Take our quiz to find out what your revision personality is! >>

scottish highers help!!

Hiya,

I was wondering if anyone could help me notes and revision material help for my subjects this year. I am doing higher english, maths, music and modern studies. Also, Int 2 french. :eek:

I am not a good english student although I am a hard worker. I was wondering if there is any good sites on close reading? :confused:

Also, I have a 'not so good' modern studies teacher so if anyone has any sites they know or books that would be great! :rolleyes:

I think hsn is a great website for maths notes so I am good with that! I love maths.
Music I am good with as well. :biggrin:

French I am struggling with a bit too but I am getting a lot of help from my teacher and my friends who have already sat it! :smile:

Thanks,
Megs xx

Reply 1

Hype en Ecosse

English is a subject where you get back what you put in. I've never been good at English, and got a D in my prelim. But I buckled down and came out with an A; getting 25/25 and 23/25 for my essays in the final exam.

English

Close Reading Exam:
-For every question in Close Reading (apart from the Understanding) there are hundreds of answers for. If the question asks about the writer's use of word choice, immediately identify a word that jumps out of you and rip into it. Why it's effective, what it makes you think of, what kind of tone it portrays and the like. With Close Reading I always envisioned myself writing a little more than necessary. For example if a question was worth 4 marks, I'd try to write 4.5 or 5 marks worth of stuff. Practice at Close Reading and accept all help offered to you and you WILL get the technique down and know exactly what to say. If you don't know how to identify a certain technique, or answering a certain type of question - ask your teacher about it! I'm sure they'd be happy to give up a lunch-time, or an hour somewhere to sit down with you and show you exactly how to do that particular thing.

Essay Writing:
-Very simple to succeed in, know your texts like they're your bible. Important quotes, key scenes, characters. EVERYTHING. You have a whole year to work at your course and you will have time to analyse things from every possible angle. I knew 53 quotes for three texts for my exam and for each of these quotes I could analyse in a different way to make my point depending on what feature I need it to be relevant to in terms of the question.

-As it gets nearer your exams, crank out essay after essay. Get them corrected, seek out your teachers so you can sit down and see exactly what you were doing right, and exactly what you were doing wrong. By the time my exam came I could draft an essay in my head in under a minute, and could think of what quotes I was going to use while writing my introduction. The introduction to your essays will become very formulaic, so much so that you won't even have to think while writing them and can spend that time planning the rest of your essay. If you know your texts well, and you know how to effectively argue your points and how to effectively answer the question, you will be cranking those essays out with EASE in that exam hall.

-GENERAL TIP. BE OPINIONATED. People who succeed highly in Higher English are either those smart arses, douchebags or ***** who have something to say about EVERYTHING. There's a reason for this. You don't succeed in English by waffling, or conforming. You be opinionated. Have an opinion on everything. I approached Close Reading with this attitude so much that in my exam I burst out laughing because the writer of the passage was Boris Johnson and it was so awfully argued - I literally couldn't wait to rip it apart in my answers! Having faith in your opinion and being able to argue it well will help you in both parts of the exam.

Maths

Higher Maths is NOT as hard as everyone likes to make it out to be. Don't give in to the "AWWWH MATHS IS SO HARD. WOE IS ME." state of mind. I don't care who you are, or how bad you think you are at Maths, with the right mindset everyone can succeed in the subject. My tips are to just work consistently throughout the entire year, if you keep on top of everything as you go along and revise effectively, there should be no problems. If you find something harder than another, work harder at it until you're as good at that as everything else! What Maths does is it gives you tools to solve certain problems, you will never get a problem you can't do. It's like learning to play badminton, you become good with the racquet don't you? It's the same with Maths, the racquet is a tool for you to use and you won't be presented with an object you can't use the racquet on in badminton. There is no secret to being good at Maths, it's just the same as everything else - work consistently, ask questions when they arise, seek extra help when you need it, and don't get complacent. If you're not getting 100%, there's room to improve, you always have reason to keep working.

I'd give you advice about French, but I did Higher and not Int 2 so I don't know what the exam's like, sorry <3

Reply 2

starstrukk

Original post by megannchurrin