Can Students pick electives? (1 Viewer)

[Tiernan]

For e.g. for Modern if I'm doing Conflict in Europe but want to do Conflict in Indochina, is there any way I can change? Do I have to go through a teacher?

 

[anomalousdecay]

For Physics, A few of us spoke to the teacher regarding option modules. Our teacher was confident enough for us to be independent learners, so letting us choose our own options. The top 3 of this year smashed the HSC for Physics, doing the option module that the teacher wasn't teaching.

But this is not a great idea if you are not an independent student and usually need your teachers help. We were independent on learning content, and rather received extra-curricular understanding and explanations about HSC style questions and tips and tricks in class.

If your teacher is very resourceful and spoon feeds you, then this is not a good idea, as you will not get the same benefits.

However, if you really like the different elective and you enjoy studying it, then you may see an increase in results.

But avoid this if you have been highly dependent on your teacher to learn content.

 

[strawberrye]

It depends on the school system and teacher, but bear in mind although change may be possible due to majority opinion in the class or teacher leniency, however, change is not guaranteed, and if this is the case, you should just try to make the best of what the school has decided upon and try your best to excel in it-usually school decides on a particular elective for good reasons-i.e. teacher speciality, teaching resources available, popularity, student preference etc. You MUST talk to your teacher if you wish to change-it is USUALLY the school that picks the electives, not the students.

 

[lunaretta]

From personal experience (Chemistry), keep it in mind that your school may have specific assessment tasks based on their chosen elective or write their trial in such a way that doing an elective based purely on private study is impossible or simply not worth the effort. Personally, I don't think it's really worth doing another elective based only on independent learning if you have to sit in class and learn the school chosen elective, because it's a bit of a waste of time. Also, your teacher may have valuable resources that will enable you to do better. However, if you can get your teacher to allow you to use lesson time to study your chosen elective, go for it, if you think you are a good independent learner. Keep in mind that sometimes it's up to the head of department, so maybe talk to them too.

Echoing strawberrye, if you want to change elective, you should try and get the whole class option changed, but even then, it's no guarantee.

 

[enoilgam]

As has been mentioned above, you need to speak to your teacher about independently studying electives. Logistically speaking, it usually isnt that much of an issue, because most trial papers cover all of the available modules and on the HSC, you can do whatever you want. It's just the internal assessments that can be an issue, in addition to whether your teachers can mark responses from other topics (most can). To a lesser extent, some teachers may be reluctant to let students study on their own in class or they may not trust students to learn independently due to their aptitude.

When I did Modern History, I wanted to do Conflict in Europe as opposed to the Arab Israeli Conflict and my teacher was happy to let me do it because of my record. The only condition was that I needed to do an assessment for the Arab Israeli Conflict worth 15%. This wasnt an issue because the assessment was an essay which could have easily been prepared for without having study the topic in depth. Ultimately though, it was a moot point because the teacher gave our class a choice between the two topics and Conflict in Europe was unanimously selected.

 

[ShadowLighte]

Okay so apart from what everyone has said above, are there any other modern classes who are doing that topic? In my school the teacher let the class have a vote and majority ruled. But there was another class who did a completely different topic and a few of the people in my class really wanted that topic so the teachers discussed it and transferred the students for that topic only. It really depends on your school.