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by jennie

2009′s Infamous English Paper 2.

June 6, 2009 in Study

On Wednesday evening, after the shocking news about the English paper 2 fiasco, I got a text telling me not to panic, that I’d look back on the whole idiotic mix-up and laugh at how flustered I’d gotten.
Let me tell you all, there has been no laughter as of yet. This afternoon, there was no “Ah sure, an exam on a Saturday? This is a mad laugh!”, no “I ACED that!” and no “I can’t believe I got so freaked out about being the victims of an SEC shortcoming”. There was added stress, added exhaustion and added effort.

In my opinion, today’s paper wasn’t very nice. A lot of people seemed to be very happy with what came up, others not so much.
As soon as the papers were handed out, there were murmurings of “Bishop! Yes!” to be heard in my exam centre (Full of risk-taking repeats like myself) and this left me grinning, but further inspection wiped the smile and smug expression straight off my face.

First off- Poetry. Personally, I was pretty happy with the actual poets which appeared- I’d stayed up cramming for Elizabeth Bishop until the wee hours and knew her inside and out- but I thought the questions themselves were excessively tricky. Instead of being asked how we feel, or what aspects of the work appeal to us, we were tied down to specific questions- What questions Bishop poses in her work and  the conflict in Walcott’s poems, for example.
It had all the signs of a poorly prepared paper and seemed almost like a poor Sample Paper, with the kind of questions found in our textbooks which our teachers warn us won’t actually show up on the REAL exam. They were all a bit convoluted, cornering students instead of leaving plenty of room for personal engagement and expansion like we’re all used to.
The lack of Longley threw a few people as well- myself included to a certain extent.
Weeks ago, I’d chosen him as my main poet to study, so convinced was I that he’d make an appearance. Unlike the dreaded Bishop, whose work is incredibly tedious, bland and overrated, Longley genuinely appealed to me.
Needless to say, my Bishop essay was an epic spiel of my adoration for the poet, but my enthusiasm was all fake as hell.

Straight after this, I took a shot at the Unseen Poetry. I forfeited my morals here because, after running out of things to say about why the frankly awful poem impacted on me, I tear-jerkingly told the examiner that I could identify with the subject matter as my own Father had recently passed away. Fortunately, my Father’s actually alive and well- but my personal response and engagement is absolutely BRILLIANT, and no examiner’s going to be able to resist giving me extra-high marks. I threw in some rubbish about the poem’s form and it being an “Emotional Journey and a moral landscape” which I didn’t mean either, so hopefully I’ll pick up a few nice marks here.

Next up, came the Comparative Study. Again, I felt the questions here were quite convoluted. I chose to write about Cultural Context as it’s all I had prepared, but it wasn’t just a case of “Talk about the IMPACT of Cultural Context on you”- it involved focusing on the characters and such. Not only this, but it specified that we had to talk about the MAIN character in each of the texts. As one of my texts was “My Oedipus Complex and other stories” by Frank O Connor, I was a little worried as there are several main characters throughout the anthology as opposed to just one. I decided that I was going to just write about them all, in any case, as I don’t think i could be penalised for it. It was the fault of the question for, quite frankly, being too narrow.

Finally, came Macbeth. At this stage, I was about 17 or 18 pages into my booklet, and the Red Bull which I’d foolishly drank before the exam was starting to wear off. I took a shot at answering on the consequences of Duncan’s murder on both MaccyB himself and Scotland, but I don’t think it was too epic. I’d learned a good few quotes, but I also found myself making one or two up. Or three or four. I didn’t really know the storyline all too well, but I actually think I did quite well on this, considering. It was probably my worst question, but it wasn’t too woeful. I’d imagine it’s definitely not below 45 or 50 out of 60 in any case.
Macbeth was pretty much the only place where the questions were quite lenient and broad, which I was particularly thankful for. They were no Banquo/ Deception though.

All in all, I’m quite happy with my own performance on the paper. I’ve always gotten A1s on paper 2, and I’m hoping this one won’t be an exception. I do, however, have my doubts.
The Paper, overall, was a bit nasty, and I really hope it’ll be marked easily and broadly as a result. A lot of students who may think they’ve done well certainly haven’t as far as I can see. I talked to a few people who were utterly thankful for Bishop, yet they didn’t actually ANSWER the question asked, they just stuck down a general response. I’m not going to be the one to tell them they’re epic failures, they’ll unfortunately see that in August. I foresee uproar.
The other paper would have been nicer, for me anyway, but there’s not much point saying “What if…?” now.

Anyway, I’m off to have an early night’s sleep- tomorrow’s going to be busy! With Maths paper 2 and Irish paper 1 on Monday, I really have to be on my game. Also, the stress factor of the Leaving Cert’s left me ratty as hell.

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by elizabeth

English Paper 2: Bye Bye Medicine

June 6, 2009 in Study

I seem to be the only person not overjoyed by English Paper 2. Despite both Theme & Issue AND Cultural Context coming up for the Comparative, despite the Macbeth essay being incredibly vague and open-ended and despite three of the four poets on the leaked paper coming up, I still managed to mess it up.

Five minutes before the exam the papers were handed out. Everyone had their faces screwed up and pressed against the back of the paper to see if they could make out any of the poets’ names and various sighs of relief were heard throughout the exam hall as people saw that Walcott, Bishop, Keats and Montague had all come up.

When we were finally allowed to look at the paper I was overjoyed that both Theme and Issue and Cultural Context had both come up and started with Cultural Context. The question threw me a bit, there was a quote about the main characters in a text coming into conflict with the culture, but it then asked you to discuss how characters interacted with their culture in light of that statement. I was a little confused as to whether it meant for us to write about conflict, or conflict and other aspects of interacting with the culture. I hedged my bets and mainly talked about conflict, I hope to God I interpreted the question right.

By the end of the Comparative essay I was already half an hour behind and jumped straight into poetry. When I saw the questions I panicked a bit, they were all really specific. Usually there’s at least one or two which ask you to “Write an Introduction to the Poetry of…” or “Write your personal response to the poetry of…”. But no, the questions on the only two poets I could answer on asked us to write about Derek Walcott’s exploration of tension and conflict and Elizabeth Bishop’s interesting questions. In retrospect I really should have done Bishop. If I’d thought about the question a little more I probably could have answered it much better than Walcott. My Walcott essay was a shambles. Maybe it’s just the potry I’ve studied, but I’ver seen little conflict or tension in his poetry. In fact, Walcott is so laid back he seems to avoid conflict altogether. I had half a mind to say “actually I disagree with this statement…but Walcott does do a lovely treatment of the passage of time…” and just write the essay I prepared. I thought it might seem a little cheeky though, so I rambled on for four pages about how the conflicts he discusses are philosophical ones, such as the human conflict with time.

Not a good essay.

Macbeth was the second last question I did (though I can hardly count unseen poetry…) . I did the question about the horrible consequences of Macbeth’s murder of Duncan and I don’t think it went too badly, though I could only write three pages. I didn’t have much time to plan my essay though, so there wasn’t great cohesion between pragraphs.  I also might have banjaxed a few quotes here and there.

Finally, with ten minutes to go until the end of the exam, I got on to unseen poetry, which was a complete and utter shambles. Got less than half a page written for the first part of the question (question 2) and literally only about three and a half sentences for the second part. I didn’t even get to finish my sentence as the superintendent was making sure nobody wrote any more.

I’m pretty disappointed. I know you can’t judge something as vague as English, but I really don’t think that the essays were the quality they needed to be for the grade I need to get. I’ll just have to start looking forward to Human Health and Disease now!

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by marie

English Paper 2: Philadelphia, there I go.

June 6, 2009 in Study

ZOOM.

Okay, I’m just going to give you an insight as to what it was like being me this morning. I got up at five to read Macbeth quotes like a madwoman. My appropriately towards the poetry went something like this, “shit shit shit shit if Bishop isn’t there I’M GOING TO DIE”. And I would have. Suffice to say I had every single of of my eggs in one basket.
Thankfully it paid off.
9.25am:
We were sitting in the exam centre, that much anticipated paper was sitting, face down, in front of us. In sheer desperation I was squinting at the “Blank Page”, my nose was about an inch from the desk. I could faintly make out what I was hoping, the name “Elizabeth Bishop”.
(Not hugely relevant but it says desperation and it’s cute…)

PHEW. I sat back for the remaining few minutes in what only can be called a coma of relief.
Okay, paper itself.. Probably went better for me than the original would have. I thought that Macbeth question, “compelling drama” was beautifully ambiguous, I went mad taking about development of the characters and how as humans we find the downfall of others very interesting blah blah Macbeth’s fatal flaw etc etc.
Thought that the unseen poem was lovely, I fucking love cardigans (Aran knit ftw).

My Bishop essay narrowing avoided have little love hearts and kisses drawn at the bottom.

For comparative essay I did a rushed but hopefully okay essay on theme and issue. I kept it well structured and I have to say that the Red Bull I downed at 11.35 helped me to get through that.
I did my comparative essay last and when I was just starting it I couldn’t help but think “Holy crap it feels as if it’s been DAYS since I started with the cardigan poem”.
Now my hand is a little dead and for the life of me I can’t form sentences in my head.
Okay that’s a lie.. my hand isn’t dead, it’s convulsing and shaking of it’s own accord. Should I get worried? The shaking is either muscle cramps or blood poisoning from the amount of ink splatters all over me.

Going to plunge into Maths as a nice contrast.
Dreading my Monday and Tuesday combination, sensing a great big dark depression to sink in..
Okay well.

Plus, will people PLEASE stop being mean to the guy who handed out the wrong paper. I’m not just saying that out of a post nice paper love but out of common decency. He’s just a guy and everyone makes mistake. While I find general “stupid Louth” comments quite amusing, hearing of photoshopped images of the man in question and a dunces cap etc to be a bit sickening. Have some sense of decorum and a basic respect for fellow man why don’t cha? (More directed at the dirty tabloids than anyone here directly but hey, if the cap fits…)

Now, going to have porridge and try to convince myself it’s morning and that I have energy to sink into study.

Marie “Dressed Like Pro-Bishop Feminist Today” Dromey.

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by grace

English Paper 2: Good Riddance

June 6, 2009 in Study

I don’t think any Leaving Cert paper has garnered as much media attention as this year’s English 2, it has made quite a name for itself. Although many considered the original paper to be a ‘dream paper’, I think it’s fair to say that the contingency model lived up to the hype. There was a collective sigh of relief in my exam center this morning as we each sped read the questions, then sat back content for all of thirty seconds before lashing into it.

The Macbeth questions were delightfully vague, hopefully they suited just about everyone. I wrote on Macbeth having all the ingredients of a compelling drama, taking Macbeth’s own character as the key ingredient. I tried my very best to saturate the answer with personal response as my last Macbeth essay was lacking in this. The Comparative Study was all too pleasing, with both Theme and Cultural Context making an appearance. I did part A question 2, and wrote a long rambling piece of prose about how the theme of identity held my interest in Jane Eyre, only to go back and substitute the word ‘identity’ for ‘independence’ for all eight or so pages of my answer. Way to be prepared!

Then to the big finale: poetry. The prescribed poetry section of the paper is usually the most talked about, which may be due to the fact that there’s so much choice involved, or perhaps the sheer amount of time it takes to analyse the work of up to eight poets. Bishop and Walcott featured, which was the main cause of the collective sigh of relief. I had planned on writing on Keats, but I disliked his question and opted for Walcott instead. I’m hoping my answer was coherent, but I do remember quoting Journey and so that remains to be seen.

Although the poets that turned up should have pleased just about everyone, (except those of you who stayed up all night learning Rich) I couldn’t help but think that the questions were the tiniest bit tricky. Usually there’s a “state what you like or dislike about the poetry of Elizabeth Bishop” style question, but this year they were a little more specific. It wasn’t too difficult to discuss Walcott’s inventive way of exploring conflict, but writing on Keat’s presentation of ‘abstract ideas in a style that is clear and direct’ or Bishop posing ‘interesting questions delivered by means of a unique style’ was a convoluted way to ask some simple questions.

Oh well, it’s all over now and the horror that was attending school on a Saturday is no more. It’s all about Irish 1 and maths 2 now. I’m seriously banking on a recession essay for Irish, if it doesn’t feature then I’ll have to be very creative. As for maths, if the paper is anything like the first then it should be pretty okay. Here’s hoping, anyway.

What were everyone else’s experiences with the infamous English paper 2? Hopefully a little less idiotic than mine: for some reason I peeled the backing off the sticky strip on my answer book before starting the exam, and wrote a full 24 pages with the answer book stuck to the desk. WHY? Good question. My poor superintendent had to peel it off the desk, sellotape, sign and stamp it. Not one of my finer moments.

The site received more Times coverage today :)

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by elizabeth

Much Calmer Now

June 4, 2009 in Study

A few hours after I wrote my meltdown post last night I switched off my laptop, took a few deep breaths and thought about what I could do to maximise my English grade on Saturday. After the initial panicky thoughts of “oh God, that was my dream paper!” I realised that the contingency paper doesn’t necessarily have to be a nightmare.

So Deception and Banquo came up in Macbeth- so what? Sure I had Banquo prepared, but not that well and who’s to say an even better essay- like language and imagery or evil- might not come up?

Bishop, Longley and Walcott- the holy trinity- came up. So what? It doesn’t necessarily mean at least one of them wont come up in the contingency paper. No matter what, four poets will come up. I’ve studied six, admittedly only three in detail, but I do like Mahon, and could write about Rich at a push. I think it’s extremely unlikely that the two poets I haven’t ever looked at- Keats and Montague- would come up with Larkin and one of the two that came up last year- being Rich and Mahon. I’m fairly sure that at least one of the Holy Trinity will come up, but if they don’t I’ll be sure to have an extra one prepared as a safety net.

Comparative. There are only three comparative modes: General Vision and Viewpoint, Theme and Issue and Cultural Context. Apparently Cultural Context came up in the leaked paper- does that necessarily mean it wont come up in the new paper? No. If theme and issue comes up then I’ll be as happy as if cultural context came up. In fact, no matter what comes up in the Comparative I’ll be happy.

Having slept on it, I think that this will be a true test of education. In theory, after 14 years of schooling we should be well-equipped to cope with this. We should be able to adapt to new situations and do our best under pressure. In theory. This new paper is a cardboard box with a giant question mark on it- all bets are off. This new paper will separate the students with a natural flair for English, who can compose well-thought out, articulate essays under pressure,  the students who learn off reams of notes. Unfortunately for me I fall into the latter group, but I will do my best to adapt to the new circumstances. After all, I want to enter a profession which will be filled withlast-minute problems and urgent decisions.  If I allow this situation to get one up on me, am I really suited for medicine? This will be a true test of all our abilities to cope with the surprises life throws at us.

Hopefully this will help anyone who’s still a bit freaked out. I take back what I said last night about all the work I did up until now gone down the toilet; the study I did over the last two weeks still means something and hopefully will still stand to me on Saturday. This goes for all students too. If we all remain calm, focus on our weaker spots and strengthen them as much as possible for Saturday, then we’ll all be fine.

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