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What am I doing?!?! Cambridge Admissions Assessments freakout thread


:woo: Welcome to the Cambridge Admissions Assessment thread! :woo:

It was bound to appear sooner or later



We 2017 applicants are starting to grow nervous ahead of the brand new Admissions Assesment, and in light of this @jamestg and I decided that we needed some sort of support thread.

Feel free to stress, support, post any tips/advice that you have, talk about strategies, seek help if you're worried about a particular part, chat, or whatever.

Useful links for prep or information:

Spoiler


Subject prep (IN PROGRESS)

Spoiler


Cambridge official website's general advice and guidance:

Spoiler


Good luck everyone! :thumbsup:

(By the way James, you can start blinking again now :laugh:)
(edited 6 years ago)

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My first one of these, hope I did an okay job. :tongue:
It's perfect! And you've just reminded me that I was gonna look up how to evaluate sources at a uni-level :smile: Will post my discoveries!
Original post by Rachel58
It's perfect! And you've just reminded me that I was gonna look up how to evaluate sources at a uni-level :smile: Will post my discoveries!


Please share it with me! :biggrin: I had a little bit of googling earlier, but I didn't find much.
Reply 4
Original post by SteamboatMickey
:woo: Welcome to the Cambridge Admissions Assessments freakout thread! :woo:

It was bound to appear sooner or later
We 2017 applicants are starting to grow nervous ahead of the brand new Admissions Assesment, and in light of this @jamestg and I decided that we needed some sort of support thread.

Feel free to stress, support, post any tips/advice that you have, talk about strategies, seek help if you're worried about a particular part, chat, or whatever.

Other University of Cambridge links:

Spoiler

Cambridge official website's general advice and guidance:

Spoiler

Good luck everyone! :thumbsup:

(By the way James, you can start blinking again now :laugh:)


Yay!!

My eyes have swollen but I think I'll be okay :h:
Original post by jamestg
Yay!!

My eyes have swollen but I think I'll be okay :h:


Hahaha! Oh too bad, how will you watch your food videos now? :frown:
Reply 6
What tests are you taking? How are you finding revision/practice?
Reply 7
Original post by SteamboatMickey
Hahaha! Oh too bad, how will you watch your food videos now? :frown:


I guess I'll have to resort to smell-o-vision
Original post by thatawesomekid
What tests are you taking? How are you finding revision/practice?


I'm taking the HAA (History Admissions Assesment). I'm finding the practice okay, but it's frustrating because we only have one specimen paper so I can't accurately find my strengths and weaknesses. I did make some silly mistakes when I went through Section 1 first and scored 58%, but when I took a little bit more care I scored 83.3%. I'm so worried that the actual paper is much harder than the specimen, though. For Section 2 I have been over with my teacher, some TSR friends, and in my mind, I have come up with a few points but I have yet to write anything down.

What tests are you taking? What kind of revision/practise are you doing?
Original post by jamestg
I guess I'll have to resort to smell-o-vision


Genius. :lol: At least it'll give you an excuse to procrastinate.
How much weight do you think they'll give to these admissions tests when considering an applicant? Obviously they aren't going to disregard them completely (otherwise what would the point be?), but with this being the first lot of these kinds of tests it seems more like a test run and less like something make-or-break.
Or maybe I'm just worried :colondollar:
Original post by ABookThief
How much weight do you think they'll give to these admissions tests when considering an applicant? Obviously they aren't going to disregard them completely (otherwise what would the point be?), but with this being the first lot of these kinds of tests it seems more like a test run and less like something make-or-break.
Or maybe I'm just worried :colondollar:


They're not being used for shortlisting.

It's simply more information gathering.

It's also designed to fill the hole of AS grades, and also those from varying school backgrounds (IB, Cambridge Pre-U, A-levels etc). So they can look at applicants from the same benchmark.
Original post by jamestg
They're not being used for shortlisting.

It's simply more information gathering.

It's also designed to fill the hole of AS grades, and also those from varying school backgrounds (IB, Cambridge Pre-U, A-levels etc). So they can look at applicants from the same benchmark.


Ah, right--that makes sense, especially in regards to the AS having changed (I think I was in the last year to have been given AS grades, though I could be wrong). Thanks for clarifying! :smile:
Untitled.jpg
So here's my like general information that I managed to gather.

The thing I'd stress most is be clear with your argument, because half the essay specification is like 'Be Precise' so yeah. They want you to be really clear so say things like "The similarities between Source A and B in regards to Athenian Democracy are..." at the start of every single paragraph, so the reader knows what you're about to talk about. Similarly, end it with "Therefore, the similarities between Source A and B in regards to Athenian Democracy are...". Repeat yourself. Be dull. There's nothing on the specification about writing interestingly.

Secondly, looking at some subtleties in the specification, it seems like a thematic response may be preferred as it says to 'make connections between sources and ideas' and 'handle CONCEPTS precisely'. I assume it's not necessary, but Cambridge does have a whole exam section about 'Sources and Themes' so...

Thirdly, it talks about historical mentalities, so read up on your historiography like mad.
Reply 14
Original post by SteamboatMickey
...


Not to dampen any spirits or be a buzzkill, but if you want this to be a serious thread that people can actually find, you should probably name it something more constructive, both the title and header; just my two pence. :')
Original post by Zacken
Not to dampen any spirits or be a buzzkill, but if you want this to be a serious thread that people can actually find, you should probably name it something more constructive, both the title and header; just my two pence. :':wink:


Haha thanks, Zacken! Well, James suggested the title late last night and it seemed like a good idea at the time so :tongue: I appreciate your two-pence, I'll consider changing it :wink:
Original post by Rachel58
Untitled.jpg
So here's my like general information that I managed to gather.

The thing I'd stress most is be clear with your argument, because half the essay specification is like 'Be Precise' so yeah. They want you to be really clear so say things like "The similarities between Source A and B in regards to Athenian Democracy are..." at the start of every single paragraph, so the reader knows what you're about to talk about. Similarly, end it with "Therefore, the similarities between Source A and B in regards to Athenian Democracy are...". Repeat yourself. Be dull. There's nothing on the specification about writing interestingly.

Secondly, looking at some subtleties in the specification, it seems like a thematic response may be preferred as it says to 'make connections between sources and ideas' and 'handle CONCEPTS precisely'. I assume it's not necessary, but Cambridge does have a whole exam section about 'Sources and Themes' so...

Thirdly, it talks about historical mentalities, so read up on your historiography like mad.


Nice! Thanks so much! There definitely isn't anything on the specification about being interesting, but I suppose they'll have so many answers to mark and assess that they will probably appreciate originality as long as it's clever (i.e. a logical inference that may be abstract in comparison to others, but nonetheless makes a good point).

Thank-you so much, may I ask what the "ad..." word is where it lists the different types of language in the image? I am thinking about typing your image up if that's okay :smile: It is some solid advice for all of us taking the HAA :P (if that is your handwriting - it is superb).
Original post by SteamboatMickey
Nice! Thanks so much! There definitely isn't anything on the specification about being interesting, but I suppose they'll have so many answers to mark and assess that they will probably appreciate originality as long as it's clever (i.e. a logical inference that may be abstract in comparison to others, but nonetheless makes a good point).

Thank-you so much, may I ask what the "ad..." word is where it lists the different types of language in the image? I am thinking about typing your image up if that's okay :smile: It is some solid advice for all of us taking the HAA :P (if that is your handwriting - it is superb).


Just don't value originality over clarity.

I wrote it all neat for you guys!!! My normal handwriting is much fancier and curvier and you STILL can't read it!!! Gonna cry 😖😖😖 Advisatory 😜
Original post by Rachel58
Just don't value originality over clarity.

I wrote it all neat for you guys!!! My normal handwriting is much fancier and curvier and you STILL can't read it!!! Gonna cry 😖😖😖 Advisatory 😜


Haha, I think I need a stronger prescription for my glasses, to be honest. Thanks for taking the time to write it so clear :wink:

That's true! I think my method is going to be to get the obvious stuff out of the way and see if I can phrase some more original viewpoints and since I get a word processor I can just thematically group them together :biggrin:

Do you think a paragraph opener should straight away, and clearly so, outline what theme you are going to discuss? Or do you think it would come across as too simplistic?
Ahaha I'm hoping they don't weight it too heavily bc the admissions test is legit gonna kill me

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