band 6 standard english, is it possible? (1 Viewer)

bananainpjss

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so i chose standard english because all my english teachers said that advance is wayy harder than standard. and the workload is very different and that most people shouldn’t do advanced. now that i have chosen standard, i want to move up to advanced because i find standard is too easy and i think i’m capable of doing advance. the problem now is that my school isn’t letting me move up and now i don’t know what to do. does anyone have advice on what i can do now? i have also read that getting a band 6 in standard is extremely hard and only 1% actually gets it. why is the percentage so low and what can i do to get the band 6.
 

Drdusk

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so i chose standard english because all my english teachers said that advance is wayy harder than standard. and the workload is very different and that most people shouldn’t do advanced. now that i have chosen standard, i want to move up to advanced because i find standard is too easy and i think i’m capable of doing advance. the problem now is that my school isn’t letting me move up and now i don’t know what to do. does anyone have advice on what i can do now? i have also read that getting a band 6 in standard is extremely hard and only 1% actually gets it. why is the percentage so low and what can i do to get the band 6.
I did standard as well and well there are many reasons such as.

- Standard is the lowest course and so most of the low ranking schools have almost no one in standard that actually cares about the HSC and I'm saying this from experience. Out of the 180 people in standard in my school I was the only one serious about the HSC..

- All the selective schools and top private schools have Advanced as the lowest option and many force students to take Ext 1 in prelim so already the best in the subject are in advanced by default.

- You have to get a really high mark for it to align to a 90, higher than advanced.

Regardless if you find it easy then you can definitely get a band 6. There's a saying that the students who get band 6's in Standard should've been in advanced anyway. I suggest try and get into Advanced, tell them your finding it too easy and maybe if you get a good result in the first assessment they'll even let you move up - this has happened before in my school. All in all do the course which best suits your ability so you won't be limiting yourself in any way.
 

Carl10101

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so i chose standard english because all my english teachers said that advance is wayy harder than standard. and the workload is very different and that most people shouldn’t do advanced. now that i have chosen standard, i want to move up to advanced because i find standard is too easy and i think i’m capable of doing advance. the problem now is that my school isn’t letting me move up and now i don’t know what to do. does anyone have advice on what i can do now? i have also read that getting a band 6 in standard is extremely hard and only 1% actually gets it. why is the percentage so low and what can i do to get the band 6.
I would really try and push them to move you into advanced because it will be worth it in the long run.

If they still do not let you, really just try your hardest and try not to let your classmates influence/distract you if they are not working at the same level or caring about the HSC. If you do find it easy then you could be part of the 1% that does achieve a band 6.

I know this is common advice for all subjects, but I would highly recommend getting constant teacher feedback or looking into tutoring if you want to push your marks from 70 to 80 or 80 to 90 etc, due to the fact that english will be 2 mandatory counting units and english standard doesn't scale that well historically.
 
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I had the exact same question as you coming into my HSC year lol, and I won't deny that it's definitely tough to get a B6 in standard English. What you can probably do from now on is to do your best in studying for english standard. A band 6 is possible, but you'd have to be ranked within the top few in your school. For me (scraped up a band 6 in english std.) I was ranked 5th of 76 people which definitely helped, so definitely try to start off strong with your assessments and secure a good rank.

Try to use every resource you can to improve at english std. like your teachers (their feedback is important bc every school marks a bit differently!) and if they take english seriously, your friends and classmates. Also I recommend looking at B6 responses online and preparing dot point or responses for each part of the syllabus. A band 6 isn't impossible, and I'm sure you'll be able to get it if you put in the effort! :)
 

bananainpjss

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I would really try and push them to move you into advanced because it will be worth it in the long run.

If they still do not let you, really just try your hardest and try not to let your classmates influence/distract you if they are not working at the same level or caring about the HSC. If you do find it easy then you could be part of the 1% that does achieve a band 6.

I know this is common advice for all subjects, but I would highly recommend getting constant teacher feedback or looking into tutoring if you want to push your marks from 70 to 80 or 80 to 90 etc, due to the fact that english will be 2 mandatory counting units and english standard doesn't scale that well historically.
my headteacher of english gave me the condition that if I hand in one of my essays, she'll think about it. I'm deciding between the importance of being earnest or macbeth. which one do you think I should do?
 

Carl10101

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my headteacher of english gave me the condition that if I hand in one of my essays, she'll think about it. I'm deciding between the importance of being earnest or macbeth. which one do you think I should do?
I would recommend whichever you think you would write a better essay for, which would hopefully convince them to move you up.

I would also try to reference a text, multiple texts or quotes or something subject-relevant in the essay so that you can demonstrate that you have the ability to perform good textual understanding and analysis in relation to your theme/topic.
 

_rakelt

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Hello,

I really wanted to do advanced english during HSC, but my year 10 marks were not outstanding so my school didnt let me. Instead, I did standard english and I have NO regrets. During my junior years, I was always a C student in english but I really push myself to do well for standard english when i started yr 11.

I got a band 6 for standard english as I expected, but I was surprised at how well it scaled my atar up seeing that it was only 'standard'. Don't think simply because its standard, its not that great compared to advance because its possible to do great for hsc : ) Good luck!

Also, I'd prefer getting a band 6 in english standard than a band 4/5 for adv english - just my opinion.
 

bananainpjss

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Hello,

I really wanted to do advanced english during HSC, but my year 10 marks were not outstanding so my school didnt let me. Instead, I did standard english and I have NO regrets. During my junior years, I was always a C student in english but I really push myself to do well for standard english when i started yr 11.

I got a band 6 for standard english as I expected, but I was surprised at how well it scaled my atar up seeing that it was only 'standard'. Don't think simply because its standard, its not that great compared to advance because its possible to do great for hsc : ) Good luck!

Also, I'd prefer getting a band 6 in english standard than a band 4/5 for adv english - just my opinion.
ahh thank you for this!! Fortunately, my school let me move up to advanced so I hope I'm not going to regret this and do well in advanced.
 

Cherrybomb56

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I did standard as well and well there are many reasons such as.

- Standard is the lowest course and so most of the low ranking schools have almost no one in standard that actually cares about the HSC and I'm saying this from experience. Out of the 180 people in standard in my school I was the only one serious about the HSC..

- All the selective schools and top private schools have Advanced as the lowest option and many force students to take Ext 1 in prelim so already the best in the subject are in advanced by default.

- You have to get a really high mark for it to align to a 90, higher than advanced.

Regardless if you find it easy then you can definitely get a band 6. There's a saying that the students who get band 6's in Standard should've been in advanced anyway. I suggest try and get into Advanced, tell them your finding it too easy and maybe if you get a good result in the first assessment they'll even let you move up - this has happened before in my school. All in all do the course which best suits your ability so you won't be limiting yourself in any way.
how hard do you have to study for standard to get a band 6? and why is it really hard to get a good mark In standard? Is it just because no one in standard puts much effort?
 

Drdusk

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how hard do you have to study for standard to get a band 6? and why is it really hard to get a good mark In standard? Is it just because no one in standard puts much effort?
I wouldn't say it's 'hard' to get a band 6. The course is easier than advanced. If you get a band 6 student from advanced they could probably get a band 6 in standard with a bit less effort. Point is as I said most of the cohort doesn't really care about doing well in it and I speak from experience.
 

quickoats

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how hard do you have to study for standard to get a band 6? and why is it really hard to get a good mark In standard? Is it just because no one in standard puts much effort?
It is just 'uncommon' to get a band 6 in standard. There are 2 reasons which are the cohort itself and the alignment process. Lots of people in standard do the bare minimum and don't really care so that's why the marks aren't great. To get a band 6 in standard, you would need a raw mark in the 90s, whereas in advanced, you'd only need something in the low-mid 80s. NESA compares the common module/paper 1 to help determine this alignment but in essence, it means that they feel a 90s raw mark on the standard paper is an equal achievement to the 80s raw mark on the advanced paper.

Note that the equivalent aligned mark scales exactly the same i.e. a 90 in standard gives the same atar boost as a 90 in advanced.

I got 89 in standard (idk my raw mark) but if I continued with advanced I would've gotten a much lower score because that's where I placed in the grade. People in advanced who got 89 HSC ranked about 15-20ish but I was rank 100+ so I did better off in standard.

I guess there are 2 types of people who should or should not drop to standard? My writing was pretty decent (good marks in HSIE) but I just couldn't grasp the complex texts of advanced so doing the easy standard texts allowed me to get some decent marks, thus I was better off in standard. However, some of the people that dropped to standard just weren't good at expressing themselves in writing and did not improve on their advanced marks (their essays were always just meh) so they might have been been better off riding the alignment of advanced.
 

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