Okay, I’m not going to lie and pretend to sound studious- I went out drinking last night!

It can only be described as brilliant. There was so many leaving cert students out, I was gob-smacked. Today I am unregretful- something my friends find impossible to believe, it really was a well deserved break and I didn’t go over the top (unlike the grad mass two weeks previous). The music was great and the craic was forte. Us leaving cert students simply laughed it off as college friends slagged us about our current affliction.

This morning, I thankfully awoke with a clear head and away I went with another days study (or lack thereof). I remain optimistic and have chosen to completely forget about completed exams which clouded over me last week. This week will be long and daunting. From Monday morning I have two exams a day starting with maths paper 2 and Gaeilge paper 1. Things are getting easier in a way as we conform to the long and strenuous day.

We are almost over the line!

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Tags: drink, exams, leaving cert, social, student

After yet another night of only 4 hours sleep, I got up again at 6am to look over some notes and practice a little. The exam seemed fine at the start. I had a quick glance over it and told myself that I was going to make a good effort at this.

The first question that really frustrated me was question 1, part C, (ii). “a cent less than a multiple of €10″. In fairness, thats more like they’re trying to trick us rather than focus on what we were actually preparing for. I never seem to grasp how or why they phrase questions in such akward ways and hinder people from showing their actual ability to solve the given task.

I ended up doing about 7 questions out of the 8 just to be safe. I wasn’t very happy with the exam I have to say and I really hope that Paper 2 will put me in a better mood.

Now If you’ll excuse me, I am going to head out for a well deserved pint!

Tags: 2008, exams, leaving cert, maths, maths paper1, ordinary level, paper1

Maths paper 1 came a with devious questions this year, many part C’s consisting of confusing symbols and figures. Question 1, arithmetic is generally the easiest on the paper- Not for me this year. Terrible phrasing was seen throughout part C where we marked-up the sale price of an unknown item.

After a bad start, I got into the game and flew through my questions only experiencing a demanding question here and there. Under the stress of the moment it is hard to remember every little rule during differentiation and functions but I managed to pull through.

Overall: Satisfactory. A few friends are very unhappy. many fear failing! If a high failure rate is possible in ordinary level subjects then it’s my opinion that the exam should be revised. Although we still have paper two to regain our optimism, paper 1 has out a dampener on many students weekends!

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Tags: exam, leaving cert, maths

This morning I had a fry cooked up for me as promised. What a start to the morning. I ended up setting my alarm for 6am to begin my 2 years revision for the English course. I gambled and decided to learn one poet that morning, having only briefly skimmed through Boland.

As soon as I was seated, I flicked through the paper to see what poet had come up. And lucky I was, there he was, Derek Mahon. The gamble had paid off, having only revised one single poet. I read through all the questions on the paper and then began doing what I like to call, a ‘memory dump’. I began writing out all the names of poems, authors and texts. Then quotes from each poem I had learned that morning.

The Othello question wasn’t as bad as I had expected. I never got around to learning any quotes, so I had to resort to the only one I knew. “Oh honest Iago”. I was tempted at times to make up my own quotes, but I figured that might not go down well. I ended up writing about 5 pages in total, probably having spent a little too much time on the question.

With Othello out of the way I began the Comparative question. Theme & Issue, something I had not prepared for at all. Most people seemed to learn off A standard essays and write them out again. I got caught for time in this question as I got bored during part B and moved on to the Poetry section.

The final section went down quite well, though I found it hard to answer the question properly. I had the knowledge and the quotes so I may have gone off topic a small bit. Oh well.

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Tags: 2008, english, leaving cert, Paper 2

Like a walk in the park… I think not. My primary poet did not come up, where were you Eavan Boland! But not to worry I managed to put together the few bits on Philip Larkin I strenuously put together this morning at 5am. I have been running on caffeine all day! I have to say I was a little calmer this morning for paper two of English than I was yesterday morning despite this being notorious as the more difficult of the two.

It was exceedingly predictable (despite Boland!) in my opinion, with a nice Othello question as an opener. I did the question on Othello’s foolishness and I got a great quality piece out of it, supporting it with my plentiful quotes. Next was the comparative study, I went down the theme or issue lane, I hope I didn’t waffle with this one too much switching between the 3 texts on the one theme.

The unseen poem was very straight forward and the question on a personal response was ideal for me. I was very pleased. The dreaded prescribed poetry followed, switching between Mahon and Larkin, I settled on the poet of unhappiness- Philip Larkin. I had been banking on Eavan Boland but I did my best and I am just glad to have English over and done with. The paper was very fair with no big surprises.

Maths paper 1 in the morning. This should be a doodle as I like to think I am good with numbers and figures but then again I’m taking the ordinary level paper for this one.

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Tags: exam, leaving cert, poetry

1 down, a LOT more to go. I awoke early this morning, it must have been 7am, and by no means had the Leaving Cert hit me. I drank my numerous supplements, minerals and other general remedies that we seem to indulge in at this time of the year. Who knows if they work, we’ll just pretend that they do anyway.

I arrived at the school with plenty time to spare. It was only at this moment my nerves got the better of me. But by no means was I overcome by them. I enetered the exam hall and the general frenzy that you would expect to happen was going on, running around for exam numbers, borrowing pens, etc.

The paper hit the table like a ton of bricks and I felt the pressure of it! “You may begin!”. IDENTITY, teenage society, the one I didn’t read, writers study rooms, this was by no means difficult. But we all have our weaknesses and mine was time management. I was running out of time when it came to doing only my second question of three. It was rushed. My composition was a race against time, but I finished what I began, definitely not the length or quality I imagined but we all make mistakes. Let’s hope to rectify these in the coming days!

I left the exam hall neither happy nor unhappy, I just don’t know how I did. Tomorrow I will be doing my second English paper, I am nervous. It is predictable but what if it’s not as predictable as expected, just how many poets, what poets! It’s scary, I haven’t started studying for this paper yet and it’s only hours away!

I must go study!

oh the stress of it all,

Colin.

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Tags: 2008, english paper, exam paper, leaving cert, paper 1

This morning was different. I woke up, and my mother went to the shop to get me fresh rolls. Something I’ve never experienced in this house before. And I’ve been promised a fry in the morning! Maybe the leaving cert isn’t so bad after all?

So I ate some food, hopped into car and tuned into Spin South West to listen to those fools ‘waffle’ even though they claim not to. I arrived at the school in time and ready for exams. We were sent to the canteen for a motivational speech, which was rather humorous. Of course we were expecting breakfast rolls or something.

I headed for the hall, found my seat and sat down. First things first, I had to prepare my red, blue and black pen, obviously! Then make sure I had remembered the right exam number. I had my eye on the clock. I was in my zone, my table, my workspace. The smell of fresh exam paper. The excitement in the hall. You could feel it.

Then we began, the hall went quiet. I read over the questions in text 1 and text 2, decided what questions i was doing and crossed out the others. Then it hit me that there was 3 texts. So i rushed to have a glance at the third text. I went for question A - Text 1, Question B Text 3. By the time I had read over the paper, had a good look around me, and sufficiently chewed a pen it was already 10am. And then in walks another guy from our year who had ‘overslept’. It was bound to happen to someone.

I then made my way through the paper trying to stay as motivated and interested as I could. And in fairness to the department, I think the texts they gave us this year were rather fair. So I finished up the A & B questions and turned over the page to the Composition question. Having prepared for the short story question I decided to change to personal essay in the last minute. Which I’m hoping was my strong point of the paper. I actually enjoyed writing the personal essay unlike previous years.

I finished about five or ten minutes before the exam ended. I have to say I was pleased with the overall exam so far, but then again I’ve stopped using my own judgement after the pre’s.

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Tags: 2008, english, english paper 1, first day, leaving cert, morning, one, paper

Years of preparation- useless! Nothing has prepared us for this, life altering experience, a test of strength, ability and endurance. After months of training we are thrown into the battlefield, no, the mocks were nothing like this. The supervisors give us our commands and we sit anxiously waiting for the go-ahead. Tick-tock, tick-tock… with a perplexed look on our faces we look around for familiar faces, seeking comfort. But nothing. There’s no going back now.

We begin. Advancing through the wild trenches of our inner mind we seek answers, we seek help, we seek success. Peering over every corner we hunt for a comfort zone, something recognizable, some thing we can relate to. But nothing. Feeling helpless, we do what we can. But in the end we will survive and we will experience the sheer pleasure that we, we did it. We accomplished the ‘Leaving Certificate’!

Best of luck to everyone!