[00:02] because it was a 10 out of 15. [Music] all know english is one of the hardest subjects to get right and it can be very
[00:14] first assessment so today we're visiting the campus of and i'm my friend chloe here to share her story on how she went from a below ranking in her hsc english exams so chloe do you want to
[00:29] hi guys so i'm chloe and i'm the founder of concept english solutions of concept english solutions and i stayed ranked 16th in 2018 when i graduated and did the hsc and also scored a 49 out of 50 for
[00:42] english extension one and so ever since then i've taught over and i've seen time and time again exactly what it takes to get those top like your actual journey throughout english for
[00:55] the hsc so my story is a little bit interesting because i actually seriously messed up my first english exam and so throughout all of year 11 i
[01:07] average kind of student so nothing amazing but i knew that subjects of the hsc because it was compulsory and because of well in your ranking and so given that i made sure to study
[01:23] super hard for my first assessment i actually started my english draft in the holidays before year 12 began and i had about six drafts of my creative assessment and it was worth 25 so i knew it was a
[01:35] bit hefty when i got my results back yeah i was shattered because it was a 10 out of 15. yeah and so with that my ranking after the first assessment was actually
[01:47] over a hundred so it was like obviously i was still above average but it just was quite a hit to my ranking obviously my morale as well first assessment and from that i actually thought there'd
[02:01] be no way i'd be able to recover but i knew that if i was gonna get the atar that i wanted in the end then i had to put this first assessment really really freaking hard for the rest of my assessments
[02:13] and if that meant that i would be trying to aim for full marks in all of them then i was going to do whatever it took to get that it first started with the determination and the mindset and i told myself that i was going to recover
[02:27] this first assessment affect me and so after i made that resolution in order to make sure that i aced my next four exams i kind of thought to myself okay there's four more
[02:40] rather than get too caught up with my old assessments in making sure that i was because so much of actual
[02:52] english and exams is all about like your mentality going into that exam room yeah so like after that how did you actually improve from that and get the better results that you are looking for yeah so i knew that the
[03:06] three exams would all be mostly like essay-focused i knew that as long as i found the type of essay writing that would appeal to then it was almost guaranteed that i was
[03:20] gonna do well and so with that i would say the key is to really start can start handing them in and pretty much for every single assessment since that first one i had minimum five drafts that i would
[03:34] teachers with every single time and basically the way ready was when i had no criticisms on my final so we all know that at school the type of feedback you get isn't very extensive
[03:49] it or they have a question mark or they tick it and so i knew that okay if i have an underline i have to rewrite that means it's good so i would just pretty much keep
[04:01] redrafting my essay up until every single line was pretty much a tick or there'd be not much feedback and assessments it's all about appealing to your school's english department
[04:14] and so when you know that then when you hand in your work you're really aiming have no real criticisms from the school's the key takeaway is to really just start your jobs early and keep reworking
[04:28] them so don't actually wait until even two weeks before your drafting try to get it done as early as possible feedback so you know exactly what you should be
[04:40] assessment i was actually able to get full marks in everything up until trials where i lost two marks and so in total over like my whole hsc journey i lost seven marks
[04:55] from my original so you guys lost two marks for the rest yeah so the recipes so like what was the kind of essay framework that you finally realized was the best to use
[05:09] english drafts and like perfecting your essay yeah so after i was able to hand in all of those essays i started to see that there was almost like a systematic framework or approach that
[05:21] they were looking for when it came to like what the hse markers want in your essay i would say there is some way to actually figure out the exact type of structure the exact type of style that your english teachers
[05:34] again emphasis on getting feedback but i'll actually share with you guys today the scaffold that i ended up creating after writing all of those drafts and i pattern with what the teachers were looking for
[05:47] structure and just the way in general that you argue your essay so one really key tip that i learned was that you really want to try make your writing as succinct as
[05:59] because you want to pack in as much analysis as can so this meant that as like a general rule of thumb minimum five quotes throughout it so coming in
[06:14] junior level english you often are told to write in the structure called pedal or teal and with that you end up taking multiple across so i found this was very inefficient and
[06:28] was an alternate structure which is in the scaffold that you can use to get a lot more analysis in your paragraphs have a greater chance of getting more marks just because you have greater
[06:42] um and breadth of analysis yeah so like approaching an actual exam like before just those few days before what were like your key steps that you took during that actual exam yeah so i was actually never one of
[06:56] were naturally really talented at english so i sort of looked at write really well on the spot but i knew i couldn't do that and so i actually took the
[07:08] pre-memorization approach where i would memorize the perfect generic essays but also a few paragraphs on top of that that i would switch out in the exam that i would switch out in the exam so in total for around my for my module
[07:21] specific module when it comes to the type of questions they can ask you paragraphs wow how long was that like you had to memorize look it was close to around 2 000 words but this is
[07:36] really necessary for you to be like absolutely prepared so if person who's really good at thinking on the spot memorizing at the minimum additional quotes or additional pieces
[07:50] paragraphs that you'd slot into the actual exam so i actually really credit my success through this approach because on the day of my actual hsc
[08:03] of my actual hsc exam for the final hsc in 2018 i actually ended up writing a completely new essay to the one that i used new essay to the one that i used in my actual generic essay originally
[08:15] differentiated me as a student from all of the other people who are writing like a generic kind of scaffold and so when it comes to module b especially you really want to differentiate yourself in
[08:29] personal interpretation of the text and so this is a really good approach just like on the spot engage with the question best just because you are prepared for all different types of questions so of
[08:42] course like that works for essays and analytical kind of questions reading tasks like do you have any general tips or it comes to creative writing tasks that first
[08:56] lesson um when it comes to writing something that the markers will actually understand and like so the problem was first assessment it was a creative task and i tried way too hard to be
[09:10] entire creative metaphor and i would highly recommend so you gotta put your mind in the shoes of the marker who are reading multiple creatives one after another and they're not really going to
[09:25] give you the time to actually try to figure out what exactly the symbolism is so i would say the biggest tip for creative writing is to make your creative have some type of moral message but at
[09:38] the same time don't try to make it like super deep or don't try to something because the markers know that you're a going to assume that you're some like amazing
[09:51] like literary writer or something so i would say try to have a really solid moral message in your creatives but the same time make sure that that's super clear for the marker and don't try to mask all of that in
[10:04] something that's really difficult to actually decipher to figure it out but then like what happens when in the actual exam for the question that they might
[10:18] actually a huge believer that some creatives are actually a lot more and so what you actually have to do with your pre-memorized creative is you have it's adaptable by having multiple
[10:32] so you don't just explore one idea but you explore multiple different ideas and so i really like to go through this checklist with my students so when it comes to having different layers to your
[10:45] least two out of three of these different checklist i would recommend having some type of social critique within your creative so it doesn't have to be something really extreme like some political
[11:00] for example your persona could be upset at the way the commercialization of literature nowadays pressures a lot of writers to write something that's more favorable to what will sell as
[11:14] so it doesn't have to be something hugely critical but it can just be some critique that's embedded within your plotline secondly hsc markers and a lot of school teachers as well love love love
[11:29] the theme of culture so really try to throughout the entire story mainly because it just gives an extra layer of depth to your story and teachers really love it when it
[11:42] looks like you've done your research so try to integrate a lot of cultural elements in the details throughout that creative and so lastly is exploring the coming of age experience
[11:54] and so have your character undergo some type of maturation throughout the creative and the reason why this is so good is something that all people can relate to
[12:06] actually write something that the markers feel like so they're more likely to connect with your talk about coming of age experience i'm talking about some type of
[12:20] creative that is reflective of your character undergoing um like maturation so of these elements notice how that gives your creative a
[12:35] and so if you have all these different elements in your creative then you're on the day just because there's a higher chance an idea within the stimulus so of course
[12:48] experience and experience yourself like what are the biggest common yourself making other students commonly make as well in english of them don't feel super comfortable with
[13:03] the same situation that i was where i wasn't super confident but what they do is they prepare their essays way too late because when it comes to having a pre-memorized essay
[13:15] you've got to make yourself really really good at actually adapting it because otherwise this is like the biggest thing that all hsc markers say question but the students just regurgitate something that they've
[13:28] of biggest thing that's told by all these so that's why it's actually really important to give yourself the time to practice adapting your pre-memorized essay so as a general rule of thumb i
[13:42] leave it at least a minimum of one week to actually adapt your essay after you've you're you've got your final generic essay draft ready so i think just sort of the key takeaway
[13:54] this mistake is really just like the lack of preparation and planning of students do is they only start writing their essay that english notification which is two weeks before the actual exam
[14:09] already have a draft that's ready and i would say you actually perfect that draft before you're focusing fully on really
[14:21] memorizing consolidating your argument and then adapting to different types of going to be really quick on your feet during the exam aback by any surprise question that you haven't actually prepared for
[14:34] yourself to so many different questions really give these students a kind of schedule for them to follow so we actually try to plan
[14:46] before the actual exam practice after practice um so we go through these practice questions and we samples to them and how exactly to approach that question so that when you
[14:59] there is almost nothing that can really throw you off because you've already of questions so pretty much the way we hold our courses from start to finish is the first few weeks are really focused
[15:13] on conceptual understanding so once you have that foundation you know that when you get to the exam you truly understand your text so after foundation we then move on to more of those
[15:25] terms of the structure how to get that 20 out of 20 or band six and then after it's fully just practice so this is the kind of structure that i've seen work for me and for my students time and time again
[15:39] small changes to actually really elevate your marks so what i really love seeing is these students get these results that they didn't even know that they themselves could achieve just because they were doing maybe one
[15:52] high school career and yeah so did you have any other final comments you wanted to say um final comments would be to like and and comment to get that essay scaffold if you guys want to see what i did
[16:05] well in english as well so make sure to comment so you can get my essay scaffold useful from this video and can apply some of these tips to your own english as mentioned there's an essay scaffold as a free resource so make sure you
[16:20] down in the comments down below and if you found what chloe said today concept english solutions which is located in town hall down in as always take care and i hope to see you guys in the next video
[16:35] you guys in the next video bye did y'all say bye no i just like bye did y'all say bye no i just like said goodbye