We asked six teachers to take this year’s Leaving Cert exam papers. Here are their thoughts on the exercise – and their results, as determined by experienced correctors
ENGLISH Paper 1
Roisin Ní Mhóráin
SO, WHAT POSSESSED me to agree to sit Leaving Cert English paper one? Was it an ego trip? No. An opportunity to show off? No. It was, in fact, a chance to re-acquaint myself with what my students go through every year.
I arrived at the Irish Times building with the questions of my colleagues ringing in my ears. What if you fail? What if you don’t get an A? What if, what if . . .
I put their worries to one side and focused on my thoughts. When it boiled down to it, I didn’t care about getting an A. In fact, I didn’t get an A the first time around, in 1993, so if I did get one it would be a pleasant surprise.
With paper one, you can’t really “revise” or “study”, you can only practise. So I set about testing my short-story writing skills, thinking I was excellent as I wrote. Once finished, I re-read my composition and realised just how awful I was. Short-stories were duly marked off my list. Then I focused on writing a feature article, giving advice on public speaking. I judged this effort to be slightly less atrocious and decided to stick to factual-sounding pieces in the exam.
Having knocked my confidence, by virtue of my savage correcting eye, I decided not to pursue the self-analysis any further and just do the exam and hope for the best. What does that say about me as a student? As a teacher? I hadn’t even sat the exam and I’d already learned something.
Exam day dawned and I reminded myself to practise what I teach, namely read the front cover, find the common theme connecting all the texts, before continuing to read the questions, followed by the texts. Could I do what I told others to do? Holding the unopened exam paper, I looked at the blank pages of my answer-book and had a moment of fright. It was so long since I had been faced by the scary sight of a blank page. I read the front of the paper. “The future” was the common theme linking the texts.
Text one, an interview with Séamus Heaney. A lovely piece of writing. Text two, a speech by Al Gore. Hard-hitting. Text three, an excerpt from a novel set in a future where books are burnt. Horrible. Decide to stick to Al Gore’s piece. Seven A4 pages later, I’ve answered as best I can on climate change and the mechanics of speech-writing.
I look to question B, size up my options. A letter, a radio talk or an interview. Decide on the interview. The piece is to be set 50 years in the future. My character is interviewed by a sprightly 90-something-year-old Miriam O’Callaghan and has been elected president. She talks a lot about past experience. But is a president really a politician? Decide to finish quickly before Miriam gets bored.
Now for the composition – 25 per cent of the exam. I settle on option five: “Write a speech to your classmates on your graduation night, encouraging them to be optimistic about the future.”
Right. What is there to be optimistic about? I can only come up with negatives. Decide to put myself in the shoes of an 18-year-old. I’m positive that the past six years of my life will stand me in good stead: surely running the gauntlet of exams, peer pressure, work experience and Friday afternoon detentions will all equip me for my future.
What else do I like about being 18? Social networking sites. My ability to communicate effectively and swiftly is second to none. I can utilise the wonders of modern technology like no one else. I finish by stating that the fatalism endemic to our society has to stop. I propose to my audience that they are the ones to put a stop to the negativity: after all, for change to occur, you must be positive.
ENGLISH Paper 2
Fiona Kirwan
“LOOK GUYS, I know it’s tough, and I really wouldn’t like to be in your shoes, but you have to try and stay focused.” Those words came out of my mouth on a sunny May afternoon. That evening I received a text asking me to re-sit the Leaving Cert English paper and write about it. The gods are listening, and of our complacency make instruments to plague us!
Every year I give my exam classes the benefit of my accumulated wisdom on what not to do. I tell them how it is essential to get up, get dressed, eat breakfast and get to the appointed place of study quickly in the mornings in order to minimise dossing. The critical thing is to stay at the desk. You eventually get so bored that you will open a book and do some study.
But what happened to me? I slipped right back into my default study mode. It used to involve “re-organising” my room but now I have access to an entire house (which also accommodates two children under the age of five) of unlimited cleaning opportunities.
Not only was I breaking all my how-to-study rules but I quickly began to break other exam preparation rules that I’ve always espoused, such as “don’t pick one or two poets, make sure to cover five thoroughly”. Everyone may have been banking on Boland, but I was yelling for Yeats.
But I also clung to some of my strategies. I’ve always believed that self-testing as you revise material is critical and I give study tips on how to do so. But as the hours fled away I realised just how difficult this can be as, while on most occasions it affirms your efforts, it can also confirm that nothing is staying in. But it did work, and I had moments of insight into just how gifted some of my students are in the way they stay motivated and positive under pressure.
In the minutes before the paper came, as I continued to clutch my pages of revision notes, I thought my principal would have to prise them from my hands. Because, like a small snake, the sliver of incipient panic writhing within was hissing.
"Surely you know it all already?" was the refrain from colleagues and friends. You know it, but not with the sort of specific, sharp accuracy required. You don't learn off poems by heart – you just check that they have. I can tell you what page, in what edition, to find specific quotes from Wuthering Heightsbut I don't know the entire sentences – just the start of them! The burden of the sheer memory retention required shocked and frustrated me.
So to the exam. My hand became a claw in the race against the clock. I used all the planning or pre-writing strategies that I recommend to my students – they helped.
But as I condensed months of discussion and insights to soundbites in the comparative studies section, the unfairness of it all began to rankle. Why was I being forced to rush all this while writing in agony with a cramping arm? I cannot claim to know anything about international best practice in the examining of English literature but surely there’s a better way to examine knowledge of literary material in a way that allows students to experiment with the expression of their ideas and gives them leeway to illustrate their understanding and range of knowledge? If 20 per cent of the history and geography papers are “in the bag” why, then, can’t a section of this paper be moved?
Why not let them research and edit a piece of work and then submit it in advance?
Don’t throw any logistical or economic excuses at me – I’m feeling a bit touchy. I let reality bite me, and I felt only a fraction of the pain; and, rather unexpectedly, I’m canvassing for reform.
RESULTS
PAPER I
Question A
The task was to outline Al Gore’s argument in support of his view that we are confronting a planetary emergency. In a well-organised, articulate response, the candidate identifies the causes and effects of climate change as presented by Gore, and resists the temptation to veer into a detailed treatment of the solutions. The candidate displays an excellent appreciation of rhetorical techniques, but the phrasing occasionally tends towards sloppiness.
Question B
Candidates had to write the text of an interview about the experiences and influences in their youth that contributed to their later success. The candidate’s choice of a newly elected president is interesting, but poorly thought out, leading to problems with tone. The consequences of the error are apparent in the opening exchanges, which deal not with youth, but with the interviewee’s path to election.
Composition
The candidate chose to write the text of the speech they would give at their school’s graduation ceremony, encouraging their audience to be optimistic about the future. The essay offers a spirited and enthusiastic case and a realistic appraisal of the challenges. The style is rhetorical and enthusiastic; the essay displays skilful use of rhetorical techniques, an engaging humour, and a constant awareness of its audience, while maintaining a very high standard of expression.
PAPER 2
Comparative study
The candidate’s discussion of Peter Weir’s vision and its expression in The Truman Show, their chosen text, is perfect. In the part of the question requiring a comparison between two texts, the discussion is interesting and impressive, well controlled and organised, and perfectly focused. The comparative points between the texts – The Tempest and Panther in the Basement – are well explained and well developed. I really enjoyed reading this piece.
Unseen poem
A technically adequate response to a technically adequate poem. The candidate claims that it is a “powerful” poem, but offers nothing to support this. A minor error.
Prescribed poetry
The candidate performs admirably in relation to the focus of the question on Yeats, and displays an impressive knowledge of the texts, perfect control over the delivery of the discussion, and a high standard of written expression.
Single text
This question requires a comparative discussion of two Wuthering Heights characters, Heathcliff and Hareton, with specific and consistent reference to “a positive attitude to the world”. I wish the candidate had attacked the quotation as inadequate and shown why. I longed for a bit more aggression, a bit more passion . . . a bit more Heathcliff.
Results
Paper 1: 178/200. Paper 2:193/200. Combined: 371/400 = 92.75 per cent (A1)
MATHS Paper 2
Brendan Guildea
WHEN ASKED BY The Irish Timesto sit a Higher Maths paper under exam conditions I immediately agreed. My role model in this is a former colleague and Holy Faith nun, Sr Eileen, who routinely sat the mock Irish exam and submitted her script for marking with those of her students.
I decided to sit paper 2, as I would then be well placed to compare and contrast the “traditional” paper 2 with the new paper 2 from Project Maths. I was somewhat nervous during the weekend, and on the night before the exam, I packed four biros, one ruler, one compass and two calculators. I was ready.
In the exam centre my invigilator gave me the paper and the new book of maths tables. Against my own advice, I started with Q1. (This was an error.) Drew lovely circles with the compass. All going well, I thought. Next up was Q3 – part (c) (ii) was messy. On to Q7, a lovely question. I hit a wall on the (b) part, but it came out after a bit of thought. Q4 followed: (c) (iii) was very tough and I left it until later.
One hour in, and the time budget was going very well. I continued with Q5 – it had a couple of tricky bits that made me think. The Option Q9 was the easiest question – I should have done it first! Back to finish Q4.
Did question 6 as a backup: not sure if I got (c) correct. Two hours have passed. Thirty minutes left to check everything.
Uh-oh! Q1 (c) answer is not correct. I redo it. Check answer, wrong again. I panic, redo it, fast. Still not right. Major panic! One final attempt, check the work: it’s correct, I think.
Time’s up.
Wow! Much more tired than I expected to be. Soooooooo glad not doing Irish paper next.Hats off to each and every one of you real students, who have to endure this rite of passage.
I am looking forward to my summer holidays. Then there will be the small matter of the stressful wait for my half-result. However, at my age I know life is a series of endless tests, trials, tribulations and deadlines which, somehow, we all survive.
Footnote:
I compared my traditional maths paper 2 with the Project Maths paper 2.
Aside from Project Maths questions 2, 7 and 9B (a), all the other questions were equivalent to the traditional maths Higher Level (a) and perhaps (b) parts. However, Project Maths candidates have to do every question. I have since observed that Q4 (b) in Ordinary Level was identical to Q9B (a) in Higher Project Maths level. This hardly seems fair.
RESULTS:The format of Paper 2 is that candidates must attempt five out of seven questions in Section A and one out of four in Section B. Each question is worth 50 marks, giving a total of 300
In Section A, the candidate attempted six questions – one more than the required number. In five, full marks were obtained, and in the sixth, 44 marks out of 50 were awarded. In some questions, methods other than the most efficient were used, but the answer was correct. Some marks were lost in Question 6(c), on probability, which traditionally causes many problems. But as this was an extra question, the score for Section A was 250/250.
In Section B, Question 9 was perfectly answered, giving 50/50. Therefore, the overall mark was 300/300 = 100 per cent (A1).
These corrections were not sanctioned by the State Examinations Commission.
Tomorrow:Irish, French and home economics
