As someone before me has said i found it all very basic until year 11. Pretty much just simple, logical, common sense stuff, and if not just needed listen in class and voila. However i have found now in senior school it is harder, and i can tell i am going to have to put in a lot more work, becasue honestly i pretty much relied on natural telent most of the way through. But you have to be serious. As people hve said if you wnat to get an honest answer it is a bit of both.
I got straight A's for my SC grades and all marks ranging from 85 to 99. And i won't say that i just fluked it. I did try and work hard, but mostly only at critical times. I revised before the SC and di all my assignments the night before.
I distinctly remember a history assignment which i got 95%+ for and got 45 minutes sleep that night.
I would not say i am an especially gifted or naturally super smart person or whatever, so i can't reallty answer... i can't even describe what it's like for me.
+1.
The junior school is dramatically different to the senior school. In year ten, I got away with pretty much zero study and top marks. I just put the effort when it was class and that is it. It was so easy and I didn't really have to think that much.
That said, I was always such a "deep" thinker and my brain would be (annoyingly) ticking. Constantly. So, I developed really good habits. I didn't study for the SC AT ALL, but I did great anyway.
Year Eleven is such a big leap and I am really having to work now. Sure, nothing from prelim goes into your HSC year, but still. At any given moment during the past month I would have at least one essay/assignment due. It was so crazy and I found it hard to deal first up - only now am I learning how to juggle everything.
OP: I am determined. That's what makes me work so hard. I want a good life, so to speak and I want to go uni. I want to get out of Sydney. I want to start life. And that, for me, begins with uni. But before that, the HSC. That's where I get my motivation and drive from - a desire to get away.