interessant's vce journey

[interessant]

Heyo heyo! What an interesting journal you have here. I can already tell this is gonna be filled with the word interesting haha.
How did you find the methods exam and starting year 12? Also, hope you get the results that you were aiming for!!
Also, also, not doing homework until the last minute is a religion we students live by at this point haha. Have fun on your overseas trip btw.

Thanks Yesh Eh, the methods exam was alright, made some annoying mistakes, could've done better but it's finished now. Yep, I've been leaving my holiday homework till the end since the start of year 7, so I thought I'd try again (not working so far:) )

What are you doing over summer interessant?

I'm going overseas to visit family! How about you?

[Evolio]

Hey interessant!  How are you doing?
How's Year 12 going for you?

[interessant]

Hiii! It's been quite some time but I'm back I had amazing holidays, not that I remember them that clearly and now I have a few SACs in the upcoming weeks which I'm stressing for so much. I'm so looking forward to the holidays! Also I'm extremely behind for spesh because our first SAC is in term 2 (like most people, I'm sure), but as soon as all my others sacs are done I'll smash all those exercises out. One thing I've learnt from last year is to not leave the checkpoints until the end of the year but do them as I finish topics. Last year, when I started doing methods prac exams I was stumped by the way they ask questions because I had been assuming that they would be like the textbook questions. DEFINITELY NOT. So for those doing methods this year, or any other subject, make sure to do checkpoints as you go, whenever y have time, so that you're not trying to smoosh them all in in October. I'll update you guys after my sacs are over!

[interessant]

Finished all my SACs for this term, completely bombed chem but the other two subjects were alright. I know what to work on now, and I've also realised that I learn a lot better from experience.

[interessant]

So now that the holidays have started, I'm really relaxed and not really stressed about the situation in terms of how it will affect VCE, knowing that everyone will be affected the same way and no ones at a disadvantage. But now it's going to be near impossible for me to keep my motivation levels high seeing as school isn't opening in the foreseeable future, so any tips would be massively useful

[Evolio]

Hey interessant. 
That's a really good mindset you have about not being stressed. I mean, you're right, everyone's disadvantaged and in the same boat.

Okay, these tips for motivation might be simple or weird but they help me so I hope they help you too!   

- Watching those Study Motivation Videos on Youtube. Okay, don't judge me.  They're really inspiring and I always watch them when I feel like I failed or that whatever I do isn't worth it.
- Exercising. It just makes you feel happier and more energised, allowing you to tackle study and get things done!
- Taking breaks and talking to people. When I feel burntout, I like to go and talk to my brother and it helps me draw myself away from studying for a while and just reconnect with people. Then, when I come back to study, I feel refreshed and ready to tackle another Specialist Maths exercise. 
- Setting goals. Write a SMART goal and stick it up somewhere so that you're always seeing it. Hopefully, this will make you motivated to study and achieve your goals.
- Doing subjects that you like first or ones that are easier. I usually find that it helps when I do some Chemistry or Psychology (subjects I actually enjoy) before doing Specialist because it makes me motivated to do Specialist even though I didn't want to before . It also keeps your study flow going.

These are the strategies I usually use, but I can't think of anymore right now. Maybe I'll update this later when I've remembered them.

[J_Rho]

So now that the holidays have started, I'm really relaxed and not really stressed about the situation in terms of how it will affect VCE, knowing that everyone will be affected the same way and no ones at a disadvantage. But now it's going to be near impossible for me to keep my motivation levels high seeing as school isn't opening in the foreseeable future, so any tips would be massively useful

Hey interessant!!!
You might find using something like this useful! Considering our learning will be self-directed a study timetable could be really really helpful, i love using these over school holidays to make sure I have enough time to do everything, it's got the bell times for my school and i prefer to break things up into 30 minute blocks so two study sessions fit into one period but you could make a copy of it and change it to fit you!

In terms of motivation tips here's a few things you might like to read as well as some things that you might find useful;
- Tips for VCE Students: there is a section on productivity you might find useful as well as a bunch of resources too
- Exercising: it makes me feel really focussed and good about myself
- Goals: make sure they are your goals, and they are something YOU want and make sure you write why go back to it each time youre unmotivated to study remember your why
- Surround yourself with positive people with similar aspirations
- 2 minutes. sit down and start doing your work for 2 minutes like not waiting for the time to be up like just do it go ham and chances are you'll exceed the two minutes its a good way to just get started
- Make a to do list and do your favourite task first when done do a big tick next to it (it feels so good to tick things off haha)
- buy some lollies or something and reward yourself after you finished a certain thing

[interessant]

Oh my gosh, thank you so much for the tips, I really appreciate them! I'll let you know when I try them out

[interessant]

It's been a few days stuck at home and I haven't really been productive, except for doing some spesh exercises (which I seriously need to catch up on). I thought I'd make a to-do list today and try to do three of my subjects. So far, I've managed to do one question in spesh and that's about it :/ Hope everyone else's days are a lot more productive!
I've also been reading this book called 'That Deadman's Dance', quite boring at the start but it's gotten a lot more interesting near the end, and once I've finished it, I have a few more books to read which I'm a lot more excited to read! I was about to ask for any more book recommendations until I realised that literally all the libraries near me are closed for the foreseeable future *facepalm*.

[interessant]

Crazy how these school holidays will be my last. Haven't posted in this journal in a loong time, it completely left my mind! I'm a bit behind on practice exams, but overall I feel like I'm in a better position than last year. It's so hard trying to start a practice exam without coming up with excuses to start it later- 'still need to revise unit 3 content' and 'i need to make notes for one more chapter'. ugh. But today is a fresh start! No more excuses - my plan is to finish off LegaC exam 1, do the 2014 chem exam and do a practice sac for health. Feeling quite intimidated after reading the to-do thread and seeing people do four or five practice exams in one day :O

Did I mention that I have three sacs left? I'm bummed out about it, but talking to other people, I'm considering myself lucky not having five or six - now that would be terrible. I'll post here tomorrow, hopefully having ticked off my very short to-do list 

[interessant]

Ummm - only did the LegaC exam 1, but I plan on doing the other two things today

[interessant]

So there's only about a week left till the englang exam I'm lowkey freaking out because of my timing (which I still haven't got downpat), but other than that, I can definitely see the improvement since the start of the year. I was reading some essays I wrote for the first SAC, and my explanations have gotten a lot more detailed which is so motivating!! not that I'm feeling particularly motivated right now hehe
It feels like it was only a few days when there was still a few months till exams, and now it's nearly over, which blows my mind. One thing that teachers always repeat is to 'take a break, get enough sleep, eat and drink lots', and I honestly feel like I've been doing that this whole year - and when I wasn't getting enough sleep it wasn't because of VCE but uhh watching youtube and other things hehe. Also now that I'm looking at the long list of practice exams I'm intending to do, I think I'll have barely enough time to finish VCAA ones, let alone company exams. I'm really grateful for NHT, seeing as two of my subjects have NHT exams, but right now it's all a little overwhelming. I'll talk about my other three subjects below, make the entry look a lot nicer and it'll help organise my thoughts a little.

Spesh
I've done two company exams (1 and 2) and VCAA 2017, and to be honest, exam 2 is freaking me out. It feels quite a bit like déjà vu from methods, where I never felt fully prepared for exam 2. I'll read some short answer questions and realise I have no idea how to answer them - but then when I look at the solutions, I think 'oh I would've gotten that if I got that in the exam' - which is a terrible mindset when I full well know that I wouldn't. I think the only way to fix this problem is to do plenty of short answer qs and spend some time understanding the method for future questions. I'm alright with exam 1s but sometimes there's a random question that throws me off - I'll just get better at that.

Chem
I've done quite a few company exams and a couple of VCAA ones, and to be honest, I'm enjoying chem exams the most (not that I enjoy doing any exams). Even though I think the exams are fun, I never seem to get a really high mark which sucks - I think I'll slow down with the amount of practice exams and just go over some unit 3 content - which seems to have completely left my mind 

Health
I'm quite screwed for health. I've done the VCAA sample questions and a couple questions from a company exam - I'm terrible with remembering content so I really need to crack down on health. People say that health is such an easy subject, but I still feel like if I don't do any practice I'll just freeze in the exam. I guess health content doesn't come too naturally to me. I've got my spesh exam 1 and health exam on the same day, which is annoying but there's quite a break (about 5 hours) in between so I can catch a breath then.

I'm really really looking forward to the end of exams - as I'm sure many are My boss emailed me to ask my availabilities during the exam period, and I told them that I'd only be available after my last exam - which basically means I won't be getting any more shifts. It really sucks but I really don't think I'd have a lot of time left to study, especially seeing as I'm only really starting to do full exams right now. Anyway, that's enough, hope you're all enjoying the day off! The weather's amazing.