PDHPE Short Answer Questions: A How To Guide

Why are the short answer questions important?

Excelling in section two of the PDHPE paper, the short answer questions, is the key to pulling up your marks. It could be the difference between a band four and band five, or band five and band six! The importance of this section is often underestimated. Being worth 40 marks, it puts it at equal value to the amount of marks contained in the essays in section three. However, it is much easier to score a perfect 40 in the section than in section three.How have I come to this conclusion you may ask? A 12-mark essay question has a lot more criteria to fill to get full marks, in comparison to say a four marker short answer question. This means that markers will be looking for a lot more in your response to get a 12/12, and from experience, they will often only save a 12/12 for the most impressive responses. It isn’t supposed to be easy!

For a four marker, the criteria is more precise. You’ll have fewer boxes to tick, and a smaller space to do it in. Teachers are looking for responses that simply but surely answer the question, provide examples, and relate to the syllabus. By aiming for full marks in each smaller value question, a 40/40 is very achievable!

Here are a few steps that you can follow to suit any PDHPE short answer question to gain full marks in each short answer question, and push up your marks immensely.

Follow these five steps

Exemplar question: ‘To what extent is access to health care facilities and services equitable for all Australians” (8 marks)

1.   Outline the verb and key points of the question.

You need to make sure you are answering the short answer question according to the verb’s demands. For instance, a ‘compare’ question needs similarities and differences, but the ‘to what extent’ question needs a judgement. The key points of the question will also help you gain full marks by ensuring you refer to the correct areas of the syllabus.

2.   Directly address the key points at the beginning.

As well as doing what the verb is wanting you to do!  Your opening sentence should be straight to the point by making reference to the question. For the exemplar question, the question asks ‘to what extent’ and therefore we need to make a judgement about the extent. The key points include ‘access’, ‘health care facilities and services’, ‘equitable’ and ‘all Australians’. An opening sentence may look like: “Access to health care facilities and services are only somewhat equitable for all Australians, as whilst services like Australia’s universal health care system ‘Medicare’, is able to satisfy the social justice principal of equity, facilities such as private hospitals are unable to.” This briefly makes note of each key point, whilst also making the judgement. It gets straight to the point, but we can also expand on it later. This is a short answer question, so we need to be precise.

3.   Expand on your topic sentence/thesis so far.

For a lower order short answer question such as an ‘outline’, you could use examples to show your point. For an eight marker question like this ‘to what extent’, it is essential to include more information. Determine what exactly you want to discuss in your response, such as a section on Medicare and the Pharmaceutical Benefit Scheme’s ability for their access to be equitable for all Australians. For inequities, private hospitals can be discussed. As well as various determinants such as location for rural and remote dwellers as an environmental determinant that causes an inability for equitable access to health care services and facilities as they may need to pay expenses to travel to these. Ensure these sub-topics re-enforce your judgement, comparison, explanation, or whatever else the question has asked you to do.

4.   Include examples.

Continuing on from the step above, you must ALWAYS ALWAYS ALWAYS include examples. In the lower mark questions you need to include at least one. In the higher mark ones you should include as many as you believe is appropriate. For Core Two questions, always make sure the examples are sport specific, such as using a marathon swim to demonstrate the use of the aerobic system. Examples for Core One are a bit harder, but always draw upon any real-life studies you have studied during the year. For the question above, the example of Medicare, the PBS, private hospitals and various determinants are needed to get into the top band of the question.

5.   If you can, relate to other areas of the syllabus.

This may sound a bit odd but it assists in guaranteeing full marks in your response. However, this is only relevant for seven or eight mark questions. This involves already referring to the correct areas of the syllabus that the question is asking about, and then adding on top this extra layer to significantly show the markers your outstanding knowledge. BUT, I stress again please ensure you have covered all the primary areas of the syllabus that the question is asking first. Else, the markers may think you have gotten confused.

For the exemplar question, using groups experiencing disadvantage and the determinants, such as the rural and remote dwellers example, is a great way to add this great understanding. This is because I have already spoken about relevant dot points of the health care in Australia section, and have shown I understand the content so well that I can link it to other areas also.

So for now…

Start ironing out any difficulties in this section early on by handing loads of responses to your teachers. This will make sure that by the time trials and the HSC come around, you’ll be in a great position to achieve your full potential.

Check out our PDHPE threads on the forums – ask questions, receive answers, help other students – that’s what we’re about!

About the author:

Ella Kasmar studied the HSC over 2016 and 2017 through the condensed syllabus approach. She has been an outstanding member of the ATAR Notes community. Ella consistently shares her knowledge about the course to help other students – and we think she’s incredible.