Leaving Cert 2016/17 Off-Topic Thread

Mr Rhode Island Red · 27-08-2015 2:25pm

spurious wrote: »

Should be standard in all schools. Too many people opt for OL at JC and then regret it.

I used to tell my classes there was no OL in my subject.

When I started 3rd year they were running 3 HL Irish classes and 1 OL class.

By Christmas the OL class was packed to the rafters due to heaps dropping down, so they changed one of the HL classes to an OL class.

And then by Easter there was so few doing HL they combined us into 1 class and changed the remaining class to OL as well.

So by the time the JC came around, there was only 15 students (me included :pac:) out of a year of 110 doing HL Irish, the remaining 95 had all opted for OL at one point or another.

Once a few started jumping off the HMS Higher Level the majority followed when they started hearing these stories of magic and wonder and handiness coming from the pass classes. Teachers tried to stop them dropping down but then students started rolling out the cavalry (Mammy) and that quickly changed their tone. Pathetic enough now that I think about it, students just deciding "Arra...I'm dropping down to pass" just out of laziness, not because they weren't actually fit for HL.

And now many of them are stuck in a dilemma because it is not physically possible for them to achieve their desired points come LC because they're doing too many OL subjects, and as spurious said, they regret their decision(s).

Liordi · 27-08-2015 2:36pm

Parents have to come into the office in our school if people want to opt to OL for any subject.
I know for Irish in our school 42/43 of 96 did HL. [2 HL / 2 OL classes]
It's starting off with 2 HL / 2 OL this year too but I'll be surprised if it stays that way until the LC comes. :rolleyes:

NOS3 · 27-08-2015 3:45pm

In my year there was no HL or OL classes for any subject except maths, probably due to timetable restrictions. We remained in our base classes and the room was divided into the HL side and the OL corner.

Most of the HL students were seriously tempted to drop levels after seeing how some of the pass students in the classroom were more relaxed and having more fun. By the end of the year our class, and most of the other classes were roughly split 50:50 between higher and ordinary, with a couple of students taking the foundation paper.

If it was possible to have separate classes for each level I imagine not as many people would have dropped.

smiles_1998 · 27-08-2015 3:55pm

For JC, we had separate classes for HL and OL in English, Maths and Irish, with there being one OL class and 3 HL classes for English and 2 big HL classes and 2 smaller OL classes for Irish and Maths. Very few people did any of their other subjects at OL, only about 5 people per subject and the teachers only let us decide our levels for our non-core subjects after Christmas of JC.

For LC, we are looking at a roughly half and half split between OL and HL in Irish and slightly more doing HL than OL in English, while we will have 3 OL and 2 HL Maths classes.

spurious · 27-08-2015 4:03pm

smiles_1998 wrote: »

the teachers only let us decide our levels for our non-core subjects after Christmas of JC.

Did they explain the repercussions of dropping down?
I had colleagues tormented by students saying 'I got an A in the Junior' while failing to mention it was at OL and thinking they could just waltz into the HL class.

smiles_1998 · 27-08-2015 4:24pm

spurious wrote: »

Did they explain the repercussions of dropping down?
I had colleagues tormented by students saying 'I got an A in the Junior' while failing to mention it was at OL and thinking they could just waltz into the HL class.

Well they all basically said "The majority of the class is capable of doing this subject at HL" and argued very strongly against anyone taking the OL paper unless they were failing, which was fair enough I think.

I think there's a policy in our school though that you can't do the HL LC paper unless you got at least a D (and in some cases a C) at JC HL. I don't think anyone is allowed into a LC HL class if they did the subject at OL for JC.

NOS3 · 27-08-2015 5:30pm

smiles_1998 wrote: »

I think there's a policy in our school though that you can't do the HL LC paper unless you got at least a D (and in some cases a C) at JC HL. I don't think anyone is allowed into a LC HL class if they did the subject at OL for JC.

This reminds me of an Irish teacher in my school. If she gets a HL senior cycle class, she only allows people who got an A or B in higher level in the junior cert into her class.

The people who get these grades might not have a good standard of irish, but could have gotten lucky and wrote-learned a suitable essay to match the theme given in the exam and got a lot of marks.

Someone with an interest and aptitude for Irish may have ran out of time, or the pressure got to them and they did poorly in the exam.

To be fair I mostly agree with what she's doing. She is an excellent teacher. Most students want to get into her class.It is unfair that some people who messed up on 1 day miss out, but It is a lot easier than loads students begging "oh miss, I got a C, but I ran out of time", etc. There is no easier way for her to to filter students for her class.

smiles_1998 · 27-08-2015 5:41pm

NOS3 wrote: »

This reminds me of an Irish teacher in my school. If she gets a HL senior cycle class, she only allows people who got an A or B in higher level in the junior cert into her class.

The people who get these grades might not have a good standard of irish, but could have gotten lucky and wrote-learned a suitable essay to match the theme given in the exam and got a lot of marks.

Someone with an interest and aptitude for Irish may have ran out of time, or the pressure got to them and they did poorly in the exam.

To be fair I mostly agree with what she's doing. She is an excellent teacher. Most students want to get into her class.It is unfair that some people who messed up on 1 day miss out, but It is a lot easier than loads students begging "oh miss, I got a C, but I ran out of time", etc. There is no easier way to filter students who are suitable for her class.

They seem to have streamed our classes so that, if there's two HL classes, one has all those who are A/B standard and the other is for those who are C/D. They did the same for HL Irish at JC and it worked really well as the class can move at a pace that suits everyone.

NOS3 · 27-08-2015 5:55pm

smiles_1998 wrote: »

They seem to have streamed our classes so that, if there's two HL classes, one has all those who are A/B standard and the other is for those who are C/D. They did the same for HL Irish at JC and it worked really well as the class can move at a pace that suits everyone.

In my school there is roughly a system like this, but I think it's pretty lenient. People who got As and people who got Cs or even Ds were in the same class. This Irish teacher is very particular about it though. She's really the only teacher who is strict about it. Maybe it's just a case where my school is different to most others. :rolleyes:

Liordi · 30-08-2015 1:28am

Opted for Applied Maths instead of LCVP or Study.
Hopefully an 8th subject won't kill me.

Kayleigh.. · 30-08-2015 3:21am

Liordi wrote: »

Opted for Applied Maths instead of LCVP or Study.
Hopefully an 8th subject won't kill me.

It shouldn't, IMO

I did 9 subjects for leaving, didn't do as well as I would have liked (555 points) but did better that I thought I would!

8 subjects should be very manageable

Liordi · 30-08-2015 1:03pm

Yeah, I'm hoping it won't be that much extra work but I'll probably appreciate doing it for points as I can't see myself getting better than a C3 in Irish / English.

Mr Rhode Island Red · 30-08-2015 4:27pm

I'd say my worst subject is going to be French by a mile. I'll probably end up purposely neglecting it in 6th Year to work on my other six subjects instead. As long as I pass French, I should be fine.

teafanatic · 30-08-2015 4:35pm

Mr Rhode Island Red wrote: »

I'd say my worst subject is going to be French by a mile. I'll probably end up purposely neglecting it in 6th Year to work on my other six subjects instead. As long as I pass French, I should be fine.

For me it's Irish, I'll be "strategically" neglecting it and I'll probably end up dropping to pass in 6th year :P

Liordi · 30-08-2015 4:38pm

teafanatic wrote: »

For me it's Irish, I'll be "strategically" neglecting it and I'll probably end up dropping to pass in 6th year :P

Pretty much the same for me. I just want to get a C3 in HL so that I'm not ruling out some career paths that I may have an interest in.

smiles_1998 · 30-08-2015 7:14pm

teafanatic wrote: »

For me it's Irish, I'll be "strategically" neglecting it and I'll probably end up dropping to pass in 6th year :P

Irish will most likely be one of my back-up subjects, especially as I am now doing Music outside school.

Anyone else on here doing History? I have my first History class tomorrow and I'm actually a little nervous- I've heard some horror stories about the workload of the subject and I really want to do well in it in the Leaving Cert...

teafanatic · 30-08-2015 8:59pm

smiles_1998 wrote: »

Irish will most likely be one of my back-up subjects, especially as I am now doing Music outside school.

Anyone else on here doing History? I have my first History class tomorrow and I'm actually a little nervous- I've heard some horror stories about the workload of the subject and I really want to do well in it in the Leaving Cert...

I am, love it so far and find it more interesting than the JC

we did a good bit of the course in TY and I found it was one of my easier subjects, but of course it depends on whether you're naturally good at it and if you do your work.

My teacher is always telling us that History is no harder than any other subject once you take an interest in it and do your work, which sounds obvious but I think most of the people with the horror stories don't do this.

VG31 · 30-08-2015 9:00pm

I'm doing History; I think having an interest is the most important thing.

smiles_1998 · 30-08-2015 9:13pm

I really like History so hopefully that will help with keeping on top of the workload

I would die with happiness if I could get an A in it!

Does anyone know what texts they are doing for the comparative yet?

teafanatic · 30-08-2015 9:25pm

smiles_1998 wrote: »

Does anyone know what texts they are doing for the comparative yet?

The majority of my class wants to do The Fault in Our Stars so that'll probably be one of them, I'm pretty annoyed about it tbh since I thought the book was overrated and not well written at all.

Who else is doing Hamlet as their single text?

Liordi · 30-08-2015 9:31pm

Our English teacher has been absent since we came back so hopefully he'll be in tomorrow.
I think the other classes are planning on reading The Great Gatsby so odds are we'll be doing that too.

smiles_1998 · 30-08-2015 9:50pm

teafanatic wrote: »

The majority of my class wants to do The Fault in Our Stars so that'll probably be one of them, I'm pretty annoyed about it tbh since I thought the book was overrated and not well written at all.

Who else is doing Hamlet as their single text?

Oh my god i would actually move class if our teacher made us do TFIOS...I detest John Green so much.

Apparently we are doing Foster, The Plough and the Stars and The King's Speech which must be one of my favourite movies ever

and Hamlet as our single text of course!

Liordi · 30-08-2015 9:52pm

No chance of anyone voting to do TFIOS in our school - an all male school. :rolleyes: I read the book last summer and thought it was a bit overrated.

What way are you guys' timetables for the year?
I was just looking at mine and realized we've got more Maths classes a week than English & Irish? [7 vs 6] Is that common?

S_Hick12 · 30-08-2015 10:24pm

Liordi wrote: »

No chance of anyone voting to do TFIOS in our school - an all male school. :rolleyes: I read the book last summer and thought it was a bit overrated.

What way are you guys' timetables for the year?
I was just looking at mine and realized we've got more Maths classes a week than English & Irish? [7 vs 6] Is that common?

I'm not sure about most schools but mine is kinda the same but its 6 classes for maths, compared to five for everything else. All i know is that double irish, first thing on a monday morning followed by double p.e, will be the death of me

Liordi · 30-08-2015 10:52pm

Irish in general will be the death of me. :rolleyes:
I also have it first thing on a Monday but thankfully it's a single.

teafanatic · 31-08-2015 2:28pm

How's everyone who went back already getting on? I'm back tomorrow and I'm ****ting myself

Liordi · 31-08-2015 5:01pm

teafanatic wrote: »

How's everyone who went back already getting on? I'm back tomorrow and I'm ****ting myself

Doing good so far. Feels weird having to do homework, though.

Found out we were doing Hamlet for English today. Dunno if that's a good or a bad thing. :rolleyes:

Significant399 · 31-08-2015 5:08pm

In tomorrow as well. Dreading finding out what teachers I'll have and who's in my classes

Liordi · 01-09-2015 7:38pm

Had three hours of homework tonight. I'm not liking this :rolleyes:

Monaghan_98 · 01-09-2015 8:00pm

Mr Rhode Island Red wrote: »

So what subjects is everyone doing?

Biology, Chemistry, Physics, French and the usuals here

Economics, Accounting, Business and History, Im also going to start doing French as an extra this year, to have a third language

I really want to do economics in UCD, just hope I'm going to get around the 500 mark. I'm planning to do grinds and study this year, and hopefully I'll do well..

Leaving Cert 2016/17 Off-Topic Thread

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