Leaving Cert Irish Paper 1
Keelyn - Higher Level
This paper was quite a treat. The listening was fairly straight forward and the essay titles were fairly straightforward. The only essay i learned was heroes so i was delighted to see "daoine cailiula sa la ata inniu ann". overall I'm very happy - roll on paper two :P
Sarah - Ordinary Level
Well.. Irish Paper One is not usually something I would be nervous about... but as it got closer and closer to the exam I began to feel a bit sick. I sat in the room waiting hoping that it would be something easy and to my surprise, it was! The first part was the listening. I flicked through the questions and translated the main words. They were pretty easy questions I thought so me = happy! And thankfully the people speaking on the tape were easily understood too. I got the answers pretty quick so.. (Y) I flicked to the back of the paper to where the writing section was. My teacher got us to do the story and the letter (not sure if it's the same in all schools). I translated both parts of each one, I thought that both seemed pretty easy so once again, I was happy! I did the story first. I did the one about the fog in the mountains, which came to me pretty easily because one of the Sraith Pictúir's or however you spell it was basically the story of the sentence they gave us, so I found that grandddd. Then next was the letter. I chose the one about winning the game & the party afterwards. It was pretty easy to blab on about anything in that one so there was no major difficulty. Overall, I thought it was a good exam and I'm pretty happy with my answers for everything. Hopefully you's all found it okay! :) And hopefully paper two tomorrow will be in everybody's favor! Good luck to you all! :)
Please note: blog posts reflect the opinion of the author and not necessarily the opinion of the Irish Second-Level Students’ Union.
Leaving Cert Maths Paper 2
Keelyn - Higher Level:
The one word I would use to describe this exam is better. Paper two was nicer than paper one. Some of the questions were quite tricky especially the last long question, about a clock of all things. There was a lot of probability and statistics. I'm confident I passed it but I doubt by very much.
Aoife - Ordinary Level:
Maths paper 2..... Well, it wasn't ideal but it was decent... It was expected to be more difficult than paper 1 considering the how straight forward that exam proved to be. I feel some of the questions were just oddly phrased and I spent most of my time trying to figure out what it was asking me rather than actually doing maths. The test overall seemed needlessly complicated in words but once you could decipher it, the "maths" part was actually quite easy.
Brendan - Ordinary Level
This was a much better paper overall than Paper 1. Although parts were tricky, the 70 marks available for the question about the property tax was very straightforward and topical. The questions were not too wordy and in line with what was expected. A question about a windmill was also topical, but slightly more challenging. Section A allocated 50 marks to probability and although definitely not my favorite topic it was generally fine. Questions 3 and 4 were also fairly nice. Most candidates seemed relatively happy. A quick change of focus was undoubtedly needed with Irish in the afternoon and many students, excluding me, can see light at the end of the tunnel with a large chunk of the exams now out of the way. Best of luck with Irish Paper 2!
Please note: blog posts reflect the opinion of the author and not necessarily the opinion of the Irish Second-Level Students’ Union.
Leaving Cert Geography
Declan - Higher Level
I like Geography, so I was positive going into todays exam. I started off by doing the short questions, which usually are fine. However, I felt some of the questions were a bit tricky and I did guess I few... We have a selection and get marked on 10 in total (So, hopefully, that will be ok).Many people feel physical geography is the easiest, I prefer the regional & particularly the economic geography. I was delighted many of the questions I have covered really well came up, like the multinational companies (I had the Johnson & Johnson case study revised) and I did the case study on the Wexford coast for the question on human interaction with coastal processes. I felt these went well. I was delighted with my answer in the economic geography section, particularly the question on the impacts on the european union enlargement. Overall, I thought the long questions were pretty good.This morning in school there was a lot of predictions on the essay. Unfortunately, I'd imagine there was a lot of disappointment when the desert biome didn't come up. I was a risk taker with the essays and only had the human alterations to biome studied, goes to show stick with your instincts! Although, for future students I'd recommend be well covered for the essays (that section is worth 80 marks!!), because there was people who weren't in the best situation with only the desert biome learned.A bit of advice, don't base your exams on predictions it doesn't work out (look what happened Heaney for english paper 2).All in all, I thought it was a decent paper and I was happy with it. It's always good to know that we have a project done for this subject, it gives ya a bit of reassurance in a exam.Best of luck to you all in the exams ahead!
Please note: blog posts reflect the opinion of the author and not necessarily the opinion of the Irish Second-Level Students’ Union.
Leaving Cert Maths Paper 1
Keelyn - Higher Level
Although certain parts of the paper were doable, some of the questions were quite mean especially considering there was no mention of financial maths or algebra. It was mainly to do with arithmetic series and integration. Let's just hope paper two will be more straightforward
Brendan - Ordinary Level
Area and Volume and Co-ordinate Geometry are expected to generally appear on Paper 2, but in going with what seems the general trend of the state examinations so far today bucked the trend and emerged on Paper 1. Apart from that there were no major surprises, although of course some questions proved more challenging than others. A question about the theory behind complex numbers was thought provoking. Overall it was a manageable paper, the final question about the rocket was in particular very straightforward. Most of the candidates seemed reasonably happy with the paper and are now looking forward to a brief rest before diving back into study. Paper 2 is my stronger of the two, and I am looking forward to Monday.
Aoife - Ordinary Level
It would be completely impossible for this exam to have gone any better. Everything was so straight forward, and that 75 marker at the end was the cherry in the cake. The tricky question with the box had me stuck for a while, but it was more manageable when I stopped to think about it. I spend so much time studying for paper two, I was a bit worried with this one but that paper was easier to me than any of the sample papers I did to prepare for the exam. I know many people that were struggling with ordinary maths that were laughing as they came out. I'm hoping for a B with that paper, let's hope paper 2 is as nice. :)
Please note: blog posts reflect the opinion of the author and not necessarily the opinion of the Irish Second-Level Students’ Union. Blogs are updated daily by 6.30 pm on scheduled examination dates.
Leaving Cert English Paper Two
Shahed - Higher Level
The dreaded English Paper 2, where the questions are either awful or a blessing. Thankfully, the general consensus this year is that it was a nice paper throughout!I opened the paper and quickly read the questions. When I saw the poetry section, I nearly screamed with joy. Thank you, SEC!!For the Single Text, I answered the question about Macbeth's relationships and how they can be seen as power struggles. This was a pretty straightforward question with a lot of leeway for answers, as you could include literally any of the other characters in the play. It was a nice start!For the Comparative Study, I answered the Cultural Context question relating to difficulties that the characters face and how they respond to them. This took some thinking, but once I got into it, it was quite simple.Next was Poetry, the section that everyone dreaded. I turned the page and who was there but Seamus Heaney, yet again! Only this time, for the Unseen Poetry questions, which related to what the meaning of the poem was and two of your favourite images or else to give your personal response.The Prescribed Poetry section was a miracle. Emily Dickinson and Sylvia Plath both came up, as did William Butler Yeats and Philip Larkin. Despite the fact that this section is worth the least amount of marks, it's certainly the hardest and the one worried about the most. The poets were all what everyone hoped for and the questions were straightforward. I answered about Plath's language and theme.With one subject down, I now have six left to go. Time to tackle some maths!
Nicole - Higher Level
Hi everyone!First off I should say (and this will say a lot about my personality) that I only realised today through no one's fault but my own that I WAS blogging English. So apologies there.So onto the papers. Well I'll say this first because we're all thinking it: HEANEYYYYYY!!! *shakes fist at the sky*Where were you where we needed you? All my very brilliant English teachers in my school and heck, every teacher in the country was counting on him to come up. And he did!...in the comprehension and unseen poem. Err I think I'm speaking for everyone when I say this, that's not what we meant exam makers!Though I must be honest, it was not a tragedy for me as it was for some as I was counting on my gurl Emily Dickinson all the way (see my bio) but still. Cheek.So Paper 1 went alright didn't it? It's nice I think how we have an exam that doesn't require studying (unless you're hardcore) on our first day. I went straight to the back page once the clock hit 9:30 and checked out the titles for the composing sections. I had decided previously that personal essays and speeches were just not for me. Unless I can rant about something I truly am passionate about, I'm pretty useless with them. The title I ended up choosing (and quickly so, though we are warned about not reading the paper properly, lets face it nobody wants to dawdle around) was the ghost themed story. Once that was picked I quickly scanned the rest of the paper (taking a second to appreciate the irony of Heaney showing up in Paper 1) and I went straight into Question A. I chose Text 1 (as did most of my year I found out later) and went straight to work. For some reason I do this thing where I write absolutely loads for the first question of whatever exam I do, and this was no exception. I must have spent over an hour on those silly comprehension questions! Question B I chose from Text 2, a speech on positive and negative influences in young peoples lives. I started writing and I somehow twisted it around to suit myself and made it really about looking out for abusive relationships, that the ones we most love could be the most harmful. Pretty heavy stuff but I was pleased enough. And then my story. Well my story was implying that my character was just after dealing with someone dying but their memory still haunting them. And let me tell you readers, I thought I was the STUFF writing it "Aw yeah this is going to be GREAT!" I was thinking to myself. And of course I was punished for my arrogance when I read over it as it was...well I was alright I guess. In summation I think Paper 1 was grand. Really, to be honest I have no idea whether it went really well or bad, but by talking to others I can safely say I'm not alone in feeling that way.Now Paper 2. How lovely was it to start at 2:00pm? I had attempted to studying yesterday but I only succeeded in organising my notes, watching a John Green live show and giggling to myself at the always fantastic Leaving Cert memes that surface this time of the year (the Seamus Heaney ones; oh LORD people will not let that go anytime soon). So I tried again this morning with about 50 million pages in my hands, reading them over and over and over and so on and just hoped while I could not feel it, that SOMETHING was going into my head.When the exam started at 2, I think I was in shock because everything I was reading just didn't seem to be reaching the part of my brain that y'know, comprehends anything. "Huh?" I was saying, having to read over and over, until I could finally focus. Everyone dashed to the last page to see who the poets where and thank god, the woman herself, Emily Dickinson was there. I was also doing 'Macbeth', and for my comparison essay my chosen texts were 'Wuthering Heights', 'Sive' and 'Casablanca'.The first thing I did was my comparison section, which was on the cultural context because I could never throughout the two years of the Senior Cycle comprehend the order and structure of an essay like that. I caaaaaaaaaan't flip back and forth between texts without getting very confused and structurally diabolical so I literally needed to learn off the order of what I was going to say. Again I spent a good hour or so on it and it was by far my longest piece in the exam (which is fine by me, its a good load of marks).I had to note how the people in the texts reflected the society so I tried by best by mostly repeating the sentence "This is shows how ___ was a reflection of this culture".Then I did 'Macbeth', which everyone thought would be about Lady Macbeth but alas, was not. I find in essays like this, just be really strong in opinion. Say things like "I would argue that..." "Some critics say..." heck even if the critics you are referring to are make believe, it sounds a lot stronger, like you are certain of what you are talking about. Then I went onto poetry which, for future Leaving Cert students I have to say to you, try not to stress about too much because it's not even the biggest part of the exam. But every year people stress (with good reason, don't get me wrong) about this section and you're just going to make things feel a lot worse for yourself. My poetry essay I found out was a lot shorter than what my friends were saying their's was, but even then there is no point on stressing about it now, its over! Lets celebrate! When I finished my unseen, I literally exhaled like the way you would after taking a gulp of a cold fizzy drink "Ahhhhh!" partly because my hand had been killing me and could finally rest, partly because I'd needed to go to the bathroom for over and hour but was too afraid to leave and waste time, but mostly, MOSTLY because I was DONE.Thanks for reading!
Please note: blog post reflect the opinion of the author and not necessarily the opinion of the Irish Second-Level Students’ Union.
Leaving Cert English Paper One
Shahed - Higher Level
The past two years have been building up to this moment and now here it was: the first day of the Leaving Cert! The first exam was English Paper 1. I wasn't nervous beforehand, as it's a nice paper to start off with (usually!) I took some time to read through the paper then dived into the questions. The texts were, for the most part, straightforward, though people were thrown when they saw Seamus Heaney in Text 3! I answered Question A on his essay, which was about the importance of objects from the past. For Question B, I wrote a talk on negative and positive influences, which was without a doubt the best question of all three, in my opinion. Next came the composing section. Luckily for me, there were two short story questions, so I was spoiled for choice. The first was about a ghostly presence that plays a significant role and the other was to be based on "...a new beast, slouching towards us... The beautiful mutant," which was taken from the second text. I chose the short story about the ghost. Over all, I think it was a good paper and am happy with how it went. Here's hoping Paper 2 is just as good!
Please note: blog posts reflect the opinion of the author and not necessarily the opinion of the Irish Second-Level Students’ Union.