Coming up to the Trials, I find myself faced with a rather intractable problem. I'm doing pretty decently in my other subjects, but my performance in English Advanced and English Extension both leave much to be desired. I've just recently got my last assessment tasks back: 15/20 in an in-class essay for Advanced, 12.5/15 in a critical essay for Extension, and a mere 15/25 in an in-class essay for Extension. In the latter, we had to talk about three texts, and I'd only just started talking about the third when we had to put our pens down. I'm not a very fast writer—I've improved over the year, but I'm still not fast enough. My teacher (I have the same teacher for both Advanced and Extension) says if I carry this performance into the HSC, I'm looking at a Band 3 or 4. Combined with my other marks for my other assessment tasks, which have generally been middling (I'm currently sitting at around 14/23 in Advanced), and I'm seriously worried about the impact my English results are going to have on my ATAR. I want an ATAR of 76+, but assuming I don't do so great in English and good in other subjects (except for maybe Senior Science, but that's another can of worms)... is it possible? My English teacher suggested writing practice essays every weekend, but is there anything else I can do?