Hey everyone, I’m in such a good mood today!

And why wouldn’t I be? The tests are done and dusted with almost all of the results received (more about that in a minute), the school workload is decreasing, The X Factor final is tonight and Christmas is less than two weeks away! This also means two weeks of lie-in’s, good TV and lovely food! I love Christmas so much!

So yeah, I got the tests back and…drumroll…I PASSED MATHS! It was such a relief because the test was so hard and I’ve lost my flair for maths that I had in Junior cycle. I got 57% and if I’d attempted all the questions, attempt marks could’ve brought that grade to 60%. It was so unlike me not to attempt every question because I’ve had it drilled into my brain to ‘always try everything because you’ll always get attempt marks!’ I just panicked when the test proved to be so hard and there were some I had no idea how to solve! So everyone out there who doesn’t know already (although I’m sure you’re all smarter than me on this one), ATTEMPT EVERY QUESTION!

Maths was my lowest and my highest was in Business. I’m really getting to like Business a lot now, mainly because the Business results are always my highest! The Apprentice is also encouraging me to take an interest. As much as I want to do Journalism, in the past two years I’ve got a slight ambition to do Sales and Marketing. Ah well, I won’t think about that for another while!

I was pretty pleased with my other subjects but I still have to get my History test back. Hamlet is getting really exciting in English so I’m looking forward to the class, despite having one of the worst teachers ever! I think most people have that one teacher they don’t see eye to eye with and she is mine, although she’s not as bad as I once thought.

And guess what? My Irish teacher is a suspected John and Edward fan! I was nervous getting back my test, purely because I mentioned them in my essay on the recession in a maniacal moment. She’s not the type you’d normally joke with so I was shocked when I got two ticks beside the sentence about them and a comment stating how nice the opening paragraph was. Two ticks! I’m lucky to usually get one tick!

Hope everyone who has tests gets on well and remember my tips for today;

1. Attempt every question!

2. Even if you have a teacher you don’t like, don’t let that discourage you from work.

3. Mentioning John and Edward in tests could bring you success!

Thursday, free English, I decided to make a lovely little timetable where every topic on my xmas tests was completely covered, and therefore I should surely ace my tests.

Friday I sincerely tried. But we got the Christmas tree, up and standing, after a three hour long fight, because a) it’s too small and b) it naturally slants to the side. After the xmas tree battle (solved by balancing the stand on about 5 phone books) I decided to go to out instead of making notes on the lovely King Lear and Perfect Competition.

So I promised I’d make up for it today, deciding not to look back on yesterday because of the xmas tree debacle (the tree fell over this morning, so once again yours truly had to attempt to fix it) I had a surprise visit from my baby cousin, aunt and uncle, it seemed rude to try and steal off to learn of the centralised monarchy in Spain, French Wars of Religion and Ecology, so I postponed.

Too bad I forgot I was due in town at 3 for my friend Annie and mine’s joint birthday party for people from the CTY programme I went to this summer. So epic fail. Only home now. Simply am not able to study, I’m mentally exhausted. I won’t get anything done tomorrow either, because it’s my 17th birthday and my granddad’s coming to visit.

So, I’m gonna have to condense my 6 day study programme into a 3 day study programme, wish me luck.

As I said earlier as I bought a new pair of over the knee, studded suede boots to console myself. “Damnity Damn Damn Damn!”

On the bright side, I get my pressies tomorrow, be jealous .

Bonjour allhonours.ie! Comment allez-vous? Moi, je vais trés bien! Well…sort of! Let me explain.

Two weeks ago, after posting my last blog, my laptop started acting funny. It didn’t get up and do a tap-dance or sing “At last, my love has come along”, but all the same it was very different. I assured my brain that it was nothing to worry about and that it was simply having a “bad day”. Come Monday morning, there was a definite change. My poor laptop – aptly named WALL-E – decided it simply wasn’t going to get up for school and remained dormant under its covers of  black and silver. I popped on Sky News that evening, and lo-and-behold, there was a woman speaking about computers being visited by the “Black Screen of Death”.

Basically, there are certain computers that have Windows7 or Vista installed into their programmes, much like us with the neo-cortex in our brains. My poor WALL-E just happened to use his ‘brain’ and allow this ‘visitor’ entry into his home. Now I have a ’squatter’ who refuses to leave the confines of my link to the outside world and thus, I am confined to reading books to stimulate some sort of imagination during the evenings.  Now this isn’t all bad. I’ve been able to quickly read through the poetry of T.S.Eliot, Derek Walcott, W.B.Yeats and Adrienne Rich.

However, any communication with civilisation has been discontinued but, contrary to my preconcepted opinion of a world without technology, I’m rather enjoying the lack of internet modem. I’ve recently begun listening to Mozart (we’ll get to that in a minute) and am considering that the worst possible thing to happen to the human race was, and continues to be, the Age of Industrilisation and Technology. We have become a race that depends majorly on outside sources obtainable by the click of a button. Rté alone must spend so much on research using the internet and sources that were not so easily attainable in years of yore. And schools are instilling courses and techniques that employ the use of logical thinking, providing very little imagination and creativity to be required by their students, which, in the long run, makes it inevitably harder to learn. How many of us can truly envision living in a concentration camp? Or imagine the animals (such as lions, tigers and bears – Oh my!)  in each feeding stage of a Food Chain? Most of us learn off definitions by the tens and twenties but how many of us actually ask the obvious question: what does this mean to me?

The obvious answer would be that, in the long run, we see ourselves in the college of our choice. Ironically, that would be the WRONG answer. Wouldn’t it? Why be committed to something that doesn’t involve you? Why learn something by heart if it isn’t actually moving your heart? Where are the modern-day Yeats and Chapmans, the commonplace da Vincis and Deanes, the instrinsically gifted Einsteins and Bachs, and the people that thought logically and creatively at the same time? I know that we are taught from an early age to forget imagination and to start thinking systematically but must we forget that age where there were endless possibilities, multiple answers for one simple question? When the sun was a big yellow face in the sky, when the boogie-man still existed, when we could be a singer one day and a mutant ninja turtle the next? People will probably look at this and think, “But that is when you’re a child. We’re adults now.” Why did it have to change? Why did society make us believe that dreams, the majority of the time, remain as dreams? Why can’t we believe in big purple dinosaurs and bears living in big blue houses? Why do we view things in an analytical and precise fashion when so little of life is precise, and so much of life is unpredictable?

I ask these questions because I’ve been frustrated for a long time with the education system in this and most other European countries. I think creatively and my imagination is second to none because its mine. I believe everyone is the same. We all have independent personalities, thoughts and opinions. Look at the bloggers of this website. We are all dealing with the same anxieties and strains, not to mention living the average Irish lifestyle. Yet we each write about these similar issues with unique ingenuity, intelligence and opinion that is unparalleled by the previous, or subsequent blogger. However, when it comes to the Leaving Cert examinations we are asked to learn what other people have written, think how other people have thought and let our own innate abilities lie dormant. How many of your English teachers have compared your writing talents to Chaucer and Friel; French teachers that have told you that you’ve defied logic by accepting a language so naturally; Maths teachers that have told you you’re a prodigy in theorems  and functions? Any of you? And why not? Why should we believe we’re any less than “the greats”? Surely they themselves started out as we do: people with dreams, ambition, determination. Yet they are “the greats” for one reason and one reason only: not because they were born genius, but because they refused to believe that the only genius that existed was before them, and thus, they became genius themselves.

This blog has been inspired by a book I read quite recently. “Accelerated Learning” by Colin Rose. If you read one book during this most strenuous time, let it be this one. I have learned possibly as much as I did throughout my entire academic career. It expresses ideas that each of us can bring a new light to. It teaches us that we are all different, and furthermore, should embrace that difference; not supress it.

I think it is time we started thinking like “the greats”. Yes Keats, Einstein and Dante are wonderful but so are Ally, Sophie and Katie. So is anyone else that refuses to allow society condition the richness in which their lives are lived. We are not robots, we are remarkable human beings, able to embrace any culture, language, art, literature, music and science. All we must do is believe we’re great and eventually, it is inevitable that this is what we shall become.

Happy Blogging,

Ian

Hey my fellow leaving certs.

I haven’t blogged in ages! I have honestly been so busy. These Christmas exams can be really time consuming. All week I’ve had tests and today was my dreaded Irish oral. I ‘ve never had an actual oral test in Irish,so I didn’t know what to expect. I mean, I rock at the French oral, ask me anything…no nerves at all. However, today was different. I was sick to the stomach thinking about the possible questions and if I was even prepared enough..but thankfully it was pretty good. It took me a while to get into it and loosen up but I got a good result. The teacher said I would get a high enough mark and if I added the odd seanfhocail I nGaeilge I’d be sorted. So you can guess that I was really proud of myself after that. I honestly sickened the teacher. Her face when I started talking about the sharp economic crisis and racism. It was like she didn’t know I could speak Irish at all, she just smiled at me and widened her eyes unknowingly… I was laughing on the inside, I really was.

I had a great experience today. Great i tell you…it was of course the much (or so I thought) anticipated event that is non other than crazy sock day. Oh yes, students are entitled to wear any socks of their choice, be it primitive, casual or wild’ ou! Any..all for a great cause. Saint Vincent de Paul of course! We raised €715 which I think is an amazing accomplishment…I felt great, wearing my old pink tights with purple polka-dots,blue ski-socks with navy polka-dots and a white and pink snowflake pattern pair of socks over those. I surely got enough attention anyway! Is it my fault for going all out in my last year? No. So there I was, a passionate young 6th year trotting around wearing three layers of brightly coloured socks, her green plaid skirt contrasting totally,yet I was smiling happily, not having a care in the world of what boring,mediocre,plain,simple,people with regular bottle green socks and tights thought. It was great…:D

I have so much homework to do this weekend and I have a french oral to prepare for now too..Monday morning I have to talk my way through the basics in French whilst also having prepared my document. My bowling trip with the french students should help doubt it. I got a surprise (as in I didn’t know about it) Art test again today, this time on early renaissance paintings. so I failed that,,or so I think at the moment..

I have also, oddly enough, been sticking to my HPAT study plan, every morning I do 3 questions from each section. Sundays, I do 10, after school study I do as much as I feel like at the time:) it may or may not help, but I’m not taking any chances. A lovely Chemistry test awaits me on Monday morning too, naming organic compounds…easy enough.

Strange, this week I’m actually positive for a change…I like that feeling.

My friends are going to the Paramore concert Saturday,,jelous much? yes:( This Saturday is the last week I’ll be in Leeson street until after Christmas,then it’s the RCSI open (so excited!!) and then I’m back to the institute:)I hope Olly (murs…walls…sorry I’m such a nerd when it comes to french ) wins I honestly think joe might,,but he’s great too ^__^..Which reminds me, my teacher asked me in the oral, do I watch TG4? Sure didn’t I say yes..so now I’m like the number one ‘an jig gig’ fan out there…love it !

Anyway, I’ve wasted enough of your study time…ha:)

Bonne chance !! XD

Hi all,

Just a short post to spread the word about an upcoming focus group taking place next week.  I need as many Leaving Cert, Junior Cert, and Transition Year students as possible.  The focus group will simply involve a relaxed chat between 10 or so students, led by myself and a colleague. We plan to discuss your usage of the internet in general, specifically focusing on how you use the internet for study and school.  We will of course pay any student who attends €50 (€25 per hour)!  Now who couldn’t do with that coming up to Christmas?!

Some more details:

Junior Cert/Transition Year Focus Group: Thursday 17th Dec after school at 6pm, Drumcondra Road, North Dublin (Held in a hotel conference room, hotel to be confirmed). 2 hours in total.

Leaving Cert Focus Group: Friday 18th Dec after school at 6pm, City Centre location near Grafton Street, hotel to be confirmed.  2 hours in total.

Please email info [at] allhonours.ie if you are interested or need more details.  Spread the word, ask your brothers, sisters, friends, whoever!

Cheers,

Patrick.

Hey everyone

Hope everyone had a good weekend, and hopefully Monday wasn’t too bad either

Well the finale of America’s Next Top Model is tonight, and hopefully this time next Monday I will be studying instead of watching Tyra Banks and the Top Model hopefuls. I really want Aminat (but she just got voted out, so now I’m backing Allison, the blonde one) to win…okay, sorry, I know most people won’t care lol.

Had to start studying for the christmas exams really badly today, so I took on Economics and Biology and Maths in after school study. Sorry, I’ve no horror stories, it actually went okay. I got annoyed when I opened my Biology book on genetics and couldn’t remember half of it, but I just calmed myself and read over it. It’s annoying, because it was one of my best tests this year at 97% so I really don’t want to mess up on it for xmas.

I’ve had to make a timetable though, because I’ve a tendency to just study what I like, more than what I need. Irish has fallen completely by the wayside. Ditto Spanish.

My birthday is coming up this weekend so I’m extremely excited, even though it’s only my 17th. It fell unfortunately very near my exams though.

I was wondering, just reading a few posts, how does everyone study? I did a test while I was attending CTYI at DCU this summer, and I found out I was an aural listener. So I learn better if I can hear myself say it. So basically my new method of study, is time-consuming, but it works so I’m not going to complain.

Basically, I read something a few times aloud. Then I close the thing I’m reading from and say it again. Check if I’m right. Then I write it out three times. I’ve been told I’m insane, but it seems to be the only thing that works for me.

I’m also looking forward to the Trinity Open Day on Wednesday. Is anyone else going? I just want to take a look around, before I decide what courses I want from there on my CAO.

Anyhow, I know I’m getting distracted, but this is the last Monday it’s happening, so I’m going to treat myself to Extreme: Skinny Celebrities.

I’ll start tomorrow

Night all, have a good rest of week

Love from,

Aims

x.x.x.

Note to self: Always check start time of open days before going.

As the above suggests, like a fool, I took the only 109 bus to Belfield on Friday the 4th for the UCD open day. Got up at 6.30 and caught the bus @ 7.15, with my brothers who do this every day for school. I was really happy with myself, and it looked like there were lots of others on the bus with my idea of getting in early to beat the crowds. Well I certainly did that! At Belfield I got off the bus with the two remaining people, both students. Oooppss!
Well I suppose it meant that I got to see a lot of the campus! I spent the first hour wandering around trying to look like I knew where I was going! Lol! It’s so big! Actually huge! Nearly too big methinks =/ Did anyone else go up? Don’t get me wrong if I got the chance I’d go, but it probably won’t be my first choice!

How was the week for everyone else? We started getting our test results back…….. They actually didn’t go that badly, surprisingly. It’s a nice feeling to know that all the work you’ve done has paid off =D I was delighted with my B1 in Irish because it was so close to an A (84%) so almost there! English; meh, my teachers an easy marker. Basically anyone who hands up work gets an A. I got an A2, but I would have given myself a C!! Biology was something similar. And I passed my maths!! I was full sure that id failed so my D2 (47%) was a nice surprise =D Still waiting on some results but over all im pretty pleased =) For this time of the year anyway they’re ok…….Most of the stress ha had been piling up over the last few weeks has now been relieved….. what a feeling!! But there’s one part of my routine that’s still missing; exercise! Now I would consider myself afairly active person, especially during the summer, but now I’ve no time! Its not that im super image concious, I’m not! But I know its important to be healthy, and well healthy body, healthy mind! I did try to build 20mins a day into my time table but well, it hard to face into an accounting question at eight o clock when you know you still have chemistry to do =( Does anyone else have this problem???

Saturday night was my first night out since mid-term, and it was brilliant! It was an 18th so yes its allowable! Actualy its was a double surprise 18th. Now, surprises in Kells never are very surprising, bt this was! YAY =D The twins didnt have a clue!! Athboy was dead quiet but we had a great night. Its ok to treat yourself once in a while…………. so im going out next weekend too =P

Only two days of school this week, and Trinnity open day too. What more could you want? I love walking down Grafton street when all the christmas lights are up. CHRISTMAS SHOPPING!!! Well I think it will be window shopping for the mo …. broke!!!
Anyways I hope everyone has a good week…. I had better get back to some study =/
Ta ta
Katie xxx

Hi everyone, I’m Amy, but everyone calls me Aims. I’m 16, very nearly 17 and, yes, I’m a 6^th year student. Of course, I’m hearing from various people who are at university: “Aims, relax, I didn’t study much and look at me!” It’s very easy for them to say, they’ve sat their leaving cert, got their points and are now, hopefully, happy with their course. However, for the Leaving Cert students of 2010 it’s a completely different story, we’re still preparing, we’re stressing over points and we’re praying we get that course we desperately want or wishing to god we could decide which course we want the most.

Psychology is what I want, preferably in NUIM because it isn’t that far from home, and I went to the open day and loved it; however at 500 points I’m probably going to have to work very hard, school doesn’t exactly come naturally to me unfortunately. For some crazy reason, I took the early modern history course, which not only doesn’t have a book, doesn’t have a set of papers you can buy either. That is not even the best part, my research topic just smacked into a big brick wall and the thought of re-writing my first draft makes me want to cry.

The first few weeks, I was full-steam ahead, and used to study for three hours after school, determined to get my points but as time wore on, and my parents signed me up for after-school study, it became this horrible chore I had to do. Facebook has become my distraction, which is sad considering I promised I’d never ever get addicted to it. Yeah, hypocritical I know, but I need something to occupy myself when I’m avoiding learning off the functions of taxation for economics.

Also I’m increasingly distracted by my first, baby cousin Ronan, who just learned to crawl. So instead of researching my research topic during my history computer class, I’m doting over photographs in my e-mail of the child prodigy crawl around the kitchen of his new house. And to add to that, my granddad is getting married sometime next summer, and his fiancée is allowing me, the fashion addict, to help out with the wedding. So internet access at school is generally abused for sending emails to my aunt about the baby or to Caroline in regards to how lovely Malta will be for a wedding.

However, Xmas exams are just 4 days after my birthday, and they’re actually kicking me into gear. My economics is completely revised. I’m studying like crazy for history. And the others will hopefully follow suit…

I’m going to make an attempt at my history research topic re-write, so I’ll have to sign off.

Aims

x.x.x

Hi all:)

Short, quick and sweet.That’s how I thought this week felt. Once again I went to sleep last night patronizing myself for not studying all weekend. So today after school I made a study timetable. Man am I proud:).. it feels amazing to finally feel that; ‘yes I do want to do well in the Leaving cert…hey here’s an idea..why not study!!!!?’ so I did infact do just that. I spent two hours of my time today studying stoichiometry and doing exam papers, it’s sickening to know how crap I actually am at those darn questions but atleast I know where im weak..ha,yeah lets try and make that sound optimistic:)  Anyway, my younger sister is doing the junior cert too this year and she’s one of those kids that always gets 100% in her tests, that learns paragraphs and paragraphs of utter nonesense that is so unnecessary for all her exams. At the moment she is sitting next to me muttering something about Hitler’s youth policy. Im laughing inside I really am. She’s making it harder for herself…or so I thing, But she is learning everything word for word,reading it all aloud, and when that dreaded question comes up in the JC she will just have to re-read that certain paragraph in her head and pick out the answer. I almost envy her because this method ALWAYS seems to work for her. All through primary and even the early years of the junior cycle, she would ace her tests by just memorising EVERYTHING! My brother did his JC last year and got mostly As and the rest Bs. I did the worst out of everyone so far, achieving 3 As, 2 Cs and the rest Bs. My brother and I both know that our sister will most likely get all As in the JC, she’s one of the studious types, who is always organised, always studying, but suprisingly enough she actually has a pretty decent social life too. ok yes, in other words. I am jelous. Jelous of the fact that she too wants to do medicine and will probably get it because she has the talent and gift of memorization. Me? I learn by writing. writing everything down. highlighting. in other words I spend AGES revising! Some people have it all *sigh*.

Anyway…thought id stick that in there UCD should be good friday…if I can get a mode of transport over there! I dont think our school is taking a bus up anymore because of a certain incident that took place during the week involving certain immature fifth years who have a tendency to set off fire alarms and ‘mitch’ classes 24/7. Thanks guys. I really appreciate that… so, no UCD for me…im raging, I know it’s only my second choice but still. So hope that you’ll all enjoy it! Im taking a few of the french students bowling this weekend I think,, either that or monday since were off, should be fun, plus a great way to improve my already average french skills. I have most of my christmas shopping done, I think its the earliest ive ever have actually! And omg I agree with Ian about Johnjoe…..what a kid…we should all applaud his mad literature skills, I mean, at that age I think I was reading ‘guess how much I love you’ for the tenth time, I then slowly moved onto a lovely collection of winnie the pooh short stories. I salute you johnjoe,we all do. May you have a bright future ahead of you, http://www.johnjoe.com, that is correct readers…johnjoe has a website, future horologist or what

That’s all for now…have a good week

Bonne Chance =)