTR, one creative piece and the dreaded speech, which actually went all right. Of all of those the worst for me was the creative, as I struggle to be, well, creative, in a way that most people like.

Exam Thoughts: English exam 2018. Ha ha ha... Jonty Jenkins... man-bun, etc.
The whole way through that controversial English exam I was just looking forward to that final second, after which I could be free of my least favourite subject. It is split up into 3 essays, each worth 33% of the exam mark, first a Text Response essay, followed by a Comparative text response, with an Argument Analysis piece to finish. Unlike most of my class, who did the other text that our school did, I found the TR questions (Medea) quite nice, as well as the Comparative ones (Invictus/Ransom). On the whole I didn't have a problem with these, and as for the AA, Jonty Jenkins was nice to me, despite being an annoying writer who writes in a style that is really hard to write about. By the end I managed to write on everything that the Chief Examiner said was possible to separate the high achieving students from everyone else, and by the end, English was over, so  :-*  :-*  :-*  :-*  :-*  :-*  8)  8)  8)  8)  8)  8)

Textbook Recommendation: We did technically have a textbook (the Insight one) but we hardly used it, and when we did, I found it both useless and annoying. I felt like the "10 out of 10" responses they gave you were clumsily written and I didn't like the book at all. Would not recommend it.

Recommended Other Resources: None. English really isn't a subject you can learn from a textbook.

Year of Completion: 2018

Rating: 0.5 out of 5

Your Mark/Grade: 37

Comments: I hated the guts of English the whole way through VCE. If you've read any of my previous reviews you may have seen that I like to see future use in a subject. Well that was something missing in English, and I was forced to do it, so I hated it. There wasn't anything that I found interesting in English, so even though I'm good at it I really didn't put in much effort at all. I have to thank from the bottom of my heart my Physics/Chem teacher who heard me arguing with the English teacher a week before the English exam, had a 1 1/2 hour long conversation with me that ended up with him going through my objections to English and encouraging me to study for just that one last week. I did, and I'm convinced that it really helped, so huge thanks to him, as well as for being an awesome Physics/Chem teacher and a great mentor. I also know that I really messed up the year for myself in English, constantly arguing with the teacher about the value of English, and I'm afraid I messed up her year, and that is a real regret that I have now, though I know I would argue every time if I could run it over again. Sometimes it is best to just put up with something like that, something you really dislike and struggle with, so please follow my advice. And with the close of this English review, I've covered all of my subjects, almost in order of preference, and closing of course with the one of these subjects that I never have to burden myself with again.  8)

btw, English does have to count in your top 4, so live with it, like I had to, with it being my bottom subject after scaling.
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: Jimmmy on January 18, 2019, 12:09:23 am
Subject Name: Business Management 3&4

Workload: Medium

Assessment:
Unit 3 comprised of 3 SACs; Business Foundations (5% of total mark), Human Resources (10% of total mark) & Operations Management (10% of total mark).
Unit 4 comprised of 3 SACs for us in two areas of study; Reviewing Performance and the Need for Change (12.5% total split into two SACs, worth 5% & 7.5%) and the final SAC was Implementing Change (12.5% of total mark). The Exam is worth 50%, so it's a 50/50 split with SACs.
Exam Thoughts:
Short Answer & Extended Response questions with the single 10 mark question, which according to all reports was marked holistically, so beware. There is no exact structure, but most of the questions tend to relate to case studies, and we were 'forced' to learn two specific case studies that were to be used during SACs/Exam relating to the Operations & Implementing Change topics. Our school did Yakult for OM & Bega for Change. My number one suggestion would be to be super confident with whatever two case studies your school does. They didn't come up in the first year of this new study design (2017) but there was a question specifically relating to the Change case study, which was probably my big downfall in the Exam. Making sure you know the basics was crucial in our exam, but I'd still suggest making sure you know the more detailed concepts (Porter's Generic Strategies, Three Step Change Model, Senge's Learning Organisation etc.)

Textbook Recommendation:
We 'used' the Jacaranda BusMan book, but due to some unforeseen circumstances our class ended up using the Cambridge textbook that our teacher had alongside notes from the Cambridge textbook from our teacher for the entirety of Unit 4, and it had significantly more detail so it was much more useful, definitely my recommendation and is actually what our school is using for the course in 2019 anyway. BusMan is definitely a textbook heavy subject, but try to avoid using it much once you've made your notes for it, the recommended resources I'm about to mention are much more useful.
 
Recommended Other Resources:
Teaching Bubble is an amazing resource, some great summaries and the author there really knows his stuff. Edrolo (for those schools that use it) is also very good for the BusMan course, and gives extension to many of the concepts featured in the Study Design (not that the Exam covered that much higher order thinking  ;))

Year of Completion: 2018

Rating:  3.5 out of 5

Your Mark/Grade: 42

Comments:
The subject is great if you can do 3&4 in Year 10, or do it as your 'lazy' 5th subject in Year 12 IMO. Doing it as your sole VCE (Year 12) subject in Year 11 is a bit of a waste, and I wouldn't suggest doing it in that way. Looking back, I don't think I would've got a much different mark doing it in Year 10, and 1&2 is far from applicable to the Year 12 course so it definitely feels like lost time.

If you have any other questions, don't hesitate to message me!  :)
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: tiffanylps09 on February 19, 2019, 02:44:04 pm
Subject Name: Environmental Science

Units: Units 3/4

Workload: Low compared to subjects like Bio 3/4 and Chem 3/4

Assessment:
I don't remember the exact structure of my SACs but I do remember that in the whole year we had 5 SACs.
One of those will be a Poster SAC (as my school called it) where basically you run an investigation, compile up the data collected into a table and write up a report on your laptop in the given time. For our class, we were required to do some random sampling in our local parks on our own and come into class with the data to fill into our posters.
For my other SACs, most of the questions were in short answer format. I don't think we had any Multiple Choice questions.

Exam Thoughts:
30 marks multiple choice was fairly easy. I wouldn't spend too much time on them as the short answers are really time consuming and worth more marks.
90 marks of short answer questions are not hard, mostly regurgitating information. If you've done enough past year exams, you will notice the similarity of the exam questions through the years. Just a heads up, if you're a slow writer you might want to speed that up a little for the exam, I remember being pretty pressed for time trying to answer all the questions with enough depth. I also know a number of people who knew exactly how to answer a certain question but ended up running out of time and couldn't include the points they wanted to.

Textbook Recommendation:
Issues of sustainability - Environment Education Victoria : I found the the book helpful to read over when I was not sure how to phrase my sentences while answering questions.
Environmental Science Biozone 3rd Edition : Required by my school but literally never used it once.

Recommended Other Resources:
The only resources I used were practice exams provided by my teacher as well as the past year exams from the VCAA website

Year of Completion: 2018

Rating: 4 out of 5

Your Mark/Grade:
SAC 1 45/50
SAC 2 46/50
SAC 3 27/30
SAC 4 29/30
Poster SAC 24/30
Raw Study Score: 35

Comments:
I wasn't sure about this subject at first as it was the first year Enviro Sc was being taught at my school. I ended up taking it anyway because I was genuinely interested in understanding topics related to the environment (ie. Climate Change...). After taking this subject, I found it very enjoyable. I named it my chill subject. Compared to the other subjects I took, this demanded the least amount of effort. I was doing really well in SACs despite not studying as much as I did for my other science subjects.

The content covered was interesting mostly and fairly easy to understand, however I did find the parts about Environmental Management Systems pretty confusing. If you are planning on doing or did Biology 3/4 and/or Chemistry 3/4, you would find that some content from those subjects overlap with Environmental Science. (Biodiversity for Biology and Fossil fuels for Chemistry) I did all three of them together so it made my life much easier. There is a tiny bit of mathematical skills needed when you are asked to calculate the Simpson's Index but its really simple and easy with the help of a calculator.

During the course of studying, we also had the opportunity to go on an excursion to Werribee Zoo to learn more about the Eastern Barred Bandicoot and stuff related to biodiversity, so that was a major plus. Classes were pretty boring when we were just listening to the teacher explain concepts, however, we did get to do quite a number of practical work such as: measuring degree of pollution of water samples, investigating how the albedo effect affected temperature change etc.

The only regret I have with this subject was not taking into consideration the scaling of the subject. Having scored so well throughout the year, my final study score shocked me. So yeah, please keep in mind that if you find SACs are consistently too easy, you might be in trouble. In the end of the year, the SACs set by your teacher will also be weighted against the rest of the state and if the questions are too easy your scores will be pulled down to match the other schools.
 
All in all this was a fun subject. It was definitely a break for me from my other more demanding subjects.

If you have any questions about the subject, feel free to message me!
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: juicethelemon on February 19, 2019, 03:11:08 pm
Subject Name: Health and Human Development

Units: 3/4

Workload:
Honestly pretty chill subject. You have to memorise a ton but pretty much if you can think of common scenarios on the spot this subject will be pretty easy.

Assessment:
about 8 SACS but it was 2 for each Unit of area. Our school decided to make one normal sac and a separate one on data analysis to ensure students focus more on reading graphs and applying such information

Exam Thoughts:
I mean it was first year of the new study design so it was really straight forward and direct. Your hand will break though I'm not kidding. Go into your exam with a strategy and stick to it, I cant stress this enough for this subject. I decided for the exam to tackle the hardest questions first (particularly questions with reading paragraphs because like for english it is always recommended to read those passages during READING TIME) then i went on to the easier questions. Some people may do it the other way whatever works for you. I had a cool 10 seconds to spare to read back on my answers so if you think you're writing fast, write faster.

Textbook Recommendation:
I mean I only used the Jacaranda one because that's what my school got. Didn't bother to get other textbooks.

Recommended Other Resources:
Probably go to the TSFX lectures or the Healthy Network lectures (Didnt go to this one cause it always clashed with my weekly tutoring but Ive heard great reviews and the guy himself writes the Jacaranda Health textbook so he is basically a walking, talking textbook)

Year of Completion: 2018

Rating: 4.5/5 (Great subject filler especially if you like me, decide to bombard yourself with only maths and science subjects- it also ties with biology which is a small but nice advantage)

Your Mark/Grade:
SAC average:
Unit 3: 99%
Unit 4: 97%
Exam: A+

Comments: I took this subject as a bludge because I hated all the other options my school offered (aka accounting) but I ended up loving the subject, having it be my highest study score and Im doing sustainability and the SDGs implementations in university for my breadth this year, so would definitely recommend  :)
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: milanander on July 20, 2019, 06:44:56 pm
Subject Name: Studio Arts

Units: 3 and 4

Workload:
Studio is a folio subject, so it should be no surprise that it has quite a high amount of workload and is not a subject you can simply bludge your way through and still end up with a decent study score.

Assessment:
Unit 3 Outcome 1 - "exploration proposal", 750-1000 words
Unit 3 Outcome 2 - "studio process"
Unit 3 Outcome 3 - "studio practices"
Unit 4 Outcome 1 - two finished pieces of artwork
Unit 4 Outcome 2 -  "evaluation and reflection"
Unit 4 Outcome 3 - comparison of artists' methods.

Unit 3 and unit 4 both weighs 5% each

SATs focuses on outcomes 1 and 2 of unit 3 and unit 4 and weighs 60% in total.


Exam Thoughts:
The final exam is 1.5 hours long (plus 15 minutes reading time) and weighs 30%. It is worth 75 marks in total and is split into 3 sections.

You must respond to artworks in the detachable insert to explain a variety of key knowledge across both unit 3 and 4. The question usually has 2 parts (two different instruction words) and you must respond to both. For example, "present and promote" "materials and techniques" etc. You should also use your own knowledge + experience from making your own artworks.

Textbook Recommendation:
There was a textbook but we didn't use it. The VCAA examiner's reports are more than sufficient for the exam.

Year of Completion: 2014

Disclaimer: this was a while ago so I can't guarantee everything is accurate. Also, the study design was changed in 2017 so some information might be a bit outdated.

Rating: 4 out of 5 (-1 because of the theory overdose)

Your Mark/Grade: 36

Comments:
Studio was the very first VCE subject (and the first 3/4) I ever did, which was in 2014. So just to reiterate my disclaimer from above, not everything in this review will accurately reflect how your assessments and exam will look like. I have checked the weightings for the assessments with the current study design (2017-2021) and they don't seem to have changed since 2014 though. Nonetheless, please take everything with a grain of salt.

Just like all folio subjects, studio has quite a heavy workload and I would definitely not recommend it as a bludge subject, especially if you're considering doing 3/4. Lots of people pick studio thinking it's "just drawing and painting" and aren't ready for the work involved. Also, many people pick studio for the creative aspects and aren't ready for the more dry and dull part that is theory.

Aside from "just drawing and painting" there is also a heavy amount of theory in this subject, from analysis of techniques and materials artists use to conservation techniques, to the different roles present in art galleries and art exhibition spaces. You also learn things surrounding legal and ethical obligations with using other artworks (in the 2014 exam, there was a question on the ethics of using artworks by Vincent Van Gogh and Andy Warhol).

So if you're thinking of doing studio, hopefully you'll be prepared to learn all the theoretical knowledge on top of the more fun and creative aspects of creating your own artwork. It's a great subject overall and I really enjoyed it. In fact, I'm redoing unit 1 and 2 right now because I loved it so much.
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: milanander on July 20, 2019, 07:22:50 pm
Subject Name: Product Design and Technology — Textiles

Units: 3 and 4

Workload:
Trying to define the workload is so arbitrary. It varies from person to person and also depends on what you're aiming for. But on the whole I would say the workload is pretty high and the amount of time and effort you have to dedicate to this subject outside of class time is definitely on the higher end compared to many other VCE subjects.

Assessment:
Unit 3 Outcome 1 - "designing for end-users"
Unit 3 Outcome 2 - "product development in industries"
Unit 3 Outcome 3 - "designing for others"
Unit 4 Outcome 1 - "product analysis + comparison"
Unit 4 Outcome 2 - "manufacturing of product"
Unit 4 Outcome 3 - "evaluation and reflection of product"

SACs weigh 20% of the final study score; SATs weigh 50%. SATs look at outcome 3 of unit 3 as well as outcomes 2 and 3 of unit 4.

Exam Thoughts:
The final exam is 1.5 hours long with 15 minutes for reading time. The exam weighs 30%, it's split into 2 sections worth 45 marks each (90 in total).

The exam includes (but are not limited to) topics such as the roles of the designer, the client/end-user, marketing of your product, comparison of production systems, the role of technology (eg, computers), how new materials influences the design of products, Australian and International standards of design, occupational health and safety in manufacturing (risk assessment, management etc), evaluation, and how to determine the quality of a product.

Textbook Recommendation: We didn't use a textbook. The VCAA examiner's reports are more than sufficient for the exam.

Year of Completion: 2015

Disclaimer: I did PDT in 2015 but the study design was changed in 2018 so please take everything with a grain of salt.

Rating: 1 out of 5 (objective rating: 3 out of 5)

Your Mark/Grade: 39

Comments:

Please excuse the low 1 out of 5 rating I gave to PDT. It's not an extremely terrible subject, and I quite liked learning about the design process, but I had completed it in a very toxic environment which significantly impacted my enjoyment of this subject. (Hence the subjective 3 out of 5 rating).

I had picked PDT on a whim after the VCE coordinator suggested to me that I should do a VCE subject following my completion of Studio Arts 3/4 the year before. For PDT you can choose to do either Textiles or Fashion, and I picked textiles.

In a nutshell, PDT wasn't that bad and if you are really looking for a future career in product design, I highly recommend this subject as it's actually quite applicable compared to a lot of other VCE subjects. I know it's seen as a bit of a ""VCAL"" subject but if you want to do well, then you will need to put in a lot of time and effort. PDT is far from an easy bludge subject and so many students underestimate the effort involved.

If you are not looking for a career in design in the future though, I would not recommend doing this subject. If you just want to do a subject which is creative and fun, PDT is probably one of the last subjects I would suggest. I've done 4 folio subjects (studio, viscom, PDT, systems) and PDT is by far the most boring one out of the four (in my very subjective opinion).
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: Kimmy 10022001 on July 28, 2019, 07:23:04 pm
Subject Name: Psychology

Units: 1/2

Workload:
Depends on the school and how hard you want to try. I found that the workload was greater at the start of the year, I went into the class expecting to have to put in lots of work and so that's what I did. However, homework was rarely checked and I got really slack with completing it towards the end of the year. I'd say you should be doing a bit of work outside of class, but you don't need to be doing heaps.

Assessment:
SAC 1: Multi choice and short answer on the nature of psychology and research methods
SAC 2: Scientific research report on context and visual perception
SAC 3: Research investigation & report on a specific mental illness
Exam (U1): Multiple choice, short answer, and extended response.
SAC 4: Media analysis (shawshank redemption).
SAC 5: Short answer and extended response test on attitudes and factors that affect behaviour
SAC 6: Multiple choice and short answer test on theories of intelligence and personality
Exam (U2): Multiple choice, short answer, and extended response.

Exam Thoughts:
The exams were a mix of multiple choice, short answer and extended response. It was fairly similar to the type of questions seen on SACs and so long as you had studied for them, they were fairly easy.

Textbook Recommendation:
I used the jacaranda textbook, however it has since changed because I did the old study design.

Recommended Other Resources:
The only other resource I used was youtube - specifically for videos on research methods because I frequently found myself needing another explanation. I also used youtube to find out about other interesting psychological experiments, not because I needed to, just because it was interesting haha.

Year of Completion: 2015 (old study design)

Rating: 4 out of 5

Your Mark/Grade:
U1 SACs: ~91%
U1 exam: 92%
U2 SACs: ~90%
U2 exam: 91%

Comments:
I really liked psych - there were some bits that got a bit boring (research methods), however I found most of the content really interesting. I actually spent a lot of time in this subject just learning about the content rather than studying specifically for the test. The study design has changed since I did it, but I definitely found that looking for how the theory related to past experiments helped with memorising it. I'm sure my family got sick of me telling them about all sorts of weird experiments that have been conducted haha.
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: WackyWill on October 20, 2019, 11:28:08 pm
Subject Name: Physical Education

Units: 1/2

Workload:
Really depends on the school. My school really pushed VCE students to do 3 hours of study per night, however, I only did this closer towards assessments as I didn't want to burn out. Homework was rarely checked so I only did the homework where my teacher hinted was going to be on SACs and exams. Some people got away with doing nothing for the whole year and still got the S needed to pass. As mentioned previously, my teacher hinted as to what may be in the SACs and exams which reduced the workload a lot too.

Assessment:
Again this really depended on the school... (Currently in Year 11, did this last year and my friends have had different SACs thus far) (Also we did Unit 2 first)
SAC 1 (Unit 2): Multiple Choice & Short Answer
SAC 2 (Unit 2): Group Powerpoint Presentation
EXAM (Unit 2): Multiple Choice, Short Answer & Extended Response
SAC 1 (Unit 1): Multiple Choice, Short Answer & Extended Response
SAC 2 (Unit 1): Multiple Choice, Short Answer, Extended Response & Diagram Labelling
SAC 3 (Unit 1): Training Journal Reflections (Personal Choice of School to Mimic Unit 3+4) (Some schools may not have this)
EXAM (Unit 1): Multiple Choice, Short Answer, Extended Response & Diagram Labelling

Exam Thoughts:
The exams included 15 multiple choice questions (worth 15 marks), short answer questions and extended response questions, as well as diagram labelling for unit 1 (worth 75 marks) totalling to 90 marks to be completed in 90 minutes plus 15 minutes reading time. In relation to difficulty, I personally didn't find it too hard as it was the same content tested in SACs, just worded differently.

Textbook Recommendation:
My school used the Nelson textbook. Personally found the book useful however there were a lot of unnecessary information. I also didn't use it too much as I relied on my teacher's powerpoint presentations and the textbook to cover gaps in my knowledge.

Recommended Other Resources:
Other resources I'd recommend is your teacher's powerpoints as the textbook contained a lot of unnecessary information (as stated previously).

Year of Completion:
2018

Rating: 
4.5 out 5 despite being the only year 10 to complete it. 0.5 marks of due to personal reasons (not the subject).

Your Mark/Grade:
SACs: Averaged around 90% throughout the year.
Exam (Unit 2): 93%
Exam (Unit 1): 87% (disappointed in myself as I slacked off towards the end of the year)

Comments:
As someone who loves sport and being physically active, I saw it as basically my second last year of PE as it isn't currently my desired career pathway so I tried to enjoy every lesson of it. I wouldn't recommend neglecting the subject as it is a subject that really rewards the hard workers. Unit 2 can be sometimes boring but hopefully the prac lessons cover up for it :) I also see PE as a mixture of a science and humanities subject so if you're looking for this kind of mix, PE could be the subject for you. To end off, PE was my most enjoyable subject and still is this year, so I'd really, really, really recommend it to everyone.
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: planttle on November 12, 2019, 10:00:46 pm
Subject Name: literature
Units: 3+4
Workload:
 a pretty light workload, i didn't get much homework, you choose how much work you want to do
Assessment:
school coursework: 50% (u3 - 25%, u4 - 25%) exam:50%
unit 3: adaptations and transformations (essay and oral (not assessed)), creative response (written creative piece and statement of intention)
unit 4: close analysis (two essays, different texts), perspectives (essay)
Exam Thoughts:
two sections - a: perspectives essay, b: close analysis - you must choose a different type of text for each section (for example, you cannot write about two plays or write about the same novel for both sections), marking guide seems pretty vague and subjective to me
pros: it can be fun, especially if you have a good topic and passages, because you get to look deeply into your texts and have your own interpretation, there's also no set structure for how you write your essays
cons: you only have an hour to write each essay which is really hard especially since you have to both deep and wide and likely have a lot to say, you can't bookmark the pages of your question booklet in reading time, no dictionary allowed
Textbook Recommendation:
the only textbook i had was the atarnotes complete course notes, they were pretty good but i lost use for it early in the year, i suggest only getting it if you feel like you need extra support in understanding how to analyse your texts and writing essays, otherwise maybe just borrow it from a library and have a skim
my teacher gaves us notes from the insight exam guide, again probably just borrow this and have a read of it since it only focuses on the exam you might not get a whole year's use of it
Recommended Other Resources:
- find some crits and reviews online! if you become a member of the slv you can access databases for free, i suggest jstor, but you can also find some that you don't need to log into to access if you just search them up
- if you have trouble understanding your text read shmoop or sparknotes articles
Year of Completion: 2019
Rating: 5 out of 5
Your Mark/Grade: haven't received my study score yet but I scored above 40/50 for each of my sacs
Comments: lit was my favourite vce subject! I had a lot of fun looking deeply into texts and perspectives and it was lovely break from my other subjects. the culture is also really good because people don't choose literature if they don't like it, it's really good to have a mature and complex discussion of the texts that you may not have in an english class where people's interest varies, also a lot of opportunities for jokes and light-hearted conversations and debates outside of class. also, you get to read out loud in class if you want!! please do not choose this subject if you do not like reading because that's basically all you will be doing throughout the year.
the texts I studied: twelfth night, robert browning's selected poems, cat on a hot tin roof, north and south, and only the animals
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: Genshai on November 15, 2019, 09:54:05 pm
Subject Name:
Biology

Units: (Is it Units 1&2 or Units 3&4?)
3/4

Workload:
I found bio had a relatively light workload, as everything links together :)

Assessment: (Outline the various assessments which make up the subject and how much each counts for)
U3: At my school, we had 2 SACs (each 4%) for AOS1 and 1 SAC (8%) for AOS 2. Both of these were the classic test.
U4: We had 1 SAC (8%) per AOS (x3), with the final being a scientific poster.
This totalled to 40%, with the exam being the final 60% :)

Exam Thoughts: (What's the structure? How hard was it?)
I really didnt like the 2019 exam :( It emphasised a lot of 'less important' aspects of the studying design (very little adaptive response, gene regulation) - a lot more application questions and quite unlike other vcaa exams imo :) I think i had just expected something else, and didnt study appropriately.
The exam itself is 2 hours and 45 minutes, including 15 minutes reading time. There are 40 MC questions and 11-12 short answer questions, consisting of multiple parts (a,b,c etc). I find bio MC are relatively easy compared to other subjects, but the short answer requires a very specific response. be careful :)

Textbook Recommendation: (What did you use? How much did you use it?)
I used the the Nelson Biology textbook, but honestly, i stopped using it half way through. My teacher gave us summaries throughout the year, so i found those more beneficial than the textbook.
I dont /endorse/ it ;), but you can find many pdf copies of textbooks online for free, so maybe check some out before you choose to purchase one. Or use them all, whatever floats your boat.

Recommended Other Resources:
Biozone ! amazing resource for studying for SACs !! i wouldnt recommend it for the exam necessarily, but perfect for the SACs. I also used it consistently throughout the year, which i would highly recommend !
Edrolos were a great resource. I highly recommend the biology edrolo. I would watch these before we covered the content in class, and then after we covered it. Really helped to hear the information multiple times.
ATARNotes Lectures: super helpful and refreshing. The bio lectures were great for refreshing older content and preparing for what was to come. Would highly recommend.

Year of Completion:
2019

Rating:  out of 5
5/5 !!
Bio was my absolute favourite subject. I would highly recommend it !! I actually skipped the 1/2, and only did the 3/4 for timetable reasons. i had no interest in bio at first, but I quickly fell in love with the subject !

Your Mark/Grade: (Optional)
I had an average of about 93% on sacs, and was ranked about 1-5 in the cohort.
I will update you when my ss is released :)
Update: I got a raw 40 (probably 41 or so scaled) !! so stoked !!
B+, A+, A+ :)

Comments: Give your overall opinion of the subject, content, assessment etc. and a recommendation, plus anything else which you feel is relevant.
I would do it again in a heartbeat ! i really, really recommend bio. Its actually fun studying for !
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: Geoo on November 17, 2019, 04:11:39 pm
Subject Name: Biology

Units: 3/4

Workload:
Above average. There was alot of content to remember and understand, which meant some very long weeks of work.

Assessment:
Unit three SACs are worth 16%, and is out of 100. Unit four SACs are worth 24%, and was out of 90. At my school, I had three SACs for each unit, so a total of 6 throughout the year.
Unit 3:
SAC 1: Photosynthesis and Cellular respiration
SAC 2: Cellular Signals and Apoptosis
SAC 3: The Immune System

Unit 4:
SAC 1: Epidemics and Pandemics
SAC 2: Poster SAC/ Experimental design
SAC 3: Human Evolution

Exam Thoughts:
This year's exam was one of the easiest I had seen, however, it was very random and only had half of the study design on it. I think alot of the questions were a very small point on the study design that were quite specific, so if you didn't study it or didn't know it, you were kind of screwed. I was also expecting alot of of AOS 1 unit four, there were no questions on natural selection or speciation, and only one on fossilisation. The experimental design was also alot easier than previous years and more straight forward. Overall, I think it was just a really weird exam.

Textbook Recommendation:
I did not have any textbook assigned to me, nor do I suggest one for studying biology. My school required me to use biozone, and most was just taught in class were we relied on the notes we made throughout the year.

Recommended Other Resources:
Even though I was not told to, listening to douchy's biology podcast was a good way to summerise information and learn a few tips and tricks from someone who new the course and what VCAA look for inside and out. I found looking at other people's notes quite helpful to get a different perspective, and they may have paraphrased it in a way which may be easier to understand compared to a classroom definition.

Year of Completion: 2019 (year 11)

Rating:  5 out of 5

Your Mark/Grade:
G1: A
G2: A+
G3: A
Score: 38

Comments:
Overall, biology was one of my favourite subjects to study all year. I always looked forward to it and thoroughly enjoyed the content. Whilst there was alot of content to memorise, I didn't find it too much but it was definitely borderline. I spent alot of time writing notes and summery posters which I did find quite helpful when it came to revision. I do have a few regrets about the subject however, and that is expression. I knew my content inside and out, however, when it came to exams I really struggled to express myself by either giving too much or not enough detail, and sometimes just leaving a few things out. I really needed more practice with this and I unfortunately just ran out of time. So I would definitely recommend starting exam prep earlier (which I started early October, and ending up completing 17 practice exams), and doing exam like questions consistently throughout the year.

This is a very unpopular opinion, but i enjoyed unit 3 so much more over unit 4. Not only was the content more engaging, but I looked forward to revising the knowledge that I learned for my SACs, and I found that I could relate it to real like alot more. Unit 4 was were I struggled, but I believe it really all just came down to expression, in which I just didn't know how to do so. I also didn't mind the practical poster investigation. I chose to do it on photosynthesis, in where I was experimenting on how does the wavelength of light effect the rate of photosynthesis or something like that. It was a really basic research question, but I really liked the process involved and creating my own poster.

I personally think that this was a great subject for doing in year 11. It has taught me many things that I will carry over into year 12, and overall it has been a giant learning curve. I thoroughly enjoyed most of the content and I will definitely miss biology.
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: MissSunshine on November 18, 2019, 05:30:57 pm
Biology:

Units: 3/4  - year 12

Workload:
Although the subject is fairly content heavy, a great deal of the content is interconnected which reduces the workload! Many people I know found there was too much content to learn but I found having a passion for the subject and wanting to truly understand each topic made it feel like a lot less work! (Side note; AOS1 U3 Bio is practically the same as AOS2 U4 Chem which is great revision for the bio exam and cuts down your workload a tonne at the end of the year when you're studying for your last chem sac and juggling exam revision at the same time)

Assessment:
Unit 3 SACs - 2 SACs each counting for 8% so Unit 3 was overall 16%

Unit 4 SACs - 3 SACs each counting for 8% so Unit 4 was overall 24% - one of the assessments was a practical investigation, the SAC involved planning and completing the SAC followed by a handwritten timed prac report poster (it might be different for other schools but that's what we did  :) )

Final Exam - counts for 60% and involves both multiple choice and short answer (40 MC, 11-12 SA) in a 2.5 hour time frame plus 15 mins reading time.

Exam Thoughts: (What's the structure? How hard was it?)
I really liked the exam, although it is moving towards a greater focus on application questions and more niche sections of the study design is was definitely a fair exam that rewarded individuals who worked hard and understood the concepts rather than rote learning.

Textbook Recommendation: (What did you use? How much did you use it?)
Throughout the year I used the Heinemann Biology textbook but I only really used it as supplementary to my teacher's ppts (he used the textbook to make the ppts plus added extra info so I was basically taking notes from the textbook) .

Recommended Other Resources:
The resources I used the most were my teacher's ppt's and edrolo which I consistently watched before each class as well as used to get ahead of my class and the content. (I finished content at the start of term 3 which gave me sufficient time to complete 15+ exams without feeling pushed). After finishing each piece of content in class I used the Neap study smart questions which were by far my favourite resource and extremely helpful.

Year of Completion:
2019

Rating:  out of 5
6/5!!

Your Mark/Grade:
Unit 3 (GA1): 95%
Unit 4 (GA2): 100%
Exam(GA3): TBA (fingers crossed)

Comments:
Bio was genuinely my favourite subject during year 12. All of my other subjects had quite a heavy workload as well but my love of the subject and it's content made biology feel like my 'break' subject despite it having a similar load. I found flashcards to be the best form of revision (getting family to ask me questions that I put on the front and I explained the content rather than having a memorised response) but many people I know fell into the trap of just making flashcards for what they felt was the most important. The key for bio flashcards is to make them on everything even if you think it's unimportant. If your stack of cards isn't thicker than the textbook you probably haven't done enough!
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: Elsa//768 on November 27, 2019, 12:45:00 pm
Subject Name: EAL

Units: Unit 3&4

Workload: Moderate and increases before each SAC/ exam.

Assessment:
In Unit 3, the SACs are reading and creating texts, analysing argument and listening to texts.
Reading the creating means writing an analytical essay on a selected text, and my secondary school did Persepolis. Analysing argument involves both finishing an essay analysing the way persuasive techniques have been employed to present arguments, as well as short-answer questions testing comprehension of the article, which are weighed equally with the essay. Listening involves listening to two unfamiliar audios and completing the accompanying questions.

In Unit 4, the SACs are reading and comparing and presenting argument.
Reading and comparing involves completing a comparative essay analysing the similarities and differences between two selected texts, which for me were The Namesake and Reckoning. Presenting argument has two components- meaning students need to give a speech and complete a state of intention.

Exam Thoughts:
For EAL students, exam has 3 sections, with section A being listening, Section B being analytical essay, and section C being analysing argument and comprehension questions. EAL students do not need to complete a comparative essay on exams.
Overall, there were no major surprises on the exam. I thought this year's listening is a little bit easier than last year's, and section C is ok... For section B, I chose Persepolis and felt that the topics (particularly the second one) were a bit narrow.

Textbook Recommendation:
The major textbook that I used was Insight textbook for EAL students. This textbook was particularly useful because it provided many listening exercises!! Although not all of the questions are of the same standards as VCAA's, the structures are highly similar. I also recommend Insight comparative guides because the guide on Reckoning and The Namesake really helped me to have a good grasp of the major themes of the texts and offered some alternative perspectives from the ones I studied in class. In addition, LitCharts are quite useful for providing chapter-by-chapter analysis.

Recommended Other Resources:
I highly recommend asking your EAL teacher for additional help and resources. A huge thank you to Ms Ford for being so supportive and helpful!! The advice that your teacher offers are invaluable because by incorporating them into your next essay, you are constantly improving and avoiding making the same mistakes!

Year of Completion: 2019

Rating:  4 out of 5

Your Mark/Grade:
Unit 3: 91%
Unit 4: 97%
Exam: Hopefully I did not stuff up

Comments: EAL is not necessarily 'easier' than mainstream English, but it is certainly quite different both in terms of the structure of the course and the assignments that students do. Overall I enjoyed learning it because the grades you get are proportional to the work you put into the subject. Sure, you need to complete heaps of plans and practice essays and memorise quotes and there is no easy way out, but if you put in the hard work then you will definitely improve and achieve better marks. Also, I really liked the oral component of the presenting argument SAC because I love talking  :P
To quote my awesome EAL teacher--
'Knowledge brings confidence. Ignorance breeds fear.'
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: milanander on December 07, 2019, 11:58:43 am
 Subject Name: Mathematical Methods (CAS)

Units: 3/4

Workload: Pretty high. I jumped into 3/4 without doing 1/2 so I had a bit more to catch up on.

Assessment: 3 internal SACs:
SAC 1 covers all of unit 3 and is on differentiation. (17%)
SAC 2 covers the first half of unit 4 and is on anti differatiation and integration (8.5%)
SAC 3 covers the second half of unit 4 and is on probability and statistics (8.5%)

Internal SACs are worth 34% in total. There are also two end-of-year exams, worth 66% in total. Exam 1 (Tech-free) is worth 22% while Exam 2 (tech-active) is worth 44%.

Exam Thoughts: 2 exams:
Exam 1 is tech-free and has 40 marks worth of short answer questions. It's 1 hour with a 15 minute reading time.
Exam 2 is tech-active and you're also allowed a bound reference with notes. There are 20 MCQs worth 1 mark each, and 60 marks of short answer questions. The exam goes for 2 hours with 15 min reading time.

Personally I found exam 1 to be easier. Exam 2 is quite demanding of the CAS and you must be really know all the functions of the CAS inside out to do well.

Textbook Recommendation: My school used Jacaranda MathQuest. I think most people would agree that cambridge is better though.

Recommended Other Resources:
Worm's Maths Academy videos on YouTube - he goes through past VCAA exam questions in a lot of detail (way better than examiners reports)
Cambridge checkpoints were a waste of money
I found MAV and iTute to have the hardest commercial practice exams.

Year of Completion: 2019

Rating: 5 out of 5

Your Mark/Grade: 47

Comments:
Personally I loved methods and I found that I did well in it (mostly, probability ruined me though) even though I had horrible grades in maths from year 7 to year 10. I didn't do the 1/2 sequence so the first couple of weeks was quite difficult and you really need a strong foundation in maths to be able to tackle the questions. There's also a large amount of application questions on the exam which tests not your ability to rote learn concepts but to apply and think outside the box.

I think methods is a great subject to take if you enjoy maths and problem solving or if you just want to keep your options open for university courses. I found the subject to be fun (yes, F-U-N) to do and would highly recommend!
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: JR_StudyEd on December 13, 2019, 09:57:21 am
Subject Name: Psychology

Units: 3/4

Workload: Medium. But like many unit 3&4 subjects, you choose the workload.

Assessment: I believe we had two SACs in test conditions for each area of study. The end of year exam contributes 60% to your study score.

Exam Thoughts: I remember it being pretty chill to be honest. I just tried to answer as much of it as I could.

Textbook Recommendation: Well, I only used the Jacaranda textbook, and although I didn't really complete many questions in it (we'll get to Checkpoints soon), I found the information to be rather helpful.

Recommended Other Resources: Checkpoints. Do the questions in them. Check your answers with classmates and your teacher. Learn from your mistakes so that you can smash that exam. Please. I beg you.

Year of Completion: 2018

Rating: 5 out of 5

Comments: Favourite subject by far. Loved it. Really enhanced my Year 11 academic experience. I would recommend Psych to anyone who is interested in the scientific study of stuff, but thinks the likes of Bio, Chem and Physics are too "sciencey", if that makes sense.
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: JR_StudyEd on December 13, 2019, 10:08:31 am
Subject Name: English

Units: 3/4

Workload: Widely varies between students. I will probably say this for every subject review, but you, the individual are fully responsible for how much effort you put in. I personally found the workload to be in the middle ground.

Assessment: This is the order in which my school did it:
1. A Text Response essay
2. A Creative piece
3. Argument analysis
4. Oral presentation
5. Comparative analysis
And finally the exam, which contributes 50% to your final study score.

Exam Thoughts: 3 hours long.
Section A: Text Response
Section B: Comparative Essay
Section C: Argument Analysis

Textbook Recommendation: What textbook? English already has plenty of books to read. ;)

Recommended Other Resources: Uhh...ATARNotes lecture slides?

Year of Completion: 2019

Rating: 3 out of 5

Comments: To be honest, I don't have much to say. I neither felt excited nor terrified before walking into English class. If you don't think Literature's your thing, do this.
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: JR_StudyEd on December 13, 2019, 10:28:21 am
Subject Name: Biology

Units: 3/4

Workload: Rather substantial, especially if you're someone like me that never did Unit 1/2. And did Unit 3/4 in Year 12.

Assessment: I don't know how helpful this will be to students that go to schools other than the one I went to, but regardless...

Unit 3:
- Photosynthesis and Enzyme prac
- Caffeine stimulus and response
Unit 4:
- Immunity
- Evolution
- Scientific Poster
- Gene Technology

The final exam contributes 60% to the study score.

Exam Thoughts: I struggled through it. There's a mutiple-choice section, which I really, really tried to answer correctly. I suppose the short-answer questions gave me more than a significant challenge, and not a great one for my confidence, seeing as that was only my second exam.

Textbook Recommendation: Heinemann. That's the one we used.

Recommended Other Resources: Checkpoints, Edrolo, Douchy's podcast (that is if your attention span is long and you have the time)

Year of Completion: 2019

Rating:  2 out of 5

Comments: After completing adoring Psych and appreciating its content-heaviness, I thought I would have similar feelings towards Bio. But the content-heaviness was much more substantial in Bio, and blunted my interest in learning the content. Towards the end of Term 2, it just got too overwhelming. I was disinterested in Bio, thinking that only a small portion of the study design could be retained in my brain in time for the exam. And I was right. As I type this up, the letter in the mail containing my results for each of my subjects is staring me right in the face. I don't even feel close to qualified to write up subject reviews on the basis of my results. But at least I gave it my absolute best. I (mostly) didn't let my shallow desires get in the way of the long-term satisfaction of pouring 110% effort into my exam. My results may not reflect that, (and there's pretty obvious reasons as to why I ended up with these results), but at least I can say that I never gave up, and I kept going right to the very end, even with my waning interest in Bio.
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: JR_StudyEd on December 13, 2019, 10:38:06 am
Subject Name: Chemistry

Units: 3/4

Workload: Close to saying that it is heavy. Okay fine. It's heavy.

Assessment: This is how my school went about it:
Unit 3, SAC 1: The energy transformations occurring in chemical reactions
Unit 3, SAC 2: Equilibrium + Reaction Rate
Unit 4, SAC 1: Making aspirin. Oh, and answering chemistry questions relating to it.
Unit 4, SAC 2: Proteins, carbohydrates and calorimetry
Unit 4, SAC 3: Scientific Poster

Exam Thoughts: It was my last ever VCE exam. I simply gave out every last ounce of grey matter left in my brain and put in on the page. If you are not aware, there's a multiple-choice section, and a short-answer section.

Textbook Recommendation: Jacaranda. How unhelpful you were.

Recommended Other Resources: Khan Academy. ATARNotes lecture slides. Way better than the textbook I had.

Year of Completion: 2019

Rating: 2 out of 5

Comments: Found out that I'm not a science person. Like Bio, I struggled through Chem. I paid attention in class, I asked questions when I could. I simply procrastinated a tad more than I studied. Honestly, Chem wasn't a subject I was particularly thrilled to see on my daily timetable. But I know there are many of who out there who would leave their warm beds at 7am, five days a week to study Chemistry. If that's you, go for it!
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: JR_StudyEd on December 13, 2019, 10:48:46 am
Subject Name: Health and Human Development

Units: 3/4

Workload: Slightly below average.

Assessment:
Unit 3, AOS* 1, SAC 1: Understanding health and wellbeing
Unit 3, AOS 2: We had two SACs, both of which were on different aspects of promoting health and wellbeing.
Unit 3, AOS 1: We had two SACs, both of which were on different aspects of health and wellbeing in a global context.
Unit 3, AOS 2: Health and the SDGs*

*AOS is short for Area of Study
*SDG is short for Sustainable Development Goals

Exam Thoughts: Unfortunately, the luxury of a multiple-choice section will not be granted to you. WARNING: There is a lot more reading than you would expect. Read all questions carefully. Work quickly. You will run out of time otherwise.

Textbook Recommendation: Jacaranda. Very helpful.

Recommended Other Resources: Edrolo. ATARNotes lecture slides.

Year of Completion: 2019

Rating: 4 out of 5

Comments: Only behind Psych in terms of my favourite subject. I enjoyed learning about issues that concern our planet today, and learning about how we can improve the health of Australians, as well as the world. Would highly recommend.
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: JR_StudyEd on December 13, 2019, 11:02:15 am
Subject Name: Maths Methods

Units: 3/4

Workload: Honestly, regardless of your proficiency with advanced maths, the workload is heavy.

Assessment: We only had three SACs. Depending on who you are, this could be a blessing. Or a source of torment.
SAC 1 (Unit 3): Applications of Functions and Calculus
SAC 2: Calculus
SAC 3: Probability
 
Exam Thoughts: Two exams. You are only allowed to use the maths left in your brain for exam 1. And the formula sheet. You have 1 hour of writing time. It contributes 22% to your study score. For exam 2, keep an eye on the clock. It is NOT easier than exam 1. You have more time. But this only gives you more time to waste on doing unnecessary calculations. This exam contributes 44% to your study score. You do the maths when deciding which exam is more important. (Spoiler: everything is important)

Textbook Recommendation: Cambridge textbook.

Recommended Other Resources: Khan Academy. YouTube. Certain people on this forum.

Year of Completion: 2019.

Rating: 1.5 out of 5

Comments: Oh boy. How can I say this objectively? Without hurting anyone? This subject doesn't mess around. You fell two exercises behind your teacher? Get ready to do extra Methods work that night. You need a thick skin and an incessantly resilient brain to withstand the constant barrage of maths coming your way. Ask classmates and teacher for help before the situation gets out of hand. Don't be ashamed to admit that you just don't understand a particular key concept. I can't sugarcoat it. This subject is difficult, and for all my hard work and tears shed, I didn't get much back in return.
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: Geoo on December 15, 2019, 07:45:11 pm
Subject Name:

Physics

Units:

1/2 (I only did unit 1 though)

Workload:

Below average. Compared to other sciences like chemistry and bio, physics is below average when it comes to workload. There wasn't alot of content to learn, and most of it was just mathematics with a bit of theory sprinkled in. I had a weekly quiz and submission questions and that was it. There was only 2 pracs we did.

Assessment:

There were 4 SACs and one optional exam at the end of the semester. I do not know what they were worth. SAC 1 was thermodynamics, SAC 2 was electricity/ohms law, SAC 3: was particle/nuclear/astrophysics, and I can't remember the fourth. I did not do the exam as I dropped out of the subject.

Textbook Recommendation:

Heinemann 1/2 textbook was used. I only used it once. The teacher never required us to read it or do any practice questions, so it was ultimately useless to me.

Year of Completion:

2019

Rating:

2/5

Your Mark/Grade:

B+ Average

Comments:

The reason why this was rated so low was mainly the teacher, the incredibly dry content, and how it was taught to me. The course was laid out so poorly for me, and all of the assigned work either had errors, or had difficult questions using formulas we weren't taught. I also found the content extremely dry! Thermodynamics and electrical were just so boring to study as it was really just 100% theory. The only topic I liked was particle/astro/nuclear physics, it was engaging and exciting. I found out none of this was going to be in 3/4, so I decided to drop it on top of all my other problems.

So if you love physics, have an awesome teacher, and have the content be correctly taught to you, go for it, The reason I despise it so much was more from a personal experience.
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: Jimmmy on December 29, 2019, 09:27:20 pm
Subject Name: English Language

Units: 3 & 4

Workload: Moderate (5/10). This subject doesn't gain a lot from bashing your head against books IMO, but more about watching the news, reading widely, understanding social conventions and understanding purposes of language. I probably spent too much time collating content, and if I was to think about something I would've done differently, it would've been studying less for this subject.

Assessment:
Unit 3: Formal & Informal Language - Mostly to do with the varying registers of language, what dictates them, how/why texts/speeches are created, understanding what makes the purpose of particular texts (25% of your SS).

Unit 4: Identity: Australian, Group & Individual - There's so much 'Aussie' in this unit, it's ridiculous. Make sure you understand what is common to the 'Aussie' vocabulary, our culture, and interrelate the two throughout your essays. Australian values such as 'laid-back', 'egalitarian' and 'larrakin' are good to mention, whether you're arguing in favour, or against them being inherent to the Australian identity in present times (25% of your SS).
---------------------------------------
Your SACs will presumably be divided as ours were, into Short Answer, Analytical Commentary and Essay sections, and mirroring the exam. I'll try to specify a quick tip for each.

Short Answer: be specific, answer the question, no more.
Analytical Commentary: Nailing your introduction immediately puts you into the higher range. Make sure you're writing it quickly, concisely, and ensuring your social purposes and functions match the mode, audience and he context of the text.
Essay: Ensure that your contention matches the rest of your essay, and that it is somewhat complex and not dull. You want the teacher/examiner coming out of reading your essay having learnt 'something' new, or being somewhat surprised and therefore interested with what your wrote. As long as it all logically follows, you're in with a very good chance of the high-very high range.

Practice Exams Completed: 12
Exam Thoughts:
15 marks Short Answer, 30 marks Analytical Commentary, 30 marks Essay. one (or two) texts for Short Answer to analyse, one (thus far) text for the AC to analyse, and 3 prompts to choose from in the essay. You can double all these numbers for the exam, as two examiners mark your paper (this is an FYI, especially should you get your statement of marks, so you don't get a shock with numbers!)

The 2019 Exam was, overall, not a difficult one, but I definitely think people over-complicated it, I know I certainly did.

The Short Answer was on a novel excerpt, the only time they've ever used such a text type in an EngLang Exam for either the SA or AC sections. Beware for next year! They may well use in for the AC next time. The other big thing to note from this exam was that there were only 4 questions in the SA section, so they were large marks (3,3,4,5). In terms of marks, I got 23/30 for the SA (so an 11/15 from one examiner, and 12/15 for the other). One thing to be super wary of with novels is not to mistake the social purpose. Many people I spoke to used the social purpose of the narrator, who was a young boy retelling their experiences. In actual fact, they should've been discussing the purpose of the author. Due to receiving my statement of marks, I was able to see how that was marked and managed to get full marks on that first question, despite almost throwing them away in the exam. The other question I wanted to bring up here was Question 3 of the SA. It was on....sentence structures! I legitimately remember talking to a former 45+ EngLang student in the week prior and when I mentioned sentence structures, he told me not to worry too much, as they're probably too boring to discuss in an AC, and haven't ever come up in a SA...well they did. I left this question right to the end of the exam, as I was rushing and hardly finished anyway, but couldn't bear leave a 4 marker blank...and lucky I didn't! I got 5/8 (so a 2 & 3/4 from each examiner). I vaguely remember mentioning something about listing, and discussing the scope of items the boy wanted to mention in a cohesive manner. Obviously I didn't ace it, but it shows that it's important to cover all your bases in revision, as I was still able to scrap out a few marks.

The AC was a Hughesy & Kate radio show transcript. I initially thought I butchered this, bordering on tears after talking to my classmates after talking to them following the exam, as I barely even mentioned the largest social purpose! 19/30 (9/15 & 10/15) was an unbelievable output considering my immediate reaction, and considering I didn't really finish either. I think it can be credited to my uniqueness of examples (I wasn't discussing the use of simple sentences or conjunctions), and the fact I picked out niches in the text, such as the two lines where they asked for callback from the audience, which I hammered on about in relation to Hughesy & Kate's discussion on 'soft drinks'. I guess this shows that even if you miss something major in the text, you can still salvage an AC if you show complexity and detail, as I honestly thought I'd butchered it so badly in the aftermath that I was walking into a barely double digits out of 30. Ultimately, I ended up (somehow) outperforming some of my peers who mentioned far more applicable ideas in the AC after the exam, but must not have gone into them as explicitly.

The Essay had three rather open prompts, and I picked the one along the lines of 'The non-standard varieties of Australian English enrich it' (I can't exactly remember it, but it was close to that). I landed a 24/30 for it, despite some errors that stood out as I walked out of the exam, such as mentioning ethnolects in my introduction, but not going into detail with them anywhere in my Essay, which I think was the main factor in dragging me down from the very high range. As mentioned above, the key part of this essay section was to clearly identity some non-standard varieties, what they do, and how they do, or do not enrich AE. I took the path of finding a complexity, where I discussed indigenous languages (and other varieties), enriching the language insofar as it is 'mutually intelligible'. These trigger phrases are handy, as they come across as complex to an examiner and show your more worldly understanding, and ensure you don't sound the same as every other essay they read. I am by no means a great writer, but ensuring you have these details and complexities (as well as a heap of evidence!) can be crucial in lifting your marks. FYI: Examples, make sure they are as recent as possible. I was following the NSW Police Instagram and I prepared to use their posts as evidence, and had a few other very contemporary examples prepped. As is the nature of social media platforms, these posts can pop up in the weeks, even days before an exam. Use them! You can prep these sources from months before, knowing they're going to have new content come up constantly. Be prepared for it, and ensure you date these examples so the examiners know how interested and thorough you are!

The exam didn't feel great, during, I was sick and after, I felt I'd just thrown away a whole year of work with a bad few hours. I didn't feel any better until getting my score, which I was shocked with. It just shows you that, irrespective of how you feel in an exam, have the faith that your preparation carried you through. My big piece of advice for EngLang exams (and prep) is to not just do heaps of practice exams, but learn the 'typical' characteristics of each AC type, brainstorm structures for every 'type' of essay that could come up, and think about what you'd say for different metalanguage terms in a Short Answer. That way, you can adjust most effectively in the exam, as every text you get will be slightly different to the ones you practice for.

Textbook Recommendation:
Living Lingo, as almost every school I know does. It was a great reference for theory and quotes, despite being somewhat complicated. I wouldn't use this as a 'reference', per se, but instead go through it with a fine tooth comb and make notes off it. Used it regularly, 4-5 times a week.

Recommended Other Resources:
EngLang ATARNotes was moderately useful, especially for the essays they've got at the back! Not much else, to be honest. The online newspaper? Talkback/on the ride home (4-6pm) radio? All of which are crucial to get an understanding of, as you never know what might come up on any SAC, or the end of year exam.  :-X

Year of Completion: 2019

Rating: 4.5 out of 5

Your Mark/Grade: 39 (A+, A+, A), where my SACs were mid 80s.

Comments:
This subject is incredibly valuable, giving you an insight into current affairs, how language is being used in contemporary society and different cultures in Australia, and I would highly recommend it. The workload is less than the other two Englishes from what I've seen, but you can score higher than 'naturally gifted' English students by virtue of hard work, reading a lot, keeping up with current affairs and ensuring you understand the metalanguage. I under performed in the exam yet still managed to snag a pretty good score. Despite this, like any other English, there is some subjectivity, as I know some amazing students who must've gotten unlucky with how their exams were read. However, with hard work, I feel like you can really excel in this English with an absence of 'natural talent' more than any other English, and really increase your knowledge about Australian society and how language works, which is one of the things I've felt like I gained most from Year 12.
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: Jimmmy on December 30, 2019, 12:05:22 am
Subject Name: Philosophy

Units: 3&4

Workload: High (8/10)

Assessment:
Comprises of short answer questions (2-5 marks), extended response questions (8-10 marks) and essays (20 marks).
U3: 25%
U4: 25%
Exam: 50%

Practice Exams Completed: 2
Exam Thoughts: (What's the structure? How hard was it?)
The examination is worth 70 marks total, divided between 30 marks of short answer questions, 20 marks of extended response (two 10 markers) and an essay, where you have a choice of two prompts.

The examination was tough this year, but rewarded detailed preparation. Important bits to note were the specificity of short answer questions, with one referring to a single paragraph in a 40 odd page Gorgias reading. The extended response was fairly predictable, and it just depended how good your understanding was and how comfortable you were being analytical and writing in a logically critical manner. The essay threw a cat among the pigeons, as each prompt directed us to only use certain philosophers (eg. you must make reference to Susan Wolf or Nietzsche). Make sure you have your own unique point of view that cannot be strictly pigeon-holed to any prescribed philosopher if you want to ensure you do above average in the exam especially.

Textbook Recommendation:
No textbook! You will need to get your hands on the set texts, which our teacher thankfully managed to provide to us (at a small cost). You refer to it quite frequently throughout the year, and need to due to each reading's complexity, but should make your own notes which will eventually become your main reference come October.

Recommended Other Resources:
VAPS run forums roughly around May and September, which I would suggest going to, but they aren't a necessity.

Year of Completion: 2019

Rating: 3 out of 5

Your Mark/Grade: 35 (A, B, A)

Comments:
I found this to be the toughest subject to do in VCE. As my own Philosophy teacher professed to me the day we got our results, 'Philosophy is a content-heavy subject which requires you to be nit-picky and specific, is time-consuming and doesn't scale up much'. I didn't enjoy it for most of the year due to a bit of burnout, but really enjoyed preparing for it in October. I gained immensely in terms of life skills (eg. critical thinking, questioning beliefs etc.), despite it taking so much of my time, and not being particularly successful marks wise. I wouldn't recommend this subject in 3/4 personally, but would highly suggest doing it 1/2 before jumping into HHD, PE or Psych in Year 12, which is something I probably should've done had I known how tough 3/4 Philosophy was going to be.
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: Jimmmy on December 30, 2019, 09:10:31 pm
Subject Name: Maths Methods

Units: 3/4

Workload: Heavy (9/10)

Assessment:
SACs: 33% (we had six SACs throughout the year, divided evenly with each being worth 5.5%, however I know most schools elect to do two or three SACs in the year. Each SAC is divided into two parts, tech-free and tech-active, with the tech-active questions usually being longer and more strenuous).
Examination #1: 22% (tech-free, the questions can get difficult, but usually comprise of no more than 3-4 parts).
Examination #2: 44% (tech active, usually with 4-5 questions with many parts of each, with each question centering around one particular point of theory in the study design (eg. probability, integration, statistics etc.)

FYI: for the last 5-6 years, Exam #1 has been the Wednesday morning following Cup Day, with Exam #2 being the following afternoon, so be prepared for that Cup weekend!

Number of Practice Exams: #1: 19, #2: 7
Exam Thoughts: (What's the structure? How hard was it?)
There's really not much to say here after I went over the tech-free vs. tech-active differences above. Exam #1 is worth 40 marks and Exam #2 is worth 80. One major piece of advice that I'd give is to not only make sure you read every question in reading time, but identify the questions you can, and cannot do. If I'm honest with myself, I pretty much knew exactly what I was able, and unable to answer during reading time for both exams, and bar one bad slip up early in Exam 1, and a couple of sections that my mind blanked on in Exam 2 (most probably due to doing Philosophy earlier that day), I was right. Maximise your score, and don't be too proud or too arrogant when you're in that exam room.

Textbook Recommendation: (What did you use? How much did you use it?)
Cambridge Senior Mathematics was a great resource for questions, both textbook ones and those we could complete on the online interactive platform in mini-tests and topic summaries. I used it frequently, all the way up to early October before really smashing out the majority of my practice exams.

Recommended Other Resources:
The ATARNotes Methods book was exceptional as a summary, and I even used it as my bound for my first few exams without too much trouble. Edrolo & ATARNotes Topic Tests were a great source of questions, and the checkpoints is something most people found useful even though I didn't use it, and that's probably something I do wish I had done to increase my SS a little.

Year of Completion: 2019

Rating: 3 out of 5

Your Mark/Grade: 32

Comments: Give your overall opinion of the subject, content, assessment etc. and a recommendation, plus anything else which you feel is relevant.
This is a very tough subject, probably required the most work and effort throughout the year to maintain, and still ended up being my worst score! I walked into 3/4 with much higher expectations (not one of those 'only for the prerequisite' people), having done very well in 1/2, but ultimately Year 12 is Year 12, and as the saying goes, 'easier said than done'. It was fulfilling for me, a good journey, and I liked Maths somewhat so it wasn't as grueling as it was for others. Nonetheless, if you want to hit that 40 like I'd hoped at the beginning of the year, you must put in an extreme amount of work. I was spending 12-13 hours on Methods a week alone outside class, so expect to do far more than that to get 40, or be really good at the out-of-the-box style of Maths that you need to excel in this subject.
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: Jimmmy on December 30, 2019, 11:52:07 pm
Subject Name: Global Politics

Units: 3&4

Workload: Moderate (6/10)

Assessment: Comprises of short answer questions (2-5 marks), extended response questions (6-8 marks) and essays (20 marks).
U3: 25%
U4: 25%
Exam: 50%
Exam Thoughts:
The exam is 80 marks total, with 60 marks comprising of the short answer & extended response section and one 20 mark essay, where you have a choice of 4 prompts (one from each area of study). Global is one of those subjects which is really competitive, so if you want to be breaking 40, you really don't want to lose too many more than 13-14 marks on the exam in total. Also, be really thorough in your reading of the study design with this subject, especially the blurb. The second question of the exam specified a discussion of a TNC in relation to how they were facilitated by advances in communications and technology, and I very closely discussed that to globalisation. Whilst I was 'technically' correct, 'communications and technology' does lie independently in the blurb, and I only got a 3 and a 2 out of 6 for that question despite feeling relatively confident, so I'll assume my examiners weren't too happy with me defining globalisation and tying it in closely! This goes for the essay too, as three of the prompts this year derived part (or all) of their question from the blurb, so be prepared! It's only going to get more tricky in the future.

Textbook Recommendation:
We used this green ringed textbook, I think written by SEV, but it wasn't much good and we barely touched it past March. I got 95% of my information from other sources, such as my teacher, or just looking at the study design and finding my own stuff.

Recommended Other Resources:
Any news source you can find (eg. The Guardian, Al-Jazeera, any newspaper you can find).

Year of Completion: 2019

Rating: 5 out of 5
Your Mark/Grade: 41 (A+, A+, A)

Comments:
I switched into this subject three weeks into Year 12, and despite a slow-ish start, I managed to redeem myself with the selection through hard work and it was probably the best choice I made all year. This is a great subject and I'd highly recommend it, but only if you have some interest in contemporary politics and current affairs. Like English Language, you'll need to keep your eye out for things as late as the October of the exam, but this subject is very intriguing, teaches you a lot about the world we live in, and if you're interested in it, you can get solid scores without spending hours on end sitting at a desk trying to learn content. Ended up being the class I looked forward to going to the most throughout the whole year!
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: Jimmmy on December 31, 2019, 12:25:20 am
Subject Name: Legal Studies

Units: 3&4

Workload: High (8/10)

Assessment:
Short answer questions (2-5 marks) and extended response (6-10 marks).

Practice Exams Completed: 9
Exam Thoughts:
The examination is 80 marks, to be completed in the standard humanities time of 2 hours with 15 minutes reading. If you want to complete this exam with sufficient detail, you must use that reading time and basically pre-prepare your responses in your head. The 2019 exam was an absolute joke in terms of what they tested from the study design directly, there wasn't much there and a lot of extrapolation was required. Section A of the exam is worth 40 marks, containing the sole 10 marker at the end of the section. I somehow did far worse in this section than the following one, with a few 3/4's and 5/6's which cost me. This means they're still looking for an incredible amount of detail, and summing up perfectly to get full marks from this section, despite it being the less 'case-study relevant' section. I thought I had it fully covered, but you must be over-prepared! Section B is obviously, also worth 40 marks, but (shouldn't?) have a dreaded 10 marker, HOWEVER keep aware for future years. I know the P.E. exam threw in two 10 markers this year when only one was expected, so this could be the next trick they pull in the (already shockingly irrelevant) Legal Exam. Section B is meant to be heavily case study based. Every response you make must explicitly reference the case study, otherwise it's a certain loss of marks. Generally, the exam is tending to not be as 'rote-learnt' in the last few years, which means if you're naturally good at understanding the subject, you're in better stead and don't need to have a perfect grasp of the content. That said, the content is still crucial! Just make sure you practice more of those abstract questions too (eg. in the 2019 exam, they provided us a table of ages and sexes and asked us if they represented the people, one of those 3/4's for me!)

Textbook Recommendation:
Justice & Outcomes (Oxford I think?). Great resource, amazing detail, overly complex though. Highly suggest taking notes and not touching this beyond September.

Recommended Other Resources:
ATARNotes are a solid summary, but probably too far the other end and not quite comprehensive enough. I used quite a few companies' practice exams, so try get your hands on as many as possible or even make some yourself.
Year of Completion: 2019

Rating: 4 out of 5

Your Mark/Grade: 43 (A+ (100/100), A+ (100/100), A+)

Comments:
A really worthwhile subject if you want to get a grasp on the law, however the fact is, it's incredibly dry for most people. It was the biggest complaint in my class all year, and having a few friends and a nice teacher were the main things that helped me enjoy it. I think the way they assess it is getting more and more arbitrary, but if you knuckle down, you can avoid most of the ridiculously weird stuff in SACs that you'd get in the exam and nail it. I was highly intensive in Legal, and somehow managed to not drop a full mark the whole year through SACs, and managed to almost replicate that in Section B of the Exam. Unfortunately, it's also very competitive, so you need to really have a good exam day. I'd recommend it, but probably suggest trying it in 1/2 to make sure that the content doesn't bore you, because 1/2 is very much an exact replica of Unit 3.
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: The Cat In The Hat on November 19, 2020, 11:01:20 am
Subject Name: English

Units: Units 3&4

Workload: Medium - depends on how well you want to do, and if you know your texts beforehand.

Assessment: SACs are worth 50%. Unit 3: Argument Analysis, out of 40 marks, Creative piece on first text, out of 30 marks, Essay on second text, out of 30 marks. Unit 4: Comparative essay, out of 30 marks, Oral speech, out of 10 marks (this year; normal years it's more heavily weighted.)

Exam Thoughts: You write three essays in three hours.
The first one is an essay on one of your two texts studied in unit 3. You are given a choice of two questions for each, and have to choose one. It's advisable to decide which text you're doing in the exam beforehand, and study for that, rather than trying to do so for both. (However, this proved to be an issue for some people in my year because one of the ones we'd done, Old/New World, had difficult questions where the other one, Pride and Prejudice, was easier. So it might be wise to skim for the other text just in case you get awful questions that you can't answer. Note: I didn't, since I had prior knowledge of Pride and Prejudice.)
The second essay is one on your comparative pair. You are given two questions and must, once again, choose one. Don't go for the 'hard' one, is my advice, since they're not marking you against everyone else who did that 'hard' one, but everyone else who did English (is my understanding). Others may not find it hard: do whichever you will find you can express coherent and original ideas in.
The third essay is an Argument Analysis, on an unseen piece that you need to analyse. You analyse their use of language and mostly argument in order to figure out what the author wants the audience to think/feel/do, how they're appealing to certain sections of their audience, etc. This is definitely worth practising beforehand and getting advice from AN, in my opinion. I did for just one, and it helped enormously. My teacher advised us to begin with this essay, since we've read the piece to be analysed during reading time. Note: if there's a visual, best to do more than just a sentence on it. Make sure you talk about a comment, if there is one.
General advice: keep to time. I tried to work on maximum 50 minutes for the AA, and soak up that time in whichever I found I knew more relevant things about. As an exam, it's draining. I found the best practise beforehand, for me personally, was doing full exams, since I found doing the last essay very difficult (the first time I tried it, I gave up in the middle of the last essay, since my brain refused to function; having done a few, I found I actually didn't have any brain fatigue special to the last essay, in the real exam). Practise writing fast but legibly. I found that, something about the adrenaline generated from the exam, or something, I wrote faster than I ever had in practises. This meant I could write the number of pages my teacher advised, and write more, but it's certainly tiring to your hand - mine is still not quite back to normal where I gripped the pen (think knuckles going white strength grip, for three hours) and this is more than a week later. However, it's worth keeping pushing through.

Textbook Recommendation: The novels/films? I had prior knowledge of Pride and Prejudice, the text I wrote on for Section A, so from the start of the year I was rereading it over and over and noting down quotes, in my head (I didn't make notes). The teacher also lent me a study guide, I think it was a York Study Guide for Pride and Prejudice; it was useful for deepening ideas, but I did little more than passively read it through a week before the exam. As for Old/New World, I only learnt enough of that to do the essay SAC; no textbook. We used the Insight Ticking Mind textbook as well; I didn't use it much, but what I did use did help. The PDF isn't too pricey, either, and I found it worked well.

Recommended Other Resources: ATARNotes. Especially the English Marking forum; there are people there who are very happy to help, and I found some of the feedback simply and clearly expressed enough for me to make a marked difference simply from putting up one essay. Also, use your teacher if you can.

Year of Completion: 2020 (the weird year).

Rating: 4.5 out of 5

Your Mark/Grade: Obviously I haven't got my study score back yet; in my SACs, I averaged 85% in unit 3, and 80% in unit 4, ranked first in the class going into the exam (cohort of 19). I'll probably/hopefully put my study score up when I get it.

Comments: This is anecdotal because I feel it should be said. At the start of the year, I did not enjoy English, nor have a high expectation for it. The teacher said do essays - I didn't. My first SAC mark was a fraction over 75% - I was quite happy with it. (The only thing that saved my unit 3 grade was the creative piece, which is right where I like it :) and thus I tried for it.) I didn't do essays, I didn't practise, until - I don't know when exactly. Before the comparative SAC, the teacher happened to say that it was a tossup as to whether I or another classmate was ranked first. I was suddenly determined. I worked awfully hard in preparation for the SAC. Despite not reaching my goal mark, I discovered that - shock horror! - I liked writing essays about things that interested me. Next task: make everything in English interest me. Because I was working towards an exam with one of my favourite books possibly ever to write about (Pride and Prejudice) I knew I could do that if I wanted to, as a break from everything else. Just by suddenly picking up my game and deciding to work at English, I found I enjoyed it. I also picked up 10% or 20% extra marks along the way, just by practise and help from a previous student, who was willing to mark my essays by looking at them and saying, this is good, or, this is bad. Having directed feedback and this-is-your-weakness-work-on-it really helped. Just working hard at English made me discover I actually liked it, enjoyed the challenge of here is the question, break it into three logical arguments, covering all aspects of it. Where I had previously thought of essays as a chore that took the afternoon, evening and every other time available to procrastinate in, I found I could hammer out a reasonable essay, generally without looking at my books (I found essay writing the best way to consolidate quotes etc.) in around an hour. By the trial exam, I'd pulled my marks up to almost 9/10, even in exam conditions. It just takes hard work - and if you work at it, I think it'll become enjoyable as well. At least, that was my feeling of it. Put work into English and you get enjoyment out of it. Also, reread the books the day before the exam. I reread 'Ransom' (from my comparative pair) the day before the exam, which was pretty much all I did that day - read it and the screenplay of 'The Queen', and skimmed Pride and Prejudice. I used some of the quotes I wouldn't've had otherwise, in the exam.
So, as a subject, I would advise putting quite a bit of work into English, because you'll find you enjoy it (I think). Get a tutor or someone who's willing to mark it (such as the English marking board here!! Even if you wanted to PM, you'd probably find someone willing to do so.) I did more English study than otherwise because I was procrastinating on doing other subjects, such as Revolutions, the exam of which was the day after English.
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: eloisegrace on November 23, 2020, 07:40:02 pm
Subject Name: Mathematical Methods

Units: 3&4

Workload: High (7.5/10)

Assessment: I completed this subject in 2020 so our SACs and weightings were different
2020
SAC 1 - Unit 3, mostly testing functions and differentiation (22%)
SAC 2 - Calculus, testing differentiation and anti differentiation (12%)

Every other year
SAC 1- Unit 3, mostly testing functions and differentiation  (17%)
SAC 2 - Calculus, testing differentiation and anti differentiation (8.5%)
SAC 3 - Probability and Statistics (8.5%)

SACs are worth 34% of your study score, with the 2 exams worth the remaining 66%. The exams are very important.

Exam Thoughts:
Exam 1 is worth 22% of your study score and is comprised of simpler short-answer questions, and is no notes no calculator. Usually, there are no real curveballs. The questions are usually pretty similar from year to year (except for 2020 cos gosh that exam was hard). Exam 2 is multiple choice and extended response and is worth 44% of your study score. This is the tricky exam. The multiple-choice can be time-consuming and there are extended response questions that will rattle your brain for days.

The 2020 exams were tough, especially exam 1. Exam 1 had a much heavier hand calcs + algebra component compared to usual, and didn't follow typical VCAA style. A lot of your answers had to be in a specific form which was challenging and time consuming. Overall, a difficult exam. Exam 2 was more typical in terms of difficulty and I didn't get tripped up on many questions (only a couple of the last parts which are the separator ones).

When doing practice exams, I found Exam 1's a lot easier but in the real thing, Exam 2 was WAY better.

Textbook Recommendation:
My school used the Cambridge Textbook which was pretty good, however the extended response questions could have been more VCAA style. I also didn't do the chapter reviews which are apparently a good resource.

Recommended Other Resources:
Checkpoints: I had it but barely used it but should have. However, my teacher gave us massive booklets of exam questions from all company exams which were useful.
ATARNotes Topic Tests and Course Notes: I also had these but rarely used them. The notes had some useful sections but I found them unnecessary. The Topic Tests were good but I just didn't get around to doing them.

Year of Completion: 2020

Rating: 3 out of 5

Your Mark/Grade: Will update Dec 30, expecting high 30s. UPDATE I got 42 ! :D

Comments: Methods is a great subject for prerequisites, however, it is difficult. I have always been good at maths yet I struggled at times during the year. I didn't find the concepts too difficult however their applications can get very tricky at times. It also took a lot of time away from my other subjects which was find as it was an early 3/4, however if I was doing it in Year 12, I'm not sure how I would have handled it. If you do not even remotely need this subject as a prereq, I would recommend not taking this and instead taking Further Maths.
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: waterangel82 on December 09, 2020, 11:15:02 am
Subject Name: Mathematical Methods (CAS)

Units: 3&4

Workload: Very high (8.5-9/10). Almost feels like doing 2 VCE subjects.

Assessment:

Unit 3:
SAC 1 - Application task on functions and differentiation (17%)

Unit 4:
SAC 2 - Application task on differentiation and anti-differentiation (8.5%)
SAC3 - Application task on probability and statistics (8.5%)

Exam Thoughts:

Exam 1 was non-calculator and made up of short answer questions. I found it relatively okay, although many people tend to struggle with the last question (which really requires some deep thinking to solve). The main tip for Exam 1 would be to practice your arithmetic and reduce silly mistakes because it is very easy to mess up when you don't have access to a calculator. Overall, Exam 1 is relatively doable if you do many past practice Exam 1 papers. That saying, in my year (2016), many people found Exam 1 difficult because it was the first year of the new Methods study design and all SACs were designed to be tech-active, so we did not have much practice with doing calculations by hand.

Exam 2 was CAS calculator allowed and composed of MCQ and Extended Response questions. I personally found this exam (in 2016) very painful and annoying, simply because it tested knowledge that wasn't related to the study design. There were at least 2 'proof' questions worth 2 marks each, which I felt was really unfair since in Methods we did not cover proofs but people who did Spesh did, so essentially Spesh people who were also doing Methods had a greater advantage. Overall, I found Exam 2 to be full of curveballs and I don't think I performed as well as I liked.

Textbook Recommendation:
I used the Jacaranda Maths Quest textbook. It was okay, but contained multiple errors in the solutions. But its statistics section was pretty bad, so I relied on the Cambridge Maths Methods textbook for that section.

Recommended Other Resources:
The Cambridge Maths Methods textbook was a good complement to the Jacaranda Maths Quest textbook, I'd highly recommend you to get a copy of both textbooks to supplement the areas which each textbook lacks.
I also used Checkpoints, but it wasn't a good resource since it was literally all past VCAA paper questions divided into topics.

Rating:  2 out of 5

Year of Completion: 2016

Your Mark/Grade: 44

Comments:

In hindsight, this subject was absolutely PAINFUL and very time consuming. Whilst the idea of testing students via difficult application questions in theory is a good idea, in reality, I feel it is fundamentally flawed when you don't even teach students the basics of maths. Methods feels like a subject where you're forced to the deep end of the swimming pool but you don't know how to swim. I feel like basics such as modulus, complex numbers, and vectors should have been emphasised in Methods rather than Spesh, since these concepts are fundamental for solving essential maths problems. However, Methods mainly tests students based on very convoluting and long-winded problems which are more representative of a reading comprehension exam rather than a maths exam. So essentially, students are penalised for not interpreting the questions correctly rather than being able to show what they understand mathematically.

Another part of the subject I don't like in hindsight is the use of CAS. Since CAS calculators are able to solve equations, this means students don't really practice their arithmetic skills. Their overall 'by-hand' calculation skills are very poor, which is concerning since doing maths by hand is fundamental to maths. Students don't really have the opportunity to understand how to find answers, such as using the fundamental theorem of calculus, but are instead subjected to mechanical 'plugging and chugging' to find solutions. This is concerning, because if you can't work out basics such as long division, you are unlikely able to grasp derivatives and integrals very well.

Overall, I did not like this subject at all. It is very time-consuming, difficult, and does not feel like a good maths subject. Thankfully, I completed Methods 3/4 in Year 11, which was good since this meant I had a lot less pressure during Year 12. But if you are doing this subject in Year 12, do plan your time very carefully, as this subject is more like 2 VCE subjects in terms of workload.
As the previous reviewer said, Methods is great for prerequisites. So don't do Methods if you don't have to - you would be much better off doing Further Maths.
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: hairs9 on December 10, 2020, 09:49:43 am
Subject Name: Chemistry

Units: 3/4

Workload: Higher than a regular subject but it really depends how much you want to put into it. It takes more effort to understand the concepts but it really depends what you are good at and what you struggle with, as well as how much work your teacher assigns you and how productive you are.

Assessment: Usually it's 4 sacs worth 8% each+ an experimental design sac worth 8% + the exam worth 60% but it was different this year in terms of weighting

Exam Thoughts: Exam is multiple choice and short answer with a more long-winded question at the end. It's not exactly a 10 mark question like in psychology or something but it's a shorter version of that(might be two parts each worth 4ish marks).
I did not finish the exam and found it difficult in some areas. But it was also not at a great time for me in the exam schedule

Textbook Recommendation: We used the Heinmann chemistry textbook and I found it pretty useful and used it most of the year

Recommended Other Resources: My teacher made us sheets of old VCAA questions when we completed a topic which was very useful. I also used the unit 3 notes someone uploaded onto ATAR notes(it's the one with 59 pages) which I found very helpful.

Year of Completion: 2020

Rating: 5 out of 5

Your Mark/Grade: A+ A+ A+ 43

Comments:
I loved this subject. The content is a lot more interesting than 1/2(which I also enjoyed but learning about water and carbon structures can get a little dry). With things such as biodiesel, different types of fuels and hydrogen fuel cells, you really feel like you are learning about both the present and future of chemistry, which I found exciting. I also loved how the food chemistry topic linked into a lot of unit 3, which helps with both revision and understanding how everything fits together. I also loved analytical chemistry, even if some of it was repeated knowledge.
The assessments were fine, space between them was probably better than usual because of covid delaying sacs.
Biggest recommendation: make sure you know analytical chemistry and other common complex molecules(H2SO4, H3PO4, HCl, NH4+, H2CO3) super well. Prioritise chemistry so you don't fall behind because so much of it links with each other.
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: hairs9 on December 10, 2020, 10:06:16 am
Subject Name: Specialist maths

Units: 3/4

Workload: It varies throughout the year but quite a lot if you want to have a deep understanding

Assessment: Usually it is 3 sacs-one worth 17% and two worth 8.5% and 2 exams: tech free worth 22% and tech active worth 44%. It was different this year though

Exam Thoughts: Tech free is all short answer, while tech active is 20 multiple choice and a few short answer questions. I found the exam somewhat easy but I was a bit pushed for time.

Textbook Recommendation: Cambridge specialist maths. I used it a lot but we used the essential maths textbook for some of calculus(I don't know if it was necessary)

Recommended Other Resources:
Vicmathsnotes was a literal godsend. It has notes on everything and exam questions separated by topic. I used those exam questions throughout my revision and it really helped me do well when I eventually started practice exams.

https://vicmathsnotes.weebly.com/year-12-specialist-maths.html
https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B573kapCG8Afbjd0Rk1xc0I3Q0k

Year of Completion: 2020

Rating: 4 out of 5

Your Mark/Grade: A+ A+ A+ 43

Comments:
I did enjoy this subject a lot. Some of the content was a bit repetitive from the 1/2. My least favourite subject was mechanics, which took me ages to wrap my head around, as did "tanks"/mixing questions. Specialist is mainly dealing with concepts that seem incredibly hard when you first see them and some will be very difficult when you first attempt but if you keep at learning and put the effort in to master the concepts, you can do very well. Biggest advice is to not ignore specialist in the first semester and to study for any topic tests assigned like it was a test in any other year
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: ThunderDragon on December 12, 2020, 05:52:05 pm
Subject Name: Geography

Units: 3/4

Workload: Medium (7/10)

Assessment: Usually there is a Unit 3 AOS 1 Fieldwork SAC worth 12.5% of your study score, Unit 3 AOS 2 SAC worth 12.5% of your study score, Unit 4 AOS 1 SAC worth 12.5% of your study score and a Unit 4 AOS 2 SAC worth 12.5% of your study score. The end of year exam was worth 50%.

Exam Thoughts: Exam was decent although there were a few 8+ marker questions which can be hard to score full marks in and make sure you know PQE (Pattern, Quantification and Example/Explanation) really well for the exam when describing distribution.

Textbook Recommendation: GTAV Textbook Unit 3 and GTAV Textbook Unit 4

Recommended Other Resources:
GTAV Preparing for Units 3 and 4 exam. There's not really much other resources for Geo so you kinda have to rely on your school materials as well.

Year of Completion: 2019

Rating: 4 out of 5

Your Mark/Grade: 41

Comments:
I actually enjoyed this subject quite a bit. It is a fairly underrated subject however if you are interested in Humanities or want to take a break from some of the other Sciency subjects which I kind of miss this year, Geography is a good option. Unit 3 AOS 1 Fieldwork is probably the easiest part of the course as you are able to complete most of the SAC at home. The hardest parts of Geography would be Unit 3 AOS 2 as there are a lot of case studies, details and facts to remember and this is probably the most content heavy part of the course. Make sure for the exam you are able to fully answer the question and have a good structure for answering questions since most questions are at minimum 6+ marks with many questions ranging from 8 - 12 marks so gaining full marks for the questions does require a great deal of practice and having a solid structure when answering the questions.
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: ConFinCMC on January 03, 2021, 09:20:06 pm
Subject Name: Drama

Units: 3&4

Workload: Varies, though roughly 7/10

Assessment: Unit 3 Assessment Tasks involve an excursion to a devised performance (usually in Melbourne, this sucks for Rural Students, trust me, I know.), two written SACs and a performance SAC, worth 30% of the study score
Unit 4 Assessment Tasks involves a 1-2 minute Solo Performance SAC and a written SAC.
NOTE: There are two exams, the solo performance worth 35% (I WISH I was kidding) and the written exam is worth 25%.

Exam Thoughts: Two exams, which surprisingly were not related to each other.
The performance exam is a seven minute solo performance based on one of ten prescribed structures, announced in August. My God, you need to know the script back to front, inside out. In performance SACs, the teacher who is assessing you knows what your performance is like. They will base you on what your intended performance was, no matter how good or bad you perform. The exam assessors have never seen your performance, and will only assess you on what they see. If you go over the seven minute time limit, you will be stopped, harsh but fair. That means it's so damn important that you get everything crammed into that little window.
The written exam has to be one of the weirdest things I've ever seen. There are only three questions, split into two sections. Section A talks about a devised ensemble performance that you watch way back in Unit 3. And keep in mind, this is a play, not a movie. So you need to take notes in excruciatingly painful details, such as actors, costumes, etc.
Section B is about devising solo and ensemble performances based on a list of stimuli. These questions are usually based on the content of the actors and the performance, rather than writing a plot. Playmaking techniques, Production Areas, Dramatic Elements, yadda yadda yadda, expect wrist pains.

Textbook Recommendation: There are no textbooks required for this subject.

Recommended Other Resources: "The Drama Teacher" blog is like, the Holy Grail of VCE Drama. Use this and you will do well. It can be used to revise terms and techniques that you need to use for SACs, exams and SAC prep documents.

Year of Completion: 2020

Rating:  4 out of 5

Your Mark/Grade: 28

Comments: This subject may sometimes be brushed aside for being "Too Easy", but this is not the case. For the Ensemble and Solo Performances, you need to take time out of your own life to actually rehearse. SAC prep documents are so damn necessary, but you'll spend many a night trying to get them done in time. Overall... eh. My favourite subject that I did, and probably kept me from dropping out tbh. Just a note though, when it comes to Study Scores, the competition is fierce.
Best of luck.
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: Duck Tails on January 11, 2021, 11:38:29 pm
Subject Name: Biology

Units: 1/2

Workload: Moderate - more than my year 10 subjects, but definitely manageable if you keep your head down.

Assessment: 5 SACs from memory (2 research, one scientific poster), end of year exam; semester 1 exam cancelled due to COVID.

Exam Thoughts: Multiple choice + short answer sections; not too bad overall, some multiple choice threw me off a bit and one question about labelling chromosomes was a bit unclear.

Textbook Recommendation: Jacaranda Nature of Biology - pretty good, had quite a bit of filler but generally went into enough depth for the stuff you need. Based majority of notes off of it and filled in gaps using other resources.

Recommended Other Resources: ATARNotes study guide, Khan Academy. My school also used Edrolo, which I used for the videos to help consolidate.

Year of Completion: 2020

Rating: 4 out of 5

Your Mark/Grade: 84% on final exam

Comments: Probably my favourite subject last year. Not necessarily hard, but definitely has a decent workload. I found most of it pretty interesting, mainly the genetics part of unit 2. Gives a pretty good foundation for 3/4, as you'd expect. As you've probably heard regarding bio, it doesn't matter if you've memorised everything if you don't understand it and know how to apply it. If I could go back, I'd probably read through my notes every now and then to make sure everything was reasonably fresh in my mind - I'd pretty much forgotten about oncogenes and proto-oncogenes until the day of my exam. Definitely makes you see the world differently and help understand it better. If you want to do a science, I'd say bio is a pretty good middle ground.
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: Geoo on March 03, 2021, 01:08:06 am
Subject Name: Food Studies

Units: 3/4

Workload:

On the light/medium side. It depends on how much you want to put into it, but overall less than some of the big subjects. Reading through the textbook and taking notes can be quick time consuming, memorising some of the content takes time, and assessments that involve write ups are the most time consuming parts of the subject. Most of the content is common sense that make for a lighter workload, and there isn't alot of coursework to do outside of understanding some content. Areas like AOS 1 in unit 3 and AOS 1 in unit 4 are the most time consuming with memorisation. Compared to subjects like chemistry or bio, it really was a light workload, and I finished all my work within 3 hours a week (class and home work included unless it was a practical week then it would be around 6 hours). SACS were the most time consuming part compared to learning course work.

Assessment:

I did this in 2020 so it was a bit different for me, but this has been adjusted for the regular study design.  With each assessment it's split into two, the theory component, and the practical.
Unit 3: Worth 30%

SAC ONE: AOS 1, worth 50% of unit 3. I had to answer a few questions under timed conditions about sensory analysis. We had to cook a risotto from the textbook, then answer questions on the food science behind it, and some sensory questions.

SAC TWO: AOS 2, Worth 50% of unit 3. I had to follow a deign brief by making a lunch box for a fussy child by following critria. I then had an essay for a case study response, involving food allergies, assessing the meal in accordance with the ADG's (Australian Dietery guidelines) and using lifespan nutrition to answer criteria of the essay.

Unit 4: Worth 30%

SAC ONE: AOS 1, worth 60% of unit 4, this SAC came in three parts. The first was a written report on a topic of you're choosing on what you have studies throughout the unit. I choose GMO's. To see some of the ideas, click here for topic ideas. This was a big one worth the most, you have to do your own research then write about your topic following the criteria, mine was 4 pages. The second part was answering a design brief on ethics, then designing a meal on the criteria that matched the ADG's, I made a lentil soup. There were questions that came with the design brief.

SAC TWO: AOS 2, worth 40% of unit 4. This was the SAC that was affected by COVID, so I didn't do a practical portion and half the AOS had been removed. However, it was all on marketing food, fad diets, body image, food affects, misleading media, labeling, and normally branding/health claims (that was removed for me). This is normally accompanied by a practical.

Each SAC I was given a week to do, sometimes two weeks.

Exam Thoughts:

The exam is worth 40%, and it split into 15 multiple choice and around 10 short answer questions the equal 100 marks. You have and 1 and a half hours to complete it not including reading time. The final question is and extended response worth 10 marks, it can cover anything, for me it was on the digestion of a hamburger and the sensory appreciation of it. You have to write at the speed of light with this exam, it's a tough one to get through time wise. I didn't find the exam too hard, I think people were tripped up by the emulsification question but overall it went quite well. I knocked out the multiple choice in the reading time, then did the extended response question first, then did the others in order. Sometimes with the exam, not everything will align with what you've read in the textbook, there was a bee question last year and one on community gardens that weren't covered in the textbook, so make sure you are well read in other areas. Have a science background helped me. If I have any tips, it's don't stop writing!

Textbook Recommendation:

I used the only available textbook, food solutions 3/4. It was fine. Some of the information is already out of date due to changing times, but it was decent and provides most of the stuff you needed to know. I used it every week, but it was heavily supplemented by my teachers own content which I found to be more relevant. I didn't use any recipes in the back aside from the risotto, and they do have questions for practice with no answers. Overall, the content is pretty good and gives you a good idea of the content, I just recommend supplementing it with other readings.

Recommended Other Resources:

Use your teacher as much as you can! I found the A+ notes to be pretty decent, as it gave another perspective than the textbook, plus the summaries were nice as the textbook can go on and on with examples. I wouldn't recommend checkpoints, they just weren't very helpful. Any practice exam you can get your hands on, there aren't many practice exams (only 4 VCAA ones) since it's a new study design, the older food tech exams before 2017 aren't relevant at all. Overall, I just recommend to be well read. Investigate food labels, look at environmental issues and problems, look at youtube videos on food production, and keep in touch with the general news.

Year of Completion: 2020

Rating: 4.5 out of 5

Your Mark/Grade: 48

Comments:

Overall, I loved food studies. It was a chill subject that was a nice break from all my other heavier subjects. I had a fantastic teacher that really helped motivate me and make the content fun. My fav area was the food science, and my least was all the farming stuff in unit 4. I wish there was more of a practical/folio element like there was in food tech before it changed to food studies in 2017, but it is what it is. This subject has a higher workload than most people think, but the amount of work you put into the subject is up too you. The SACs were more time consuming than learning the content, and the exam prep was lighter as there isn't much to complete.

Even though this subject scales down, don't be afraid to pick it. If you have an interest in it, pick it! Some parts are a bit dry, but others are really great, and you get to make food! It's not always edible food as some can be considered science projects, but the practical element is very enjoyable.
Title: Re: VCE Subject Reviews and Ratings
Post by: mabajas76 on November 16, 2021, 08:09:34 pm
Religion and Society 3/4:
Frankly the work load is what you make of it. Our teacher was pretty strict with it so that was good, but I know some schools can be quite slack given the subject. I did about 30 minutes-an hour every night doing homework and study, sometimes a bit more of less but it wasn't too hard. It consists of alot of note taking, reviewing documents and answering practice questions to understand the content. If you have a really good memory, then the subject will be pretty chill. I will give it a 7/10 for me given I am not a huamities kid but still found it pretty bearable.

Workload and structure:
There are five assesments and one exam through out the year. They are all the same, typical SACS were it will ask you a range of questions that you answer. They can be anything from outline, explain, describe, analyse etc. Quotes and images are often used. About 20% of the marks should come from conceptual stuff but it depends on the teacher.
The first in unit three (which is called the search for meaning) is called responding the to the search for meaning. It is worth 30 marks out of 100 for the unit, which is worth 25% of your study score. Key things to know are being able to define terms like religious tradition and beliefs, LIST the nine aspects, understanding key beliefs taught by your tradition, knowing the nature and purpose of religion, how religion and societies impact eachother/what relationship they have and then knowing the seven existential questions which are:
-Ultimate reality
– The nature and purpose of human life
– The meaning of suffering
– Death and the afterlife
– The relationship between ultimate reality and humanity
– The relationship between humans
– The relationship between human life and the rest of the natural world
You need to know what they ask conceptually (meaning you don't talk about any tradition) and then talk about beliefs relating to each of them in your tradition.

The second area of study is expressing meaning. It is pretty easy to understand, the main things are:
Learn to define every aspect.
Learn the conceptual role of each aspect(HOW do they actually work to express meaning and connect adherents with beliefs)
The relationship between aspects
Then the big part of selecting two key beliefs, and knowing how each of them are expressed through each aspect. You need to talk about how they engender and nurture meaning and be able to compare different aspects and what they represent. This assesment is worth 40 marks for unti three.

The third Area of study (AOS) is Significant life experience(SLE), religious beliefs and faith: Worth 30 marks and is straight foward but also kinda annoying personally:
Know what a SLE is, know how religous beliefs influence them and vice versa, know the different types (love, suffering, joy, wonder and Major life choices.) and how they impact adherents (members of a tradition.)
The next one is what gets me, you need to know an individual, be able to descirbe their SLE, then be able to analyse how their beliefs changed before, during and after. The problem with this is that it is very easy to get caught up in the details, like  talking too much about the SLE and not properly explaining, with evidence, how beliefs changed. It is easy to just miss what the question is asking.

Now we get to unit four, Religion, challenge and change(my fav unit):
AOS 1: Religion, challenge and change
This was my fav unit:
So you need to know things like whatare the sources of challenges, what make sone significant, why do religions respond to challenges, why do they take different stances, what informs responses, how were aspects impacted etc.
Then you study 4 (but kinda 3) challenges:
One relating to theology:
One relating to ethics:
One relating to continued existence:
One relating to any of the others (My teacher just spent one lesson on this one)
You need to know the source of each challenge, what makes it significant, Aspects impacted the who, what, when, where, the stances taken by a tradition and their supporting responses, along with if there were any changes to the stance. This makes up 50 marks out of 100 for unit four which is 25% of your study score.

AOS 2 Interaction of religion and society:
So you choose one more challenge, typically different from the ones in unit 4 aos 1, you do the same stuff as before but go into much more significant detail. Then you do the stances and responses, but where it differs is that in 4.2 you analyse how the response impacted the challenge, religion and wider society. Beyond that, more detail is expected for the challenge. But other than that it is the same as the above. It makes up the other 50 marks for unit 4.


The exam is worth 50% of your SS, it is 80 marks and broken up into 2 parts:
Part A: Where most of the conceptual stuff is, its worth 30 marks out of 80, you get 2 hours and 15 minutes of reading time and consists of short answer questions, so 2-6 marks with some 8 markers.
Part B is the extended response and worth 50 marks: It is almost always tradition specific, sometimes it will have like a small 2 mark conceptual which you then talk about as a tradition specific example. It will either be some analyse/expain question, or it will give a quote or cartoon and ask for a discussion ie to what extent does this reflect something u looked at. It wasn't too hard this year but there were a couple curve ball questions I didn't expect, but you could still predict what type of questions will be on the exam.
There are never more than 10 marks for a single answer, sometimes a 14 mark question will appear but it will be broken up into 2 or more parts.

Textbook and other resources.
I used Religion and Society unit 1-4 by Mary Tuohy, Damien Green, Shayndel Samuel, Christine Valladares. It was pretty good, the conceptual stuff for it and the definition are a God sent. Like alot of the exam questions can just be copy pasted from the book (exagerating but its pretty good). Given that the course is not foccused on a specific tradition it isn't VERY useful for the tradition specific stuff.

Don't bother with the checkpoints, it really isn't worth it personally. Besides that, the subject is very barren :(, just use past vcaa exams. However, unfortunately, the resources dedicated to this subject are abysmal. There are SOME notes out there for free but mostly the vcaa examinations are all u get...we didn't even get any practice sacs. The textbook has questions which can be used but yeah, there is an unfortunate lack of resources online. Imma post my notes on the R&S fourm for anybody who wants it :)

Year of completion: 2021

Rating: 4/5

Score: Pending but maybe 35?

Final comments:
Listen, this subject is harder than you would think, or at least in my school. I was fiarly used to getting 100's in religion, so when I chose to accelerate this subject for year 11, I def wasn't very prepared. But still, I believe that as far as 3/4's go, it is very good as an intro. I would highly reccomend this for anybody thinking of accelerating a 3/4, it isn't too hard, it isn't too easy. It gives you alot of practice in taking notes, memorizing, answering the question correctly, and generally increases your writing ability. The content itself is fine, some stuff is more fun than other things but it isn't awful or as dry as you may think. The course is written and designed so that it isn't foccused on one religion, all questions are asked like "in a religious tradition you have studied" and the past exams are VERY varied in that each sample answer will be different, one for Catholics, one for Muslim, Judaism, small denominations and sects you name it! So thats nice, and it can defintely be a thought provoking subject, which leads me to my biggest issue with the subject...

You don't get an opinion.
I hate this so much, at no times are you allowed to use what YOU think, it is just what the Catholic Christian tradition (or whatev u study) teaches...You don't get an opinion, you don't get to make conclusions, nadda. As a result, this subject will favour those with a good memory over those who are really critical thinkers. I do get why, but I feel like more individual interpretation could be worked into the course in some ways to make it more engaging. There are also a lot of quotes and stuff you SHOULD remember, thinks that the CHurch said in responses, the Catichisim, Bible etc. But this isn't too hard to do, just look at them through the year and you will be good. I would highly reccomend getting a study buddy, keeping a good set of notes and learning to adress the question clearly. It can also be said that some students take this as a bludge subject and some schools teach it poorly, but plz be carful, the exam questions are not as easy as just saying "Jesus" on everything.

ANYWAY, there hasn't been a review on this subject, so I thought it was about time given the lack of info on it :p, hope this helps!