Because of this, my whole cohort is going to science tutoring.
and,
can you give me study tips for these holidays (and in general) for the following subjects;
-English Advanced
-MX1 (+ Advanced)
-Biology
-Chemistry
-Physics
-Economics
Thanks! (I noticed you're a moderator e.e)
I can give advice for MX1( + Advanced) and Physics as the other subjects are not really my forte.
Maths:
For this you really want to make sure you don't fall behind because it requires you to understand theory + practice whereas a lot of other subjects you could just regurgitate out the theory and get good marks.
You need to practice a lot for this subject and by that I don't mean finish the homework your teacher gives you every lesson. Usually the homework has questions that are around easy to medium level difficulty in terms of the HSC exam. You really need to do heaps of end of exam type questions. Don't spend time doing questions you already know you can do. What I would usually do for questions in the earlier part of the exam is just mentally solve them and check the answer to see if I was right, and then actually time myself properly with the question 13/14s for 3u and 15/16s for 4u(in your case Adv). When your studying and doing past papers, you don't actually need to do the whole paper every time. Put on a stopwatch and time yourself just for the final 2 questions and see how long it takes and find out of this is going over the time you usually have left or over. This way you can get more harder questions done instead of doing the whole paper each time.
Physics:
For Physics you really need to make sure you understand the content. Even though most of the exam relies on memory recall and regurgitating essays, if you want to ace the MC you must actually understand the content. Really the hardest questions in the Physics HSC are usually found in the MC and this is what is used to separate students. So a good study tip is to try and teach what you've learnt to someone else or even just in your room because "If you can't explain it well enough, you don't understand it yourself". You might have one of those "Ah" moments where you realize you were mistaken or didn't truly understand something.
For the long responses you could spew out all the content related to a question but if it doesn't answer the question you won't get the marks. So you should practice writing long responses as it's a skill that does require you to practice. For calculation questions there's not much to it just do any you can find.
Then there's graph questions. These questions are usually a bit 'tricky'. A lot of the time what your going to be asked to do is observe or sketch a graph based on some data points and be asked to calculate something. 99% of the time this means your going to need to use the gradient of the graph. It takes a bit of practice to see how the gradient of a graph can relate to an equation, you may also need to manipulate the equation so make sure you spend time with these kind of questions if you don't get them.
In HSC Physics the 'hard' calculation questions usually come down to equating two formulas. This usually requires you to understand what is going on to realize you can equate them. However if you don't understand it just equate the two formulas that seem like they apply to this question as a last resort.
Another note make sure you pay attention and write up your pracs because you CAN be asked questions about pracs in the HSC.
As for these holidays, I would say enjoy them! I didn't do anything in the year 10 holidays and I went fine. If you feel as though your a bit behind in Maths then maybe revise some of the year 10 content. Other than that have a great holiday, because the next time you have it you'll be studying everyday.
Thanks! (I noticed you're a moderator e.e)
Only just became one lol