Someone explain it to me! (1 Viewer)

[smurkie]

I'm so out of the loop. I'm considering doing Ext.2 english but whenever I talk to my teacher about ideas, he keeps talking about how I have to stay within the syllabus and how I keep going out of it. I don't know what hte syllabus says about the limitations of my ideas except that it has to be withing the syllabus outlines!! It's so confusing!
Could someone please explain it to me without making me feel like an idiot? That would be great, thanks.

 

[starlitwonder]

what r ur ideas?

 

[smurkie]

cultural influence/identity, mythology, power, desire, wwii. I was thinking about a short story.

 

[idling fire]

Hey. As far as I'm aware, the main criteria from the syllabus (which can be downloaded for a proper explanation) for the major work is to choose from one of these options:

Short Story, Poem, Critical Response, Script (- radio, film, television, drama), Speech, Radio Drama, Performance Poetry, Video, Film, CD-ROM, Website.

For most of these you get free range, although Critical Response usually has to be about another author's text or a particular genre.

The only other real concern is having to tie it in with work from English Advanced or English Ext. 1, as it is supposed to be an "extension" of this work.

Although, as I said, it's probably easier to look at the syllabus yourself or go over it with your teacher (if he's so interested in telling you what you can't do). ^^

 

[ElendilPeredhil]

The syllabus is very open about what you can write. for short story, you shouldn't write teen angst, or stories that suggest to the markers that you have been abused, raped, or have taken lots of drugs because they are obliged to check on you if they feel your story is too close to life, if they suspect you are in fact writing about your own shitty life where you are raped and molested everyday.

but yeah, apart from that, you can do anything. even stories about the above stuff as long as you make it clear you are not channeling yourself.

 

[konstantine']

I'm so out of the loop. I'm considering doing Ext.2 english but whenever I talk to my teacher about ideas, he keeps talking about how I have to stay within the syllabus and how I keep going out of it. I don't know what hte syllabus says about the limitations of my ideas except that it has to be withing the syllabus outlines!! It's so confusing!
Could someone please explain it to me without making me feel like an idiot? That would be great, thanks.

I don't know what your teacher is going on about but I'm pretty sure there are no limitations in regards to what your underlying concept is (at least in the ss medium). You mentioned WWII as one of your ideas and coincidentally that's what my friend wrote about this year for her short story Major Work. Like it's already been mentioned, stay the hell away from teen angst. No one wants to hear about how "She cheated on him then he cheated on her with her best friend then blah blah".

 

[smurkie]

Thanks idling fire, I took your advice and just asked my teacher what those actual boundaries were. He explained that since it was extension2 that i had to do an extension on the work that i have previously done in year 11 & 12 english so that's stuff like eliot and journeys and postcolonialism and crime fiction or whatnot for me =). But then he said that while those were boundaries, almost anything could be linked back to previous work i have done/will do.

you shouldn't write teen angst, or stories that suggest to the markers that you have been abused, raped, or have taken lots of drugs because they are obliged to check on you if they feel your story is too close to life, if they suspect you are in fact writing about your own shitty life where you are raped and molested everyday.

but yeah, apart from that, you can do anything. even stories about the above stuff as long as you make it clear you are not channeling yourself.

Yeah, my teacher said that as well. He said that markers are bored by that stuff cause they get so much of it coming in.

But yeah, thanks for your help guys. All I need to do now is settle on what it is exactly that I do want to write about