Uhmmm... it's not like that at all. The question was broad but one's inability to interpret that was being asked does not defer the fault to the BoardOS. Nor should it disadvantage unfairly to the kids who WERE thinking straight in the exam and did their best, and did it right.
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What bos said about the sor 2009 hsc exam (3 Viewers)
- Thread starter mesbaz
- Start date
I'll throw in my two cents for he sake of it.
my school studied Christianity/ Judaism. now, while there was a certain amount of indirectness of section 3, I was still able to make some sort of link between what we'd studied and the question provided. we studied Bioethics, the marriage ceremony and a significant figure for each (Moses Mendelssohn and John XXIII)
Now, in the Judaism question. it asked to
"Analyse the connections between the laws and lessons (or laws and teachings, cant remember but same same) of Judaism and the love of God" in reference to the guidance of adherents' lives
well, that was the gist of it, pretty close to verbatim IIRC.
the quote was a passage from Deuteronomy on how God's covenant with the people ensured his protection and love.
Now, I'm no Jew but anyone who has studied the faith should understand that their *entire lives*, in most aspects anyway, are guided by these laws. I had studied for both a marriage question and one on bioethics so it was just a matter of deciding whether i was gutsy enough to do both or just pick one
in the end i chose to stick with Bioethics for the sake of a concentrated essay with clear analysis and a direct link to the terminology used without bending too much, as the question dictated. So, really, if you knew your stuff you should have at least been able to answer in some form. I dont know if my response was even worth a high B in the end but i answered fairly enough based on what was clearly evident about a faith we spent two terms covering.
you guys need to be able to do this stuff, that's what they're testing for. be insightful and understand your subjects. memorised study should supplement your understanding, not replace it.
my school studied Christianity/ Judaism. now, while there was a certain amount of indirectness of section 3, I was still able to make some sort of link between what we'd studied and the question provided. we studied Bioethics, the marriage ceremony and a significant figure for each (Moses Mendelssohn and John XXIII)
Now, in the Judaism question. it asked to
"Analyse the connections between the laws and lessons (or laws and teachings, cant remember but same same) of Judaism and the love of God" in reference to the guidance of adherents' lives
well, that was the gist of it, pretty close to verbatim IIRC.
the quote was a passage from Deuteronomy on how God's covenant with the people ensured his protection and love.
Now, I'm no Jew but anyone who has studied the faith should understand that their *entire lives*, in most aspects anyway, are guided by these laws. I had studied for both a marriage question and one on bioethics so it was just a matter of deciding whether i was gutsy enough to do both or just pick one
in the end i chose to stick with Bioethics for the sake of a concentrated essay with clear analysis and a direct link to the terminology used without bending too much, as the question dictated. So, really, if you knew your stuff you should have at least been able to answer in some form. I dont know if my response was even worth a high B in the end but i answered fairly enough based on what was clearly evident about a faith we spent two terms covering.
you guys need to be able to do this stuff, that's what they're testing for. be insightful and understand your subjects. memorised study should supplement your understanding, not replace it.
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InaudibleMelody
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I wonder how much shit the writers of the exam are in over all this publicity...
I dunno, has this kinda thing happened before? I sure haven't heard of it. Maybe it's cause I'm doing the HSC this year which is why this problem has come to my attention.
I dunno, has this kinda thing happened before? I sure haven't heard of it. Maybe it's cause I'm doing the HSC this year which is why this problem has come to my attention.
InaudibleMelody
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My teacher said that the exam would be predictable and it's the easiest exam because the questions do not change much over the years.. I'm not sure if he's seen Question 3 yet.
But when you do compare Section three (Islam/Christianity) to past exams you can totally see a huge difference..
"I just realised..They prob got the "living religion" from the name of that studies of religion I and II textbook. LOL"
Haha..I have that...never used it at all though. I'd probably be able to burn it with the rest of my notes, and the school still wouldn't notice.
Haha..I have that...never used it at all though. I'd probably be able to burn it with the rest of my notes, and the school still wouldn't notice.
I am angry at what the Board of Studies chief executive Carol Taylor said about the feedback she has gotten, and she obviously never checked the boredofstudies forum to say such things. Here are articles on the issue:From Abc: Students in tears over HSC 'nightmare' - ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation) the Daily Telegraph: Rest assured, this is a fiasco | The Daily Telegraph yes, I am here to complain as well. I am not complaining about the whole section. Just the Christianity and Islam questions. The questions on the other religions were fine.
NewiJapper
Active Member
personally i just think all the SOR's are turning into a bunch of whinging bitchs. So what if they gave you a hard question that seperates the men from the boys? The BOS and other people have given creadible evidence that it was a sufficient question to test, and the BOS isnt dumb either. There is no way they would test something that wasnt HSC syllabus based.It's happend, its the HSC, get over it.
eucalyptblaze
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Am I in the minority in thinking that after reading that article that it was simply a harder question and not an 'outrage' as many claim it to be? Isn't it obvious that the BOS was looking for a way to challenge the students by giving an unpredictable question (which definetly was from the syllabus, if you did more then simply glance at it), and therefore would be more discriminatory, which is the point of testing all students. I sat the exam and became mildly paniced at first glance of the question, but after simply calming down, reading it again, and giving it some more thought, it really wasn't too hard at all. I think it just threw a lot of people off, and subsequently they gave up on it because they failed to understand it, and are now trying to make it seem like it was the BOS fault. Seriously, no one has been disadvantaged if everyone was in the same boat.
The problem with the SOR question this year is it asked a question an inteligent human would be able to answer, but a regurgitating machine that had a prepared answer wouldn't.
and i think that's the problem. The Board of studies is confused on their opinion on regurgitation vs a complete understanding of the topic.
In some subjects and even some questions within that SOR exam (section 1, 2) regurgitation was the way to go. A quick, mindless answer that wouldn't evne need to be thought about in the exam. I could go into the exam having my own mental fantasy and just write what i memorized the night before.
The board of studies has in a way "trained" students (like how you'd train dogs, but replace treats with marks), to regurgitate; but the Board doesn't know they're training students to do this, they sending mixed messages, saying "No don't regurgitate essays" and then turning around and giving those who do regurgitate full marks.
So when one of the Examiners wrote up section 3, he set a question that if you had studied the quotes in the Quran, the Hajj, baptism, whatever you did, with the purpose of LEARNING MORE ABOUT THE TRADITION, rather than with the purpose writing a pre-planned answer for the sake of a mark, THEN you would have had no issues.
I propose that the Board of studies needs to decide which one they want, an accurate, mechanical, and well written response.
Or
A thoughtful, creative, but messy and at points inaccurate style response.
Any attempt to "mix" these two together, will leave those who are used to regurgitating whining about how there were DIFFERENT WORDS USED IN THE QUESTION THIS YEAR.
and those who write creative response with great insight and an encompassing but not detailed concepts, will whine because they got a 7/20 because the marker didn't read (memorized)"key-words" and "key ideas" in their essay.
I suggest them to take the latter approach. Regurgitation may have worked in the industrial age, where the entire workforces job was to repeat the same task with little thought. But in todays age, computers will regurgitate any essay, formula, hospitality recipe much better than a human can. It is our Creativity and ingenuity as a species which will drive us into the future from now, and that needs to be reflected in our education systems.
Section 3 was pretty damn stupid imho. LIke for all the people out there at studied their butts of get stumped by an insanely worded and dodgey quote and then it's a level play field for whoever can bull$shit the most... FML
Well I think that the real problem is that even though they want us to think this year about our essay (which I don't necessarily think is a bad thing), whatever we write is still expected to conform to whatever new marking criteria they've worked out. I do 4 unit English, and I've learned that you never receive marks for creativity and lateral thinking unless it is a part of the marking criteria. So although those of us who were able to answer the question think we may have done ok, I'm betting unless we were lucky enough to stumble EXACTLY upon what they wanted, not many are going to pass. You guys have gotta stop stressing though; the ATAR is a rank, so if everyone is in the same boat in failing the one essay, it really won't make a difference : ) (That's what I'm hoping for anyway)
InaudibleMelody
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Aw.. yep, cause you sat the exam and everything..
eucalyptblaze
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I get the feeling that they just wanted to make a distinction between those who simply regurgitate pre-remembered essays and those who are good at thinking on their feetwhen something unexpected hits them, and who can understand more complexly formatted questions
kiki_koala
New Member
well what do you expect?? for them to test us on stuff that we don't know? you idiot.
to ICOLA, i think the "wasnt in the syllabus" was about the peace question for 2 unit religion,
but i totaly agree about the question for christianity,
i only do 1 unit religion
significant person - st paul
ethics- environmental
practice- saturday sunday worship.
the essay for the chritian practice was the only dotpoint that wasnt assessed in an internal exam, and thats what i based my entire essay around because i found it fitted nicely with the quote,
our teachers told us that any of the three dott points could have been used,
but i totaly agree that the christianity question was fairly ambiguous
but i totaly agree about the question for christianity,
i only do 1 unit religion
significant person - st paul
ethics- environmental
practice- saturday sunday worship.
the essay for the chritian practice was the only dotpoint that wasnt assessed in an internal exam, and thats what i based my entire essay around because i found it fitted nicely with the quote,
our teachers told us that any of the three dott points could have been used,
but i totaly agree that the christianity question was fairly ambiguous
shuttle_bus5
Active Member
Says the 2010er....
HOLY SHIT, stop complaining! everyone who keeps saying "oh boohoo the question was so hard, waawaa" are jsut making themselves sound stupider. Exams are MADE to set us apart, to show who LEARNT the course and who DIDN'T. Obviously, the thousands of kids who are making a fuss DIDN'T learn the course, because those questions WERE from the syllubus. All you had to do was think about it for 3 seconds, and look past the confusion of quotes and the absence of the key words to see what they were asking. Sure, if 95% of SOR kids couldnt get it, that would be cause to chuck a shitstorm, but there were a HELL of alot of us who understood it properly, my entire class thought it was a fantastic last section!! But seriously, these are pretty pathetic complaints, about it being a "hard exam question".morons. did you go into the HSC and expect they were going to ask something terrificly easy? Have you forgotten the point of exams?
Why dont you for a second stop being SO self centered and think about others? 'the thousands of kids who are making a fuss DIDN'T learn the course' --- err EXCUSE ME? Im dead honest sure, that the majority who are 'making' a fuss has studied their ass OFF, and are extremely distraught because they have studied and been thrown a question that they obviously dont KNOW how to attack. You know a 'hell' of people who loved it? I dont even know ONE. So go figure. We dont exactly to go to the exams and think that they were going to 'ask something terrificly easy' but we expect CLEAR, CONCISE AND SPECIFIC. You are so full of it.
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I totally agree. 1st of all were not complaining... we're just expressing our views on the exam. 2nd of all.... this has a title saying 'what bos said about the sor exam' soo practically it's referring to those people who thought the question wasn't great... so if u thought the question was good... well thats good for u... u don't have to smash it onto our face... you can have some respect and explain why u liked it and how it was taken from the syllabus rather than referring to people as 'morons'.... thats just disrespect.... because there's heaps of people who are stressing about the question... and people who are just lashing out saying that 'you should move on' are making it worse. people did study its the hsc as if u dont study.Seriously, you have a right to express what you believe... but do it in a polite manner.