If you're considering this course, here's an example of what you should not do (From an Extension 2 dropout) (1 Viewer)

[Alistruggles]

Now note that I am significantly more daft than the average person, so a lot of this might come off as common sense, but in case this might help anyone, here are my mistakes in my time during this course:

- I have always been a very disorganised person who procrastinates until the night before. I took the Extension 2 course as an opportunity to work on my organisational skills, thinking that surely doing the course will motivate me to be more organised person and work on things timely. However, in actuality the course itself was NOT enough to lead to actual changes in my work style.

I think if you have similar motivations for taking the course, until things are sailing smoothly in Extension 2, DO NOT neglect your last unit (thinking that it wont count because of EE2). I have given myself a LOT of headache in having to catch up on eons of legal studies and ranking near-last in both legal assessments, which will drag my ATAR down a lot.

- I have been doing reasonably well in English Advanced and English Extension 1, and assumed this was a positive indicator for my success in Extension 2. WHILST this gives an indication that when I put pen to paper (or fingers to keyboard), I can write somewhat decently, I needed to have considered that English Advanced and English Extension 1 are both classroom oriented subjects where the content is SET FOR ME and the teacher provides us with lots of work to do. Extension 2 is completely driven by the individual, and I needed to be more realistic about whether I have this drive, or whether I realistically need someone to check up on me AND TELL ME WHERE TO GO (In extension 2, you have to choose where to go yourself. If your default, like me, is not really wanting to go anywhere unless its required you will not go anywhere unless you really push yourself).

- I did not have much of a goal for my Extension 2 meetings with my teacher. Simply because she mentioned we should meet every Wednesday, I would set up a meeting with her ALBEIT not having progressed much at all on my major work, and not really having anything specific to ask her. This is a waste of the teachers time, and your time as well. I would suggest setting up meetings when you genuinely come across a stumbling block you'd want the teacher's advice/direction on.

- I did enjoy writing during my spare time, however this was mainly in small chunks with little point other than creating sentences that sounded nice to myself and painted a nice picture in my mind. Consider that the Extension 2 Major work is 5000+ words and has to have a strong academic basis, drawing greatly from literature. Will this realistically be enjoyable?

 

[Etho_x]

I can safely say that with reading this, I am well beyond relieved that I take Standard English

 

[Ice-Cream-Man]

I can safely say that with reading this, I am well beyond relieved that I take Standard English

But you could handle advanced easily I reckon didn’t you say you get like 18-20 with ease in standard?

 

[jimmysmith560]

Now note that I am significantly more daft than the average person, so a lot of this might come off as common sense, but in case this might help anyone, here are my mistakes in my time during this course:

- I have always been a very disorganised person who procrastinates until the night before. I took the Extension 2 course as an opportunity to work on my organisational skills, thinking that surely doing the course will motivate me to be more organised person and work on things timely. However, in actuality the course itself was NOT enough to lead to actual changes in my work style.

I think if you have similar motivations for taking the course, until things are sailing smoothly in Extension 2, DO NOT neglect your last unit (thinking that it wont count because of EE2). I have given myself a LOT of headache in having to catch up on eons of legal studies and ranking near-last in both legal assessments, which will drag my ATAR down a lot.

- I have been doing reasonably well in English Advanced and English Extension 1, and assumed this was a positive indicator for my success in Extension 2. WHILST this gives an indication that when I put pen to paper (or fingers to keyboard), I can write somewhat decently, I needed to have considered that English Advanced and English Extension 1 are both classroom oriented subjects where the content is SET FOR ME and the teacher provides us with lots of work to do. Extension 2 is completely driven by the individual, and I needed to be more realistic about whether I have this drive, or whether I realistically need someone to check up on me AND TELL ME WHERE TO GO (In extension 2, you have to choose where to go yourself. If your default, like me, is not really wanting to go anywhere unless its required you will not go anywhere unless you really push yourself).

- I did not have much of a goal for my Extension 2 meetings with my teacher. Simply because she mentioned we should meet every Wednesday, I would set up a meeting with her ALBEIT not having progressed much at all on my major work, and not really having anything specific to ask her. This is a waste of the teachers time, and your time as well. I would suggest setting up meetings when you genuinely come across a stumbling block you'd want the teacher's advice/direction on.

- I did enjoy writing during my spare time, however this was mainly in small chunks with little point other than creating sentences that sounded nice to myself and painted a nice picture in my mind. Consider that the Extension 2 Major work is 5000+ words and has to have a strong academic basis, drawing greatly from literature. Will this realistically be enjoyable?

Great advice!

I can safely say that with reading this, I am well beyond relieved that I take Standard English

English Standard gang.

 

[Etho_x]

But you could handle advanced easily I reckon didn’t you say you get like 18-20 with ease in standard?

I did at one stage although Year 12 I've slightly gone downhill, AT1 and 2 I've received both 17/20's for them so not quite within the range you described, and also the teachers at my school have suddenly decided to mark harder so receiving the 17's were not done with ease tbh, I worked stupidly hard to get those.

 

[Ice-Cream-Man]

I did at one stage although Year 12 I've slightly gone downhill, AT1 and 2 I've received both 17/20's for them so not quite within the range you described, and also the teachers at my school have suddenly decided to mark harder so receiving the 17's were not done with ease tbh, I worked stupidly hard to get those.

Still, they put 17-20 as like the top band, you could have gotten a b6 in advanced considering scaling.

Either way, irrespective of the level 17+ is still real good (I cannot get past the 16 Barrier ever since 20 mark responses were introduced in schools.)

 

[Etho_x]

Still, they put 17-20 as like the top band, you could have gotten a b6 in advanced considering scaling.

Either way, irrespective of the level 17+ is still real good (I cannot get past the 16 Barrier ever since 20 mark responses were introduced in schools.)

Oh mate don’t worry last year for Year 11 the only time I went well was AT2 receiving 25/25 for a multimodal video and 12/15 for 4 unseen short answer questions but then for AT1 I got 16 and prelims I got 15 lmao. Don’t even know how I’ve slightly improved but yo I feel ya English is a stupid subject and honestly hard to break that ‘barrier’ as you said

 

[Etho_x]

Still, they put 17-20 as like the top band, you could have gotten a b6 in advanced considering scaling.

Either way, irrespective of the level 17+ is still real good (I cannot get past the 16 Barrier ever since 20 mark responses were introduced in schools.)

Although main reason why I didn’t do advanced was that I just don’t enjoy writing according to a ”syllabus” and in my school I’ve overheard a lot about having to do essay practice every week in advanced (although I don’t know to what extent that is true). So sure while I’m relieved I am not in that position yeah I didn’t want to really spend half of my overall study finishing English work I would have been bombarded with

 

[idkkdi]

Although main reason why I didn’t do advanced was that I just don’t enjoy writing according to a ”syllabus” and in my school I’ve overheard a lot about having to do essay practice every week in advanced (although I don’t know to what extent that is true). So sure while I’m relieved I am not in that position yeah I didn’t want to really spend half of my overall study finishing English work I would have been bombarded with

an essay a week. whoa.
that's quite a bit of effort haha.

 

[Ice-Cream-Man]

Oh mate don’t worry last year for Year 11 the only time I went well was AT2 receiving 25/25 for a multimodal video and 12/15 for 4 unseen short answer questions but then for AT1 I got 16 and prelims I got 15 lmao. Don’t even know how I’ve slightly improved but yo I feel ya English is a stupid subject and honestly hard to break that ‘barrier’ as you said

Oh, I'm talking about 40 minutes time, 20 mark essay responses in exam conditions.

Other things like Multmodals and Take-Home responses are way easier though, but nice stuffs.

12/15 is still the 16/20 barrier, just simplified haha.

 

[jimmysmith560]

All this talk reminded me of Paper 1 - I remember how I had to stop working on the unseen texts because I felt like I wouldn't have enough time to write that Kenneth Slessor essay. I wrote it, then came back and wrote as much as I could to answer the unseen texts. Good times

 

[Etho_x]

an essay a week. whoa.
that's quite a bit of effort haha.

writing an essay in general is an effort, before I write an essay I need a bottle of water on my desk, reassurance I’m not going to die, paramedics at my door in case the previous does happen, absolute silence, and probably more reassurance I‘m not going to die (mostly of boredom and distress)

 

[Etho_x]

Oh, I'm talking about 40 minutes time, 20 mark essay responses in exam conditions.

Other things like Multmodals and Take-Home responses are way easier though, but nice stuffs.

12/15 is still the 16/20 barrier, just simplified haha.

yeh either way twas’ hard to break the barrier between going from B‘s in yr 11 to borderline A’s in yr 12, not much help from my english teacher tho lol, funny though cuz she she self-prides herself about the fact that she thinks she’s helping me but in reality she hasn’t really taught me anything...

 

[Ice-Cream-Man]

yeh either way twas’ hard to break the barrier between going from B‘s in yr 11 to borderline A’s in yr 12, not much help from my english teacher tho lol, funny though cuz she she self-prides herself about the fact that she thinks she’s helping me but in reality she hasn’t really taught me anything...

be one of those rare cases of band 6 in standard

 

[Etho_x]

be one of those rare cases of band 6 in standard

bruh no way lmao, high band 5 possibly but trials and hsc are gonna absolutely destroy me

 

[Average Boreduser]

I love writing and I've dreamed of doing this subject since I was in like yr8. But we got our AT1s back (Viva Voce) and I've ranked last (6/6). This was mostly due to my teachers seeing gaps in my research and overall not liking my idea for my major work short story. I'm just wondering, considering how much your rank matters for the HSC, is it worth keeping this subject? If I write an amazing major work will my marks just be given to everyone else in the class due to my low ranking?

no. fk english

 

[jimmysmith560]

I love writing and I've dreamed of doing this subject since I was in like yr8. But we got our AT1s back (Viva Voce) and I've ranked last (6/6). This was mostly due to my teachers seeing gaps in my research and overall not liking my idea for my major work short story. I'm just wondering, considering how much your rank matters for the HSC, is it worth keeping this subject? If I write an amazing major work will my marks just be given to everyone else in the class due to my low ranking?

Whether you should keep English Extension 2 is dependent on two factors, the first being whether you would be prepared to drop a subject that you were extremely excited to take and the second being whether you strongly believe that you can improve your position by performing well in your upcoming school-based assessment tasks for this subject. The fact that you are passionate about this subject could suggest that you would be open to considering keeping this subject since the option of dropping it implies that you are taking more than 10 units and that English Extension 2 may not necessarily count towards your ATAR (assuming it ends up being your worst performing subject). While not a very practical option, it would still allow you to experience the subject that you were hoping to take for so long. Of course, keeping it with the aim of improving your performance is naturally a better course of action.

Your rank for English Extension 2 (and your other subjects for that matter) is determined through your performance in your school-based (internal) assessment tasks, such as the Viva Voce. Your rank is used to determine your Assessment Mark, being the mark that reflects your internal performance and contributes 50% of your HSC mark (final mark) for this subject. Examination Marks (external marks) are also used in this process. In your case, if your final rank remains 6/6, your own Assessment Mark will be adjusted to equal the lowest external mark of any student in your cohort. From this point, the higher your rank, the higher your Assessment Mark is likely to be.

However, this does not extend to your performance in your own external component for this subject (i.e. your Major Work). This means that, if you perform favourably in your Major Work, you will receive a favourable external mark regardless of your rank relative to your cohort. With that being said, your external mark would still be used in determining the Assessment Mark of another student in your cohort. For example, if your Major Work ends up getting you the highest external mark in your cohort, the Assessment Mark of the student ranked first will be adjusted to equal your external mark.

I hope this helps!

 

[Vall]

I love writing and I've dreamed of doing this subject since I was in like yr8. But we got our AT1s back (Viva Voce) and I've ranked last (6/6). This was mostly due to my teachers seeing gaps in my research and overall not liking my idea for my major work short story. I'm just wondering, considering how much your rank matters for the HSC, is it worth keeping this subject? If I write an amazing major work will my marks just be given to everyone else in the class due to my low ranking?

Like Jimmy said it’s implied you have >10 units so doesn’t have to count to your ATAR. So you definitely have the possibility of continuing the subject “for fun”. That’s what my mentality for doing music was (also means I can do something enjoyable - music - and call it studying).