All About the Year 12 English Advanced Course at Matrix

HSC English Advanced is difficult and competitive. While English Advanced may scale more favourable than English Standard, it is essential that students perform well to benefit from scaling. To ace English Advanced, you must achieve consistent marks throughout the year. In this post, we’ll explain why studying Year 12 English Advanced at Matrix will set you up for success.

Remember, your HSC result takes an average of your school assessments and your HSC Exams. This means that your first assessment counts towards your HSC mark. Matrix English Advanced is designed to help you work towards your Band 6 result from day 1 of year 12.

What is the Matrix Year 12 English Course?

Each Matrix Year 12 English Course includes nine three hour lessons across each of the school terms. Term courses focus on a specific module for English Advanced. In Term 1, all Matrix students will complete the Area of Study: Discovery course. In the subsequent terms, we offer text specific courses for most of the HSC prescribed texts.

Each student also receives regular 1 hour one-on-one sessions with our English tutors.

During the Holidays, our Year 12 Skills Courses are designed to give you confidence in essay writing for the different modules of the HSC. These courses are ideal for students who are confident in their knowledge of their material, but need help communicating their ideas and structuring their essays.

Over nine three hour lessons, students will learn how to respond to a variety of questions, structure their arguments, and use evidence effectively as they create killer essays.

Why Study Year 12 English at Matrix?

Year 12 is an important year. From the moment you start Term 1, the assignments and assessments pile up. Unfortunately for you, they all count towards your HSC mark for each subject. Because of how these assignments are often weighted there is no room for error. What is weighting? Weighting is the shaping applied to a raw mark to ensure that it contributes evenly to your overall assessment score. For example, an assessment might be worth 15 marks, but it will contribute a weighting of 20% to your overall mark. This means that if you get 15/15, you will guarantee that 20% of your mark.

Remember 50% of your mark comes from the HSC, the rest is an aggregate of what you scored in your school assessments and trials.

Let’s have a look at a typical assignment weighting for year 12 English Advanced.

As you can see, the marks soon add up. At Matrix we can help you prepare for your assessments ahead of time. Our courses will give you the knowledge to ace that in-class essay. Our Holiday HSC Trial-Prep course will help you get across all your texts in time for your HSC Trials.

Our teachers will help you refine your ideas, and our awesome tutor team will help you put them into practice.

What’s in our English Courses?

Syllabus outlines and module rubrics are often difficult to understand and seem obscure. All of our courses make the NSW English Standards Authority expectations and outcomes accessible for students. In class, you will unpack and explore the module expectations. You will engage in close reading of your texts.

• • You will learn how to compose unique and in depth essays in response to a variety of different questions.
  • Matrix teachers are focused on developing your skills so that you can respond specifically to a variety of questions.
  • We don’t teach generic essays that won’t answer all the possible questions the HSC might throw at you.

In Term 1, Matrix Year 12 English courses begin with a broad introduction to Area Of Study: Discovery. Our AOS course provides a detailed overview of all aspects of Paper One – the creative response, the short answer section, and the essay. This course is ideal for both English Standard and English Advanced students.

Due to the immense popularity of “The Tempest” as a set text, we also offer a specific AOS course on “The Tempest”.

This course is similar to the general course, but includes additional material specific to the study of The Tempest as a core text.

Throughout the rest of the year, Matrix term courses are text specific. The HSC has four modules. AOS is a common module. There are then three other modules – Module A: Texts and Context; Module B: Close Study of Texts; and Module C: Representation and text – each of which has a set text or texts.

For modules A, B, and C, Matrix has courses designed to address the specific concerns of each text and its connection to the module. These are offered for all the popular choices at metropolitan schools. These cover text content in detail and explain the secrets to effective essay writing.

For example, our Area of Study course is structured as follows:

For more details, have a look at our Year 12 English Advanced Course.

Why 3 hours?

Three hours seems like a long time for an English class. The year 12 lessons are twice as long as the year 11 ones. Why? Year 12 English Advanced is very complex and content heavy. Students are expected to read and engage with a wide variety of texts and then compose detailed responses to them. This requires a lot of work.

The three-hour structure allows your teachers to work through content specific to your text and module in detail.

The first hour and a half of the class is dedicated to your teacher guiding you through the syllabus requirements and texts. This will give you confidence in discussing the key ideas in your work.

The second half of the class is dedicated to writing tasks. Often students lack confidence in their writing, or are not given the opportunity to write and develop their ideas in detail with guidance. But this is an essential step towards getting that band 6 result. It is important that you learn how to apply your knowledge of the texts and the module to a wide array of possible questions.

Matrix will teach you the skills to answer any question, not just use a generic essay that won’t answer your HSC question.

Are You Prepared for the HSC Trial Exams?

How ready for HSC Trial Paper 1 and Paper 2 are you? Our 6 day intensive Trial Prep course will get you across the requirements of each Module and teach you how to write Band-6 essays for each so you can ace your exams! In the 3-hour sessions you’ll:

• Receive detailed resources on common texts;
• Learn how to ace the short answer section & write effective creatives;
• Get insightful and actionable feedback on your work.

Click here to learn more about the English Advanced HSC Trial Prep Course.