Is History ext hard? (1 Viewer)

nekobutterfly

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Is History ext hard? My school decided not to have a class doing history ext this year because they decided that it wasn' worth it. Supposedly it is VERY hard and one of their students who got 100% in Ancient Hist only got 80%, is it hard?
 
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xeuyrawp

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It really depends... Asking whether something is 'hard' isn't a great question, because some people might find it hard, and other people might find it easy.

You should speak with your teacher about it. Hopefully, they'll tell you to give it a go.
 

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it depends on how much work you want to put into it
u definitely need to know your stuff about the different schools of thought and it is different to what 2u history is. many people in my grade didnt realise that is was pretty much just historiography.
what im finding now, in the final days of writing my major work is that it would be sooo much better to write a content based essay on your topic and maybe discuss the different perspectives of historians but i hate having to talk so much about the actual context of the historian - which is pretty much what extension history is all about.
its 'the study of the study of history'
if u like history, i say give it a shot. if u try at least u know ur not missing ourton anything
 

Loza33

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I agree!! It is hard and a lot of historiography but, i think, well worth it!!

It is really interesting!!

And as for that student - well that is one case!! I, for example, think i am going to do better in ext. history than i will in ancient...

The two subjects could not be further seperated... they use different skills, in a different time period and have different aims...

Dont be put off... if you really want to do it, give it a go!!!
 

nekobutterfly

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Yer, The head of History said it wouldn't be a good idea but i might do it maybe...also what do you have to do for the major work?
 
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201055

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Oh man, history extension was awesome! Really changes your perspective on what history actually is.
In terms of difficulty, it may be hard to grasp at the start because you're no longer just studying history in general, you're also considering how history is constructed, different intepretations by historians, as well as the historian's own context influencing their response.

It also depends if you have good linkage in terms of the two modules. For the second section i did Appeasement (between WW1-WW2), which linked well with what i was doing in Modern History. (To some extent, i think it boosted my marks a little too :D)

Ah the major work, it's basically a research assignment but in the context of what you learnt from the first module- historiography. You're free to choose any topic (subject to your teacher agreeing it is a valid topic), you research the context, analyse various historians' intepretations of that event, comparing and assessing their pros and cons, then coming to your own conclusion. its great you can pursue any topic, and if you're a true enthusiast you'll enjoy the freedom of researching and- for once, coming to your own conclusions rather than blankly quoting others. But yeah, a lot of work involved in researching, keeping the diary up to date, and knuckling out a good research report.
 
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Loza33

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The major work... it is good!!! Great infact... as '201055' said, it can be hard to keep up to date; espeically if you are like me and have five major works!! But the individual research is good, and it is really open to interpretation... pretty much any subject you have ever though of could be studied in a random way...

Go for it i say!!! It is great!!
 

201055

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Yeah seriously go for it, its worthwhile. And just regarding to the person who got the 100% in Ancient... just because you do well in like Ancient or Modern doesn't mean it'll be the same for Extension, they both involve different thinking and approaches to success. You might strike lucky and get a module in extension that relates to ancient or modern, but you'll only be more at an advantage in terms of 'prior knowledge' and skip the whole reading up on context part. But there's still the analysis of historians and their contexts involved in extension.
 

nekobutterfly

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Is it a private school because my head of History (she wrote part of last years Ancient History HSC paper and some of syllabis) said it was made for top private schools and that the marks for ext hist have been going down while ext eng and ext maths have been going up
 

Kujah

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Is it predominantly the content of the work or the effort that is required or a combination of both that makes History extension difficult?
 

Triangulum

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Kujah said:
Is it predominantly the content of the work or the effort that is required or a combination of both that makes History extension difficult?
Combination of both, although it varies. Personally I found most of the first section (What is history) pretty easy to digest, but I had nfi what to do for the case study. The project requires quite a bit of commitment for a good mark.
 

201055

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nekobutterfly said:
Just out of curiousity, what school do you guys go to?
Normanhurst Boy's High (Public :D)

nekobutterfly said:
it was made for top private schools and that the marks for ext hist have been going down while ext eng and ext maths have been going up
I don't think so, for our school in a class of 20, 6 got top band (E4), and most others in E3.

Kujah said:
Is it predominantly the content of the work or the effort that is required or a combination of both that makes History extension difficult?
Its very heavy content going for the sections because of all the various historians you have to read up and analyse on. And yes, i agree with Triangulum, case study content was hard to digest because its like a one year topic stuffed into like a term x.x It depends whether you'll have the effort to read up on all the stuff in your own time, cause you can't just depend on what your teacher will give you.

The project was fun to work on, but towards the end at crunch time had to pull some late nights to make a plausible diary :D But i really enjoyed the researching and writing up the report!
 

miss-smexy

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My school does well every single year. We always get more than 60% of people getting the highest band and the rest getting in the second highest band!

And my school isn't private.

Most of the coursework is interesting. And the project counts the most (~70% of whole course). You research a certain topic or interest.

You should go for it if you'd enjoy doing a major work.
 

Triangulum

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201055 said:
The project was fun to work on, but towards the end at crunch time had to pull some late nights to make a plausible diary :D But i really enjoyed the researching and writing up the report!
Ugh. I got home at about 9-10pm the night before it was due and had to finish my final edit and forge most of my log. It was like hell.
 

201055

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Triangulum said:
Ugh. I got home at about 9-10pm the night before it was due and had to finish my final edit and forge most of my log. It was like hell.
Hahaha yeah i remember forging the log, that was painful and entertaining at the same time. Most of the time i just kept printing random pages off the net and stuffing it into the log as sources used :p

Mmm, that night before it was due i think i pulled an all-nighter x.x
 

capone89

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It's funny you should mention that guy who got 100% in ancient and 80% in ext...I'm pretty much the opposite, nailing extension but having a pretty average year in ancient :)

It's difficult and content-heavy, but well worth it if you can get through it.
 

lzhu

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its something new in the study of history, and its quite essay intensive, its pretty much an extended source analysis imo.
the first section makes you analyse the different texts of historians and the views they present, and how they shape history
second is a combination of the first with an area in history where you pretty much apply what is history to your area of study, ie jfk, etc
the assignment, atleast what i did was pretty much a different second section, focusing on machiavelli. if youre lazy it gets quite hard -_-

also apparently it is a private school subject, ruse gets crap marks every year, but i think its because asians are bad at long essays, its for white private students
 

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