Leaving Cert English 2012

siobhan93

I want to get as much study done as possible over the Easter break but i just don't know where to start with english or what to study.
What are your teachers saying thats gonna come up in Hamlet? in the comparative? and which poets? in the leaving cert 2012 by the way obviously haha
Not trying to get predictions or anything but I just want to know what the majority think.
Any help appreciated :)

Celly Smunt

I remember being told many moons ago is not to get too hung up on learning too many quotes from Shakespeare due to it being somewhat risky and time consuming.For instance misquoting Shakespeare can have a negative effect on your answer,and as far as i can remember you might lose marks.

The best thing would be to learn the text inside out and understand it as much as you can so you can answer any question.

JonnyMcNamee

For the comparative just pick two from either GvvP, Lit.Gen and Theme/Issue and you'll be covered.. Its one of the few aspects of the English course that you can actually learn off by heart, or near enough without straying from the question. With Hamlet I'm just preparing ten essays which should have me covered I hope and also just learning about 10 general quotes and about 2 or 3 for each specific essay For poetry I'm just learning Plath, Larkin, Heaney and Rich

Josh93

pmcmahon wrote: »

I remember being told many moons ago is not to get too hung up on learning too many quotes from Shakespeare due to it being somewhat risky and time consuming.For instance misquoting Shakespeare can have a negative effect on your answer,and as far as i can remember you might lose marks.

The best thing would be to learn the text inside out and understand it as much as you can so you can answer any question.

We've been told ourselves that quoting is not only necessary, it's vital. Though it needs to be relevant to the question you're answering. As for poets, we've been told that Plath, Heaney, Larkin and Kinsella look the most likely bets.

diarmo06

Kind of dreading the comparitive section.
Is it fair to say, it's the same question every year? Basically- Discuss in regards to lit' genre/ general visionviewpoint etc.
Thus, Is it high risk to learn off two "perfect" comparitives in two modes?

Thanks.

Britney_Spears

My Teacher has only covered Heaney, she is extremely confident he is coming up! Should I be worried? Will he come up?

JonnyMcNamee

Britney_Spears wrote: »

My Teacher has only covered Heaney, she is extremely confident he is coming up! Should I be worried? Will he come up?

She only covered 1 poet? :O That's either extremely risky or she knows something we don't Chances are Heaney will come up but there's always an off chance that he mightn't so I would say know probably another poet or two to a certain extent just for backup like!

Britney_Spears

JonnyMcNamee wrote: »

She only covered 1 poet? :O That's either extremely risky or she knows something we don't Chances are Heaney will come up but there's always an off chance that he mightn't so I would say know probably another poet or two to a certain extent just for backup like!

Yea I'll probably do kinsella and Plath for back up but she is so sure about Heaney, hope she is right Heaney is so easy

ViveLaVie

Josh93 wrote: »

We've been told ourselves that quoting is not only necessary, it's vital. Though it needs to be relevant to the question you're answering. As for poets, we've been told that Plath, Heaney, Larkin and Kinsella look the most likely bets.

Well I barely quoted at all in any of my essays in the LC and I got an A1. I wouldn't think there is much of a need for it. A few general quotes will do fine. As long as you demonstrate that you have detailed knowledge of the texts and your argument is well written, then the corrector won't mark you down.

Britney_Spears wrote: »

My Teacher has only covered Heaney, she is extremely confident he is coming up! Should I be worried? Will he come up?

Your teacher is an idiot. You should study four more poets yourself, or at the very least cover all of the female or Irish poets on the syllabus (not sure who is on it this year). Even the teachers who are on the board that set the papers are not allowed to know what's coming up. They can submit potential questions but they are never shown what has actually been selected beforehand. Otherwise any teacher on the board could just tell their class what's coming up. It sounds like your teacher is lazy and couldn't be bothered doing any more work. Unless you have five poets covered, then there is NO GUARANTEE that someone you've studied will be on the paper.

Random_Person

Britney_Spears wrote: »

My Teacher has only covered Heaney, she is extremely confident he is coming up! Should I be worried? Will he come up?

The IOE were confident that Boland was coming up a few years ago, boy were they wrong. They predicted Boland would definitely come up and she didn't, causing the mental breakdowns of many students that year..

Will Heaney come up this year? I'm hoping he does and it's one of the predictions doing the rounds but nothing is guaranteed. Your teacher is a fool. I don't care what sources he says he has or if he knows someone blah blah blah, it's irresponsible of a teacher to only do one poet with a class. I'd advise you to get the advice of another teacher in your school ASAP about what you should do.

Whatever happens, good luck..

BellaVerita

Anyone have any advice for studying Plath by myself? We didn't study her poety in class but I'd like to study it.:cool: I don't really know how to go about it. What areas of her poetry should I focus on? What are the sort of questions that can be asked on her poetry?

Britney_Spears

What are the likely question on Heaney, I covered Irish heritage and pride, childhood and a personal response. Anything else? Also for Plath/kinsella?

paddykell

The English is always hard to predict, but basically I think what evreryone else is saying is right. Heaney is VERY likely, as is Sylvia Plath. They generally put up a female and an Irish poet. But as someone else said about Eavan Boland a few years ago, anything can come up on the day.

I did quite an in-depth blog about it on my Leaving Cert Diaries thing if anyone's interested: http://leavingcertdiaries.wordpress.com/2012/05/19/english-predictions/

Aisling_boss

Personally i hope im covered with plath, heany and Kinsella.:p

Hamlet is driving me crazy! My teacher spent pointless hours just watching the movie and when giving us notes got the names of characters mixed up! I have nothing prepared for it because i personally dont know were to start :eek:

And she also confused me alot in the comparitive. She started lit. Genre and then suddenly switched t general vision and veiwpoint. And says i cant use How Many Miles To Babylon as my anchor text against Dancing At Lughnasa and Inside Im Dancing

At least for the cmprehension, poetry and compositin Im well prepared!

thefasteriwalk

Aisling_boss wrote: »

Personally i hope im covered with plath, heany and Kinsella.:p

Hamlet is driving me crazy! My teacher spent pointless hours just watching the movie and when giving us notes got the names of characters mixed up! I have nothing prepared for it because i personally dont know were to start :eek:

And she also confused me alot in the comparitive. She started lit. Genre and then suddenly switched t general vision and veiwpoint. And says i cant use How Many Miles To Babylon as my anchor text against Dancing At Lughnasa and Inside Im Dancing

At least for the cmprehension, poetry and compositin Im well prepared!

Did she give a reason as to why you can't use How Many Miles to Babylon? as your anchor text?

Aisling_boss

thefasteriwalk wrote: »

Did she give a reason as to why you can't use How Many Miles to Babylon? as your anchor text?

She just said that she didnt like that text personally and she prefered using Dancing at Lughnasa as an Anchor text, as she wants me to compare parenting roles in the novels. We have also done the theme of friendship, which is what is was going to base my answer on, but she changed her mind after spending 3 weeks on it and changed to the theme of parenting. I went against what she said in the mocks, and i got a high mark compared to the rest of the class, but still not a great result.

Songwriter

hey everyone , can someone tell me how hard is it to get a C3 in higher level english ?
I have been studying my head out for that english coz i need to get a C3 but im worried that i dont get less than that
I Really hope Sylvia Plath n Seamus come up this year for paper 2 or half the country is screwed *true story*
any feedback , Anyone

Nq12

Hi, for poetry essays has anyone's teacher or anyone mentioned anything about using quotes from the poet in the intro/conclusion? Not from the poems I mean, but maybe something they said regarding their own poetry. Does anyone think it's a bad thing to do? My teacher told us markers appreciate it but my brothers teacher told him last year it gets you marked down!
Also, can anyone give me a good definition of general vision ad viewpoint? Thanks in advance

Naomi00

Nq12 wrote: »

Hi, for poetry essays has anyone's teacher or anyone mentioned anything about using quotes from the poet in the intro/conclusion? Not from the poems I mean, but maybe something they said regarding their own poetry. Does anyone think it's a bad thing to do? My teacher told us markers appreciate it but my brothers teacher told him last year it gets you marked down!
Also, can anyone give me a good definition of general vision ad viewpoint? Thanks in advance

I don't think you need to know any quotes from them, but you could give a short background of the poet if it fits.

The general vision and viewpoint definition my teacher gave us is 'General vision and viewpoint is the dominant or controlling outlook of the author as it is revealed in the narrative'. She told us to put that in the introduction but I'm not sure if you have to.

And I think you can change it to 'author/director', because of the film.

keoghconut

Britney_Spears wrote: »

What are the likely question on Heaney, I covered Irish heritage and pride, childhood and a personal response. Anything else? Also for Plath/kinsella?

I got a mock heaney question on his appreciation of nature/natural world ,tricky.
Plath,usually mental anguish/turmoil/vivid poetry

keoghconut

Is there any last minute ,failsafe topics to study for hamlet?havent looked at it since fifth year..
:eek:
also what kind of questions do people expect for rich if she comes up?

Naomi00

For the comparative, in the mock the examiner didn't mark a lot of my comparisons. They should have been marked though because they were proper ones (not superficial ones) and a few were definitely used in Key notes. I lost a lot of marks because they only counted a few.

Anyway, to avoid this happening in the real thing would underlining the comparative words or make them stand out somehow be ok? Because that would mean they can't overlook them. Has anyone heard of/done that before and is it ok to do?

RedTexan

What did ye make of paper 1?

QueenOfLeon

RedTexan wrote: »

What did ye make of paper 1?

The thread for Paper I is here, please keep all discussion there.

rossco11

what type of questions could be asked on poets? style of writing....etc??

Booom!

Plath was a depressing bitch, discuss
Rich had such a view on human relationships, discuss
Heaney's poetry influenced by his home/ childhood etc

ImFudged

What essays have you guys prepared for hamlet and poetry. I don't have any i just know quotes and characters. Ill make it up tomorrow. Im just wondering am i unprepared?

smithy77

For Hamlet I have Hamlet himself, women, solilioquies, deception, laertes & fortinbras.

Poetry:
Plath (Disturbing imagery, deeply personal, gripping intense poetry)
Larkin (Era/Setting, Community, Life/Death Cycle, Style/Structure)
Heaney (Life and Language)

Hoping it'll be enough:D

ellie66

Whats most likely for Hamlet higher level ? (:
If you had to narrow it down.
And for comparative, theres a pretty good chance for General Vision right ?

ImFudged

Okay, what does an essay for hamlet on false appearance/ vs reality have to contain, I actually have no idea. Just in case I need it, yano yourself

Dapics

If appearance vs Reality appears, it will be a theme. You are dealing with the conflict between the two themes within the play and are showcasing how we as a reader can witness this theme play out in the form of certain characters in the play. E.g- Hamlets antic disposition, Claudius etc.

Naomi00

ImFudged wrote: »

Okay, what does an essay for hamlet on false appearance/ vs reality have to contain, I actually have no idea. Just in case I need it, yano yourself

The way they pretend to be something they're not e.g:

Claudius pretends to be a good king/pretends to like Hamlet when really he's a murderer and insincere etc
Hamlet pretends to be mad
There's a good few more, it's just like a deception essay but with the reality included in it too.

If you have the red Hamlet book with the crystal skull on the cover, there's good notes in the back of that, idk about other versions.

siobhan93

What's the timing on paper 2? Like how long do you spend on each section?

piperroche

thefasteriwalk wrote: »

Did she give a reason as to why you can't use How Many Miles to Babylon? as your anchor text?

I'm using HMMTB as my anchor text and the teacher to use the one you're most comfortable with!
What are the chances of Plath coming up? as well as GV and V? Thanks

Dapics

siobhan93 wrote: »

What's the timing on paper 2? Like how long do you spend on each section?

My timing for tomorrows exam:

Poetry: 40-45 minutes
Hamlet: 50 minutes
Comparative: 50 minutes
Unseen Poem : Expendable (I will do if i have time)

_pure_mule_

Nq12 wrote: »

Hi, for poetry essays has anyone's teacher or anyone mentioned anything about using quotes from the poet in the intro/conclusion? Not from the poems I mean, but maybe something they said regarding their own poetry. Does anyone think it's a bad thing to do? My teacher told us markers appreciate it but my brothers teacher told him last year it gets you marked down!
Also, can anyone give me a good definition of general vision ad viewpoint? Thanks in advance

Use quotes, it makes it sound like you know your sh1t! General vision and viewpoint is the prevailing viewpoint of an author or director in relation to the world they are descibing!:)

Dapics

piperroche wrote: »

I'm using HMMTB as my anchor text and the teacher to use the one you're most comfortable with!
What are the chances of Plath coming up? as well as GV and V? Thanks

Plath is the apparent favorite to appear, i don't really know why. I would think Heaney is more possible than Plath. Boland or Kavanagh may make an appearance. Rich has been asked quite a few ways so there's not really much they can ask you on her, thats why im not doing her.
Boland could be "The (Dark) Horse" to come up....
Larkin is tipped

piperroche

Is it true they changed the author of the paper 2 due to its predictability?

Dapics

piperroche wrote: »

Is it true they changed the author of the paper 2 due to its predictability?

What? Please do expand on this statement

Naomi00

Does anyone know if Kinsella is supposed to come up?

He's the one I want to write about the most but everyone seems to think other poets will come up?

Would they actually go 20 something years without a question on him and then not put him on the paper at all?

Incompetent

piperroche wrote: »

Is it true they changed the author of the paper 2 due to its predictability?

You mean chief examiner? I heard he/she changed

piperroche

So a friend of mine heard. The Minister was giving out due to the predictability of the exams so they got someone else in to make the paper. Im not sure whether or not there's truth in this! The friend also said they did this in 2001 and so the poets of the 2000 paper came up! I only heard this, not sure whether it's true!

Naomi00

piperroche wrote: »

So a friend of mine heard. The Minister was giving out due to the predictability of the exams so they got someone else in to make the paper. Im not sure whether or not there's truth in this! The friend also said they did this in 2001 and so the poets of the 2000 paper came up! I only heard this, not sure whether it's true!

It's a hard enough paper as it is, there's no need to make it worse

ChemHickey

piperroche wrote: »

So a friend of mine heard. The Minister was giving out due to the predictability of the exams so they got someone else in to make the paper. Im not sure whether or not there's truth in this! The friend also said they did this in 2001 and so the poets of the 2000 paper came up! I only heard this, not sure whether it's true!

I doubt it was due to predictability that they changed. maybe the old chief had to retire or something to thAt effect.

lets hope not anyways!

mcpaddington

Dapics wrote: »

My timing for tomorrows exam:

Poetry: 40-45 minutes
Hamlet: 50 minutes
Comparative: 50 minutes
Unseen Poem : Expendable (I will do if i have time)

Just going to point out that it looks like you have timed it for 180 minutes, this year we have 200 minutes, to three hours and twenty minutes. Plenty of time I'd say and I'm going in with nothing learnt off as it should be.

frantic190

siobhan93 wrote: »

What's the timing on paper 2? Like how long do you spend on each section?

I'm going for a mark a minute.

60 on Single, 70 on comparative and 70 on poetry (20 on unseen and 50 on prescribed).

FinnD

What essays/topics are you putting all your last minute study into between tonight and tomorrow morning? For me- Heaney,appearance versus reality and general vision essays.

Jimbobjoeyman

No point learning a load of essays imo,
Just know the important quotes and have a good idea of the themes etc

Writing learned off essays in the exams never really answer a question fully.

Right now Im going over my hamlet quotes and since I'm taking a chance and just learning Heany Im going over his peoms and quotes.

And later on to relax I may watch Inside Im dancing the film Im doing for my comparitive

FinnD

Jimbobjoeyman wrote: »

No point learning a load of essays imo,
Just know the important quotes and have a good idea of the themes.

Writing learned off essays in the exams never really answer a question fully.

Right now Im going over my hamlet quotes and since I'm taking a chance and just learning Heany Im going over his peoms and quotes.

And later on to relax I may watch Inside Im dancing the film Im doing for my comparitive

Worked perfectly for me in the mocks

darryl_griffin

Do ye think it's a good idea to rent Hamlet out and watch the film? Would there be good quotes in it? or could it be completely different from the book?

Darren.993

darryl_griffin wrote: »

Do ye think it's a good idea to rent Hamlet out and watch the film? Would there be good quotes in it? or could it be completely different from the book?

I always find with learning off quotes you actually have to learn them from the books. There's the whole thing with different parts of one quote being on different lines and commas being between certain words.

I'd say just pick a handful of quotes from the book and try to learn them really well.