PREDICTABLE first papers in English helped Leaving Cert students settle in to the exams. Ms Fiona de Buis, TUI subject representative and a teacher in Waterville Vocational School, Co Kerry, said that yesterday morning's ordinary and higher level papers were fine overall. The predicability of the papers was reassuring to students, she said.

"The range of essays at both levels was quite varied and offered good scope," added Ms Buis. Ms Anne Browne, an English teacher at St Thomas's Community College, Bray, Co Wicklow, said that the essays were predictable but lovely, containing a mixture of technology, the abstract and art.

However, Mr Pat Larkin, spokesperson for the Teachers Association for Media Education, was less than enthusiastic about the choice of essay on offer to higher level students (see sample question). "I felt that the composition titles were somewhat cliched and scant," he said. "They were certainly not novel and awe inspiring to enthuse on a wet overcast morning that opened the public exams." In particular, he deplored, the essay entitled "Time will tell

The choice of essays at ordinary level met with his approval, ranging from subjects as diverse as My thoughts on the eve of the Leaving Certificate examination, Religion in my life and A message from Mars.

Ms de Buis said that ordinary level students may have had some problems with section five of the unprescribed prose where the language was "cumbersome and difficult." Students on the first day of the exams are keyed up, she noted, and should not have to face any problematical experiences.

The unprescribed prose at higher-level, which dealt with the performance of St John's Passion in a small German church, should not have caused students many problems, according to Ms de Buis. Mr Larkin said that this section contained good testing questions, particularly in the examination of mood.

Ms Sinead Connolly, an English teacher in Senior College, Sallynoggin, Dublin, said that the 30 adult students in her class, ranging in age from 21 to 53 years, were very pleased with yesterday's papers. These Vocational Training Opportunities Scheme students were very happy with the essay choice and extremely happy with the prose." However some higher level students found the poetry in paper II a little difficult. Ordinary-level students described the second paper as "brilliant."

Ms de Buis said that the afternoon's papers, which deal with drama, poetry and fiction, were fair, with nothing out of the ordinary. At higher level, the drama question on King Lear offered students great scope, she added. The range of poetry was fine and was complemented by the scope of the questions. The questions on the novel were also well received by students in Waterville Vocational School.

"As usual the students were exhausted and wornout when they came out of a very demanding three hours," she said. They were drained by the combination of mental and physical effort. The answer might be to combine one English paper with another subject requiring less writing rather than holding both papers on the same day, she suggested.

At ordinary level, there were no nasty surprises in paper II and Ms de Buis welcomed the question on Kinsella which gave students an option to compare the imagery and mood in two poems.

Ms Browne said that students in St Thomas's Community College were very happy leaving the afternoon's exam. Some of the poetry questions on the higher level paper seemed to be pitched more at ordinary level, she added. Her students agreed with this assessment and one student who had dropped out of higher level a few weeks ago was upset that she had not stayed with it.

"SURPRISINGLY, Hopkins and Dickinson both came up (in higher level)," she added. "I had expected one of the two but was very happy to see both. . . Yeats was widely proclaimed and didn't come up. This may have upset some students who would have banked on his appearance. The question on Dickinson was lovely but demanding, said Ms Browne.

On the higher level drama, Ms Browne expressed surprise at the lack of a character question, other than one on Lear himself, in the King Lear section. The questions on the novel were good but students needed to watch out for the sting in the tail of the Wuthering Heights question, she said.

Ms Browne's final reaction hopefully mirrored that of most students and teachers, tired after day one of the exams: "I came home with an enormous sense of relief."