1. Home
  2. HSC
  3. HSC Exams
  4. 2011 HSC Exam papers
  5. 2011 HSC Notes from the Marking Centre — Armenian Continuers
Print this page Reduce font size Increase font size

2011 HSC Notes from the Marking Centre – Armenian Continuers

Contents

Introduction

This document has been produced for the teachers and candidates of the Stage 6 Armenian Continuers course. It contains comments on candidate responses to the 2011 Higher School Certificate examination, indicating the quality of the responses and highlighting their relative strengths and weaknesses.

This document should be read along with the relevant syllabus, the 2011 Higher School Certificate examination, the marking guidelines and other support documents developed by the Board of Studies to assist in the teaching and learning of Armenian.

General comments

Teachers and candidates should be aware that examiners may ask questions that address the syllabus outcomes in a manner that requires candidates to respond by integrating their knowledge, understanding and skills developed through studying the course.

Candidates need to be aware that the marks allocated to the question and the answer space (where this is provided on the examination paper) are guides to the length of the required response. A longer response will not in itself lead to higher marks. Writing far beyond the indicated space may reduce the time available for answering other questions.

Candidates need to be familiar with the Board’s Glossary of Key Words, which contains some terms commonly used in examination questions. However, candidates should also be aware that not all questions will start with or contain one of the key words from the glossary. Questions such as ‘how?’, ‘why?’ or ‘to what extent?’ may be asked or verbs may be used that are not included in the glossary, such as ‘design’, ‘translate’ or ‘list’.

Oral examination

Conversation

All candidates communicated information and ideas in Armenian to some degree across a range of syllabus topics. The best responses were very fluent, and grammatically accurate, and candidates used a range and variety of vocabulary and expressions to sustain the conversation.

In the weakest responses, candidates struggled to use appropriate vocabulary and demonstrated limited knowledge and understanding of grammar, such as tenses and sentence structure. These candidates tended to need a lot of prompting in their responses.

Discussion

There were a variety of appropriate topics prepared for the study and candidates had used resources to support their research. However, some candidates seemed unprepared to take part in a discussion and presented information, facts and figures but were unable to or unprepared to present points of view, give two sides to an issue or debate or justify their own opinion or perspective. A discussion implies that there are various perspectives. Candidates are reminded that the Board of Studies – in its glossary of key terms used in HSC examinations – defines the term as: Discuss – Identify issues and provide points for and/or against (www.boardofstudies.nsw.edu.au/syllabus_hsc/glossary_keywords.html).

Some candidates were unable to demonstrate an ability to ‘make detailed and perceptive references to the texts’ (Discussion marking guidelines) and, while most had a range of resources to which they could refer as required, some found it difficult to relate their resources to their study. A relatively small number of candidates had not used a literary source. A literary text enables candidates to bring different perspectives to the study and provides a better platform for a discussion than webpages, conversations with family members, travel brochures and personal experiences, some of which cannot really be considered appropriate as texts for a discussion.  It is suggested that candidates use novels, films, poems and short stories to support the in-depth study.

Written examination

Section 1 – Listening and Responding

Part A

Question 1

Most candidates identified the reasons for the flood damage.  Some candidates had difficulty in understanding the Armenian equivalent of ‘weather bureau’.

Question 2

Most candidates showed a good understanding of Natasha’s and her father’s thoughts towards the move.  Some students did not compare the thoughts as required by the question.

Question 4

While most candidates demonstrated a good understanding of how the professor tries to influence his audience, few perceived the sarcasm of the radio host in her concluding remarks.

Question 5

Most candidates identified the lecture theatre as the venue for the talk, but few identified that the students in the audience were referred to as the future.
The content and effectiveness of the speech were understood by most candidates although relatively few referred to the language features to highlight the effectiveness of the speech or its main purpose.

Part B

Question 6

Most candidates demonstrated a good understanding of the reasons for the customer’s frustration.  Few candidates identified the rejection of responsibility for the sale of a faulty product as a reason for the customer’s frustration.

Question 7

Few candidates included ‘something amusing and something serious’ and references to Alina and David in their responses.

Section 2 – Reading and Responding

Part A

Question 8

  1. Most candidates identified the reasons for Garo’s visit, but some candidates missed the fact that New York is a good place to visit.

  2. Here candidates needed to interpret what would happen next. Provided that the candidates could justify their view of the relationship between Garo and Lala, substantiated by evidence in the text, different answers were accepted as correct.

Question 9

  1. Few candidates correctly outlined the plot but recounted the reviews instead.

  2. Only a limited number of candidates identified the reasons within the reviews for Mesrop as a role model and few referred to both reviews. 

  3. Most candidates showed a good understanding of the techniques used to influence the readers.

Part B

Question 10

In the best responses, candidates wrote creatively, referred consistently and appropriately to the text, answered the questions and responded to the points raised.  In addition, these candidates showed a good control of the language.

The weakest responses were characterised by a lack of appropriate references to the text, a confusion of the ideas in the text and therefore their responses did not meet requirements.  Some did not use the appropriate text type or did not use all the conventions of a letter.

Section 3 – Writing

Questions 11 and 12

In the weakest responses, a small number did not talk about how Armenian history and culture were to be promoted – resorting to writing about history and culture instead. In weaker responses, ideas were poorly expressed, with poor sentence structure and grammatical errors in verb endings.