Learning off summaries from book/essays?

Slow Show

Well, I'm not too sure about this.
Right, well I have an Irish test coming up this week and it's basic enough...we've been doing a short story and now we're supposed to summarize it for the test. Fairly straightforward. But there's a summary of the story in the book and our teacher pretty much said we could just regurgitate that or else write our own summary...
This is grand for a class test, but we're doing this story for the junior cert with a few others, and I've heard that examiners don't like when it's straight out of the book because it shows that you've merely learned it off, not that you have an actual understanding...
How true is this anyways? Should I devote my afternoon to writing a new summary :(or just learn off the one in the book?

jamesie_boy

I wouldn't worry about it too much tbh.Just remember the following:

1.The MOCKS are in FEBRUARY
2.The JC is in JUNE
3.It's the junior cert ffs!!!!....trust me when your on the other side of it you'll see my point of view...

For the time being I'd just learn a few facts from that summary in the book and perhaps put a bit of your own stance to them in the test if you can do that.

Just one quick question.Is it ordinary or higher level your doing?

elaine93

In terms of JC, its better not to learn off by heart. If you put in extra stuff thats in the summary but the question didn't ask for it, the examiner will think you haven't a clue what you're talking about and will know you just learnt it by heart. That and its a lot less stressful to not learn it by heart

Evan93

When I did my JC I learned off a page summary of a story I never even read. The reason I did this was my teacher was rubbish. I did it for the poem as well. The examiners mark you for the content of the Irish and how it relates to the question. So they cannot deduct any marks for writing down a learned summary. I did and I got on fine.The summaries will have perfect Irish, whereas your own summary may not. However, its not the easiest thing to learn off an entire summary.It can be frustrating. Whatever makes you feel comfortable.

Slow Show

jamesie_boy wrote: »

I wouldn't worry about it too much tbh.Just remember the following:

1.The MOCKS are in FEBRUARY
2.The JC is in JUNE
3.It's the junior cert ffs!!!!....trust me when your on the other side of it you'll see my point of view...

For the time being I'd just learn a few facts from that summary in the book and perhaps put a bit of your own stance to them in the test if you can do that.

Just one quick question.Is it ordinary or higher level your doing?

I know all that...I'm just a 2nd year by the way, so I have plenty of time

Higher level by the way!

OK, so I know for a fact that this summary will relate to the question because it's off an exam paper and my teacher told us this will be the exact question! I'll just simplify it and make it easier so it will be easier to learn...I think.
I don't know what I'm saying...I have hours and hours of homework ahead of me [not to mention the study I'm supposed to be doing] and it's x factor tonight and I should be getting off this and....and...
For God's sake, I'm only in 2nd year! Why should I be getting all this homework?
Ugh, rant over.
Sorry.

coldwood92

Xx_emma_xX wrote: »

Well, I'm not too sure about this.
Right, well I have an Irish test coming up this week and it's basic enough...we've been doing a short story and now we're supposed to summarize it for the test. Fairly straightforward. But there's a summary of the story in the book and our teacher pretty much said we could just regurgitate that or else write our own summary...
This is grand for a class test, but we're doing this story for the junior cert with a few others, and I've heard that examiners don't like when it's straight out of the book because it shows that you've merely learned it off, not that you have an actual understanding...
How true is this anyways? Should I devote my afternoon to writing a new summary :(or just learn off the one in the book?

don't do it

bluejay14

our whole class just learned an essay about a theme from our book about a whole story and in our Christmas test our teacher put on a question that didn't have that theme in it and caught us all out although we kinda knew that she would do it.Luckily we'd read the summary of the characters so many times (and I mean soooooooo manny times, you wouldn't believe) that I remembered nearly every line about a character and added in a load of stuff from the essay I had learned so I got full marks!It's good to learn the essay because you can then use the sentences for other questions and rearrange them to suit yourself so I would say you should learn it because the grammer is always perfect in it and your own won't be so you will lose marks.This is coming from a 3rd year and I always mess up my grammar completely!


What story is it?We're only doing one and just learning to stretch it to fit into any theme that comes up.

GO'S

jamesie_boy wrote: »

I wouldn't worry about it too much tbh.Just remember the following:

1.The MOCKS are in FEBRUARY
2.The JC is in JUNE
3.It's the junior cert ffs!!!!....trust me when your on the other side of it you'll see my point of view...

For the time being I'd just learn a few facts from that summary in the book and perhaps put a bit of your own stance to them in the test if you can do that.

Just one quick question.Is it ordinary or higher level your doing?

it may be only the junior cert but your parents expect you to do good...if you do bad they will be fairly mad and it'll mean a s**t start to ty