RM column June 6 - Exam coverage in the media – good or bad

RM column June 6 - Exam coverage in the media – good or bad

By the time this column goes to print we will have already had many post-mortems on the various exams in the Junior and Leaving Cert. From the daily television news slot, to radio reports to the daily full page in the national papers dismantling the previous day’s papers.

You certainly don’t get this amount of news stories about people sitting university exams. The fact that nearly everyone who has sat the Leaving Cert agrees that no other exams taken after the Leaving Cert are as stressful. I know people in their 50s who still have nightmares about being back in school sitting these important state tests.

The deluge of media coverage isn’t really something that I thought much about before until recently when a couple of people have commented on how this is overdrive, stressful to students and completely over the top.

I don’t really agree with the comments completely but there is certainly some merit to their arguments.

On one level it is certainly gratifying that our media cover the exams so thoroughly when I was growing up there would be a small mention when exams started and when the results came out, other than that there wasn’t much else.

I wouldn’t have thought all this coverage would put more pressure on already pressurised and stressed students but then I am not sitting exams so I can’t say that for sure.
I do know that this time last year when the Young Wan sat her Junior Cert I was living on the last nerve I had as was she.

If I missed any pre-exam supplements on the Junior Cert I felt that I had failed to get her a study guide that might have made the difference between passing and not. So I suppose I fell prey to the pressure myself.

It could also be argued that covering exams in the way they are shows another side to our kids as opposed to the normal negative news story we are used to in the media.

Given the fact that a significant number of young people leave school without a Leaving Cert, isn’t it also a good thing that so much media time is spent on the Junior and Leaving Cert? It normalises the exams as something that everyone should have.

I understand that not every child is academic but there are still options for them to leave school with some kind of qualification in their back pocket.

Given the impending economic downturn I for one want my daughter armed with qualifications. The first people hit in times like that are those without exams behind them except for the exceptional few.

As an aside if you are a student and feel that things are getting on top of you a new text helpline has been set up which will help you get information from a range of helplines and support services such as the Samaritans, the Gardai and Parentline to name a few. To find out more text ‘headsup’ to 50424 or check out their website at headsup.ie.

Summing up I can’t decide whether all this coverage is a good or a bad thing. Have you children doing exams, what do you think? Are you doing exams yourself, how does all the media coverage make you feel?

RM Column May 30th - In praise of Transitions

RM Column May 30th - In praise of Transitions

I have to admit I was not the slightest bit enthusiastic about the Young Wan doing Transition Year. I just couldn’t get my head around it, ‘WHAT, a year with no studying, real classes or exams! Is that wise?

For me it made little sense for students to stop in their tracks after the Junior Cert, surely they would get lazy, get out of the studying and working habit at a crucial age. However I was wrong and I am delighted to say that, for a load of reasons.

Firstly having a year without the stress of exams has been fantastic, seriously fantastic for both of us.

Given that the participants in Transition range are on average about 16 years old the year gives them the chance to grow up and mature, something that I have really noticed in herself.
Then, if the school has a good Transition Year programme, they get the chance to do all sorts of weird and wonderful things. I’m not saying there were not complaints from the Young Wan about the year but it wasn’t along the lines of what I would have imagined it to be.

She threw herself into everything, volunteered for everything and one of her complaints was down to this. She took part in an engineering open day in DCU and hated it. But the point is she did it.

One thing she loved was an open day in one of the hospitals, particularly the radiologist. Personally I think it has a lot to do with the fact they were x-rays of the more bizarre cases such as the man who swallowed a lighter.

She went on field trips, overnight hikes, media courses, she did all sorts.

This putting her hand up for everything paid off too. As a result she was asked by her year head along with two others to do a talk for the students coming into Transition Year to tell them what to expect. One piece of advice she said that I think was really important was that the students in her year who have complained about being bored are those who sat on their hands and did nothing.

She has flourished over the year; she has gained confidence in herself and in school. She knows more what she likes and what she doesn’t. On top of it she is a year older and a year wiser.
I’m not the only person who has noticed. A few months back when she was organising to take a media course, of which only three students took part, I was in contact with one of her teachers.
Up to now this meant she had been misbehaving or something negative. But not this time.
After her teacher and I sorted out the details of the course she then said that the Young Wan was really doing well and they were seriously impressed with her.

About time too, I thought, after all she is an amazing kid. Then the report came in and it was brilliant.

It was about this time I started to change my views on Transition Year, I could see all these amazing changes in the Young Wan, I may soon have to refer to her as the Young Woman!
At the end of the year they had a graduation for the year where they were presented with all the certificates of the things they took part in during the year and the Young Wan has an impressive folder following all her activities.

As usual I found out about it the night before and she was like ‘ach few parents are coming so don’t bother’ and I didn’t go.

Then I got an excited text from her saying that she was nominated by her teachers for student of the year, one of five students given the honour.

Of course I could have told them she was more than capable of this but I suppose this was something the school had to see for themselves and this year, finally, she has allowed herself to shine.

So I am very proud of her and delighted with how much she has enjoyed the year. If you are about to go into Transition Year be sure and take part in everything, you’ll enjoy the year more and you’ll learn more about yourself.

RM colum April 4 - Picking the Leaving

RMcolumn April 4 - Picking the Leaving

THE TIME has come for the Young Wan to pick her subjects for the Leaving Cert. As important as this is the preparations into it all feels a bit hit and miss to be honest. Aside from the fact that reaching this stage is urrghh, I can already feel the pressure of LEAVING CERT EXAMS starting to rear their ugly head.

I found the pressure of the Junior Cert dreadful and it was only once it was all over that I was able to give a half sigh of relief, the full sigh didn’t come until the results arrived in September. And the thought of two more years of constant fretting about how much work the Young Wan is or isn’t doing leaves me absolutely cold.

Of course the Young Wan was also under pressure but at times you wouldn’t have known it at all.

So now we are at the choosing the subjects stage and the proceedings were kicked off with a parents meeting in the school during the week.

Oh God don’t get me started on parents meetings; the fact that they are held during the day is one of the most ridiculous and lazy things I have ever heard in my life. I have the utmost respect for teachers, I think they have a very hard job, but take a fecking night and talk to parents, believe it or not some of us work and believe it or not it can be hard to get time off work to attend this things.

And in some cases I am quite sure if a parent can’t make it there would be some who think they are not interested in their child’s education.

The Young Wan’s parent teacher meeting this week started at 12.30, so I was in work a couple of hours before I had to leave. It was due to finish at 3.30pm so it is not even a full morning or a full afternoon, it was half and half meaning that I was only in work for about two hours that day as there seemed little point in trying to head through all the traffic to get back into work for the last hour/half-hour.

I am lucky that I am allowed the time to do this, flash back to a couple of years ago and another work place and that would not have been an option at all.

Anyhoo back to the meeting; we sat there as each teacher got up and in English and Irish and explained about each of the subjects.

“Biology is the study of living things…” When I heard that or something similar, I thought ‘shoot me now’ but I sat on and listened to all the different subject descriptions, how much work they have to do and then my ears pricked up at the mention of a lottery.

All the chosen subjects have been placed into three lines with about three subjects in each. Each student has to pick one from each line but nothing is guaranteed. So far two of her preferred subjects are on one line ruling one of them out. That in itself was bad enough, but I understand that.

However it turns out because so many kids are in her year there will be a lottery for some of the subjects. And most of the year seem to be leaning towards biology which is one of the Young Wan’s best subjects and now she will be competing in some nonsense lottery and may not be able to take her best subject!

I understand the school is understaffed and doesn’t have enough teachers to cover all the subjects but if she doesn’t get subjects she has more interest in and is better at I will seriously be re-evaluating whether or not she can stay at that school.

After all surely it is also in the school’s interests to have their students get the highest results they can, but maybe that just makes complete and utter sense to me. I’ll keep you posted…

RM column October 19th - Transitional fun

RM column October 19th - Transitional fun

Well Transition Year so far is a blast, the Young Wan is having a ball and loving every moment.

The year is divided up into segments and she is just about finishing the first one and if that is anything to go by it will be a good year.

So far among the new things she has done is Spanish, music and home economics; she has also had an outdoor activity break as well as a trip to a hospital to talk to some people who work in various roles within the health service.

Home economics has been great and we have enjoyed her newly-learned chicken curry on a number of occasions. Her lasagne didn’t make it home because she said it was awful but her brownies (which looked more like they should be called creamies) were lovely and her chocolate muffins.

Trouble was her cooking partner hates nearly everything so the first time she made the curry she didn’t use any veg at all because of the other girl. So we had a chicken curry with about 10 pieces of chicken swimming around a frying pan with lots of sauce.

However that’s a minor complaint and not really one at all because at the end of the day she now has a dinner she can make, a dinner that could be ready some evening when I get home from work.

And on top of it all and probably more importantly she really enjoys it.

The day to the hospital also seems to have been massively enjoyed by her class.

She came home ranting about wanting to be a radiographer having been to a talk where they were shown funny x-rays and the like.

My own suspicions of her new career path is that it has more to do with seeing such films of the crazy things people do to themselves.

She laughed her head over one x-ray which showed a man to have swallowed a lighter.

I hadn’t the heart to tell her not everyday would be that, eh, fun. But I am impressed that staff in the hospital managed to impress a gang of 15 year olds, no mean feat.

Once this rotation of different classes ends the Young Wan will begin the next batch involving other new and exciting possibilities.

While I am still dubious about Transition Year I am delighted to see the pressure off herself, I am delighted to see her enjoying new subjects, she is also enjoying being a senior in the school.

I remain to be convinced about the benefits of not studying fully for the year but as I said I appreciate the pressure being taken off.

The next big fun thing, or so she thinks, is work experience. Apparently other kids she knows got paid for their time and I have tried to tell her that getting paid for work experience is extremely rare and not normal at all.

She looks at me like I am mad, but we will see just how mad I am when she finishes up her week and is given a big smile and hearty handshake for her troubles.

So for now for me the jury is out on Transition Year, it has been fun, informative and all sorts of things but only time will tell on the whole picture. But I can say I am glad the pressure is off because I don’t know who was more stressed over the Junior Cert exams, her or me…

Yeeeharrrrr results are in...

Well the Junior Cert results are in and we are delighted. Two passes and the rest honours! Well done Honey. The celebrations are on me tonight :)

Dum dum duuuummmmmm

A DRUMROLL please, tomorrow the Junior Cert results are in... In a couple of hours, my baby will have completed her first cycle of State exams, done and dusted and results in hand.

However it goes we are going to go out and celebrate with dinner. Sure what can you do, as I said before worse things happen at sea. And this time is something to celebrate.

So we'll grab an early dinner with some pals (one has a young baby) and then head back for a mini-party, after all it is still a school night ;)

And isn't that much better than the customary Junior Cert celebrations where they all get dolled up to the nines, get a carry out, get pissed and then finish their night throwing up somewhere.

So tomorrow the Young Wan will be well-behaved and it will be me getting dolled up to the nines, getting a carry out, getting pissed and ending the evening peuking ;) Oh and yeah, wish her/us luck.

RM May 5 - Three weeks and counting

Just catching up on a few columns here, bear with me. This is from the start of May when the countdown to the Junior Cert stepped up a notch.

Three weeks and counting

Three weeks and counting, no, not the election, the dum dum dummmmm Junior Cert. There have been deadlines for projects, art exams, last minute preparations, stress (mostly from me) and studying, thank God.

There has also been some last minute expenses, such as paying to register for the exam and more than a little snottiness from the school.

Apparently the Young Wan asked me sometime ago to get the past papers for History. I promptly forgot. When she has asked me to get stuff, I always tell her to remind me when I am in work, because I will and have forgotten.

Apparently her teacher threw a wobbler on Monday and herself and a gang of non-History past paper holders were told to leave the class.

The school then phoned my home, despite constantly being told if they want to talk to me to use my mobile, where they talked to Nanny.

Well they actually scolded Nanny like a bold child, why do teachers adopt this tone? It is not as if I am going to ignore what they say and reward herself for bad behaviour. If she is in the wrong I will and do take the necessary action.

So I do not appreciate ever having a teacher give out to me for the Young Wan’s alleged bad behaviour.

To make matters worse Nanny then phoned the Young Wan who was now in her next class setting off her mobile phone, a hanging offence in her school.

Course when the school phoned and said she had been put out of class Nanny thought she was put out for the day so she called her. While her phone was on vibrate, the Young Wan was caught frantically trying to turn it off.

So now the Young Wan’s phone has been confiscated as she was caught trying to turn iut off and if we are to get it back I must fork out €20. I am refusing. While she shouldn’t have had the phone on, the incident was preceded by the school’s behaviour.

When I phoned up they told me she was texting, I said she wasn’t texting but I didn’t have the full information of what happened until I got home.

So when I eventually got back onto them and told them so they stuck to their guns, so I told them to check the phone logs and they can find out for themselves.

I also complained about the tone the teacher used when talking to my Mum and again the school saw nothing wrong with this.

Well I do, I am not a bold child, my Mum is not a bold child and if the school wants parents on their side they should drop the patronising and ‘you’ve been very naughty’ tone.

Notice the way I haven’t yet ranted about the wisdom of barring a child from your class weeks before their first major exam, way to go to be supportive Teacher!

Now this is where I lost the plot with the Young Wan. When I was told of the incidents there was no mention of ‘Mum you HAVE to get me those papers’, I thought it concerned something she had already and didn’t bring to class. Nothing to this effect was said when I told her at this stage she really needs to be more organised.

No I was clueless until she was put out of class again two days later. Seriously. That’ll teach her, not.

Once again way to go Teacher.

I know it was my fault she didn’t have them and this has now been rectified but I still feel this was way too heavy handed, petty and frustrating.

The sooner this Junior Cert ordeal is over, the better.

Young Wan's Junior Cert Diary - Day 6

Day 6 - Business 1 and 2

I went over everything for Business, I can't stand business and can't wait to drop it. I don't mind business but I hate the accounting part of it all.

Business 1: I think I did well on this paper but I am not expecting miracles when the results come back. It was a lot of short questions put together and then Section B was six long questions and we had to do four. They are like Mary and her family went on holiday, the brocure said they are five mins from the beach but they are actually five miles. What law was broken? Write a letter of complain. I think I did alright on Paper 1.

Business 2: Paper 2 was arrgghhhh, warrghhh, terrible, the worst paper I have done so far. Terrible there is no more I can say, oh maybe, disastrous, catastrophe.

Overall: Meh *shakes hand to and fro*

Tomorrow: Science, last day, last day, last day, last day. Ohh last day.

Young Wan's Junior Cert Diary - Day 5

Day 5 - French, History

Studying for French involved me going over phrases over and over again. I was going over new words and verbs and tenses and well French in general. For History I went over my notes and Skoool.ie.

I also got assigned again to verify that the superintendents didn't open the exam papers before it was time to open them.

French: First of all we had a listening test, then we had the actual exam. The listening test was really easy because it was like mostly concentrating on numbers, half the time it only takes one word and you cope onto to what the word was. We given a load of questions to answer about someone, what they like, what age they are, etc.

All the questions except for last two were reading comprehensions. The last questions were a note and a letter. The paper was okay, I think I did well, I think I didn't do badly.

History: History was harder, I was really lucky, I answered 15 of the short questions, you have to answer 10. We are always told to answer more in case. I think I knew them all. They were like what is an artifact? Give an example of a secondary source? It was so easy it was brilliant.

We had two documents and two pictures. They were okay, the documents were pretty much relating to a question like a reading comprehension, the answer was in the text. I had to write an account on a monk in a monastery, Leonardo Da Vinci and a Roman. Well it was an ancient civilisation and I choose Rome.

Overall: Grand

Tomorrow: Business 1 and 2

Young Wan's Junior Cert Diary - Day 4

Day 4 - Geography, Maths 2

I got a bit of studying done over the weekend. I spent my time switching back from maths to geography and I think I got a good lot done. Before the maths exam everyone was going crazy trying to remember theorems and trying to get the sin, co sin and trigonometry down. That made me feel very nervous and I was mostly revising for trig as I wanted to get at least 50 marks down.

Geography: It was funny because the night before I was looking at Skoool.ie and it was about fold mountains. The exact same stuff came up on the exam and I was delighted. It was only worth about nine marks but it was part of a whole question.

We had a question on ordinance surveys and I didn't choose that as I forgot how to do it and picked the other questions instead. One was a photo that we had to draw a sketch map of and outline stuff.

The only thing that really annoyed me was the layout of the paper, which was nothing like the mocks. In the mocks we only got one paper and in the Junior Cert we got two sections.

Maths 2: I think I did well on the first question and question six. The other questions were about finding the area and we are allowed the formula, I tried my best to work them out. Overall it was fine, it could have been worse.

Overall: So so

Tomorrow: History, French

Young Wan's Junior Cert Diary - Day 3

We didn't get around to putting Friday's up until now, and I realise that if we don't put it up immediately the Young Wan completely and utterly forgets lots. Seriously how could you forget something so big so quickly. I had to eeeekkk this out of her with about 60 questions. Ah well, here's what she remembers from Friday.

Day 3 - OSSP/CSPE, Irish 2

OSSP: This was simple except I didn't know all the leaders to the political parties and my Mam went mad at me. The rest of it was a piece of cake. We had a selection of different topics like getting to know your neighbour and a mock election. I picked the mock election.

It was brilliantly, I wrote a page and a half on the tasks I would have to perform to make it work. I said that we would have to notify the students about it and ask our local TD about how to run an election and more stuff like that.

I also drew a poster, as part of the question. I wrote on the poster 'do you want to make a difference, VOTE'. So all round OSSP was fine.

Irish 2: This was also fine. We started with a reading comprehension and that was easy enough. It was just answering questions and answering your views on it, a bit like the English paper only in Irish.

There were questions on poetry and a novel, Dhialann Chaoimhe, we studied. Irish was simple but then it is an Irish school so you would hope so.

Overall: Friday was perfect.

Next: Maths 2, Geography

Young Wan's Junior Cert Diary - Day 2

Day 2 - Maths 1, Irish listening comprehension and Irish 1

I was really, really scared this morning, petrified in case I didn't know enough and would fail Maths paper 1. I left early and walked to school. Everyone was really scared too when I got to school. The vice principal opened rooms for everyone to study in so we did. He rang the bell and we went into the hall and took our places and I signed the exam papers to prove the examiners didn't open them beforehand. I felt very important :)

Maths 1: I opened the paper and knew the first question straight away, it was easy. But when I went on through the paper it got harder and harder and I just started answering bits and pieces of everything I knew. Then I went back in the last half an hour and went back over the questions I hadn't answered and wrote some stuff to hopefully get some marks. One of the sixth years forget her calculator for her exam and was nearly hysterical, I'd say she got one from somewhere.

Irish Listening: We were put into separate rooms for the listening comprehension and it was the easiest thing I have done since I went to the school, seriously it was so easy and it was higher level. ( Red Mum says: mmhh) It was so unbelievably easy it was great. We were the last class to finish so all the other classes had to wait on us to start the exam.

Irish 1: It was a reading comprehension, essay and conversation I had to write, to see how good my language is. I wrote about five pages altogether and it was fine. I was finished in about an hour and a half, the exam is two and a half hours, and I went over things for a bit and ended up leaving early because I was just sitting there. I don't think anyone stayed for the full exam, it was that simple. In other exams I won't have time to waste so there will be no leaving early.

I think they will try to shock us tomorrow with paper 2 because even someone with little Irish could have done paper 1.

Overall: Today was grand, Maths meh, Irish brilliant.

Tomorrow: OSSP/CSPE and Irish 2

Young Wan's Junior Cert Diary - Day 1

STUDYING and other things permitting, the Young Wan and I are going to attempt a Junior Cert diary. She is going to talk to me and tell me about it and I am going to attempt to put it down true to her telling here.

Day 1 - English

Last night I wasn't nervous but I was this morning. It was hitting me, oh my god, my Junior Cert, this could affect my Leaving Cert and everything. I got up at 7am and looked over some of my English notes and then I left early and went into school to find everyone was there already.

We just sat about talking for a while waiting to register for the exams. Then we all got called up to the library with the Sixth Years where a nun from the school said special prayers for us, all the guys were laughing in the background and then the principal started going mad saying 'everyone who doesn't want to take the communion, just get out'. The whole of our year walked out, no one stayed and some of the sixth years walked out too.

We then went down to the hall to find our seats and I am on the third row. They started going on about how important this is and all the rules and one of the guys who looked really stern talked about mobile phones and that you can't turn them on and make sure they are off. His phone went off twenty minutes into the exam.

English 1

It was fine and is mostly about my personal writing, functional writing. It was okay only after a while my hand kept cramping up so I had to shake my hand a lot.

I wrote an essay with the title 'the day started the same as any other nobody could have known by that evening I would be ruler of the universe'. I wrote about my friend and I finding a magic goldfish with a funny Dublin accent that helped us become rulers of the universe.

I think my Mum would have liked 'the teenagers guide to life' in the personal writing section but I didn't do it.

English 2

The first question was about drama and I took the Shakespearian one from the Taming of the Shrew. It was perfect, great. I looked at the others but I didn't like the questions so I did the Shakespeare one.

The poetry was fine, it was a comprehension on the poem and I had to choose another one. The poem I choose was 'Stellar Manipulator' by Paul Durcan, one of my favourite poems and that also went fine. I had to describe why the title was interesting and say why it appealed to me, an easy option I think.

I wasn't too sure about the fiction as I was finding it hard to concentrate at this stage. I couldn't spell Roald Dahl and had to write it down a couple of times.

Overall: I am happy with today.

Tomorrow: Irish 1 and listening test, Maths 1

RM column May 31 - Don't Panic

This is from this week's column and I just thought no better time to publish it here than today because exams have started and also considering the amount of junior and leaving certificate search queries hitting here. So good luck to all our Junior and Leaving Cert students, remember don't panic and worse things have happened at sea.

Oh and for tips and all sorts check out Skoool.ie, Leaving Cert stuff is already on the front page while the Junior Cert tips are here.

Don't panic

Darling, by the time you read this your exams will have started. They are the first of many exams you will sit over your life. And each time you have exams you will think they are the most important thing in the world. At this time, they kinda are but in the bigger scheme of things, they aren't really at all.

For now though the Junior Cert is your first big academic milestone, well if you don't count starting school in the first place or indeed secondary school. As big as those moments are, the first time you walk into the exam hall and see the evenly spaced tables and chairs, the vigilators, and feel the tense and nervous atmosphere you wont forget it.

Getting you to study has been hard and stressful on both of us and about a month ago I came to the complete realisation that nothing I said or did would get you to study in reality. I could shout, roar but at the end of the day unless it comes from you it won't happen.

Instead of panicking I have chilled out a bit and you appear to be studying and I say appear because we all know that you could be sitting there with all the books in front of you, making what looks like notes, flipping the pages of a text book and in your head you are singing 'Smells like Teen Spirit'.

Time will tell on that.

Besides I am constantly being reassured by people that the Junior Cert is more about scaring the hell out of students in time for them to knuckle down for their Leaving Cert. I don't know if that's true not having been through the education system here. But I know we will both be disappointed and devastated if your marks do not reflect your ability.

However at the end of the day once these exams are over, they are over, nothing to do until the results come in. And once you start the Leaving Cert course, the Junior Cert ceases to matter really. That's the way of exams once you do others above the last ones you have, the previous ones are pretty much defunct.

The main thing to remember over the next weeks is don't panic. Even the worst case scenario isn't the worst thing in the world. As I was told myself as a child, worse things happen at sea. Exams can always be resat, disappointment can always be overcome. Stress on the other hand can make you sick. So forget worrying just get your head down and do your best, that's all any parent wants their kids to do, their best. I couldn't ask for more.

This is not only to my darling, the Young Wan but it is also for all those who might read this column who are about to sit or have sat exams.

Remember don't panic, don't worry, do your best and worse things happen at sea.