Revision is key for higher level success

Junior Certificate History Higher Level candidates needed to have their revision well done for yesterday's paper, according to teacher Dermot Lucey.

All questions had to be answered and an example of its wide-ranging nature was the pictures question, in which candidates had to deal with Celtic standing stones, a medieval manor and a famine riot in Dungarvan, Co Waterford.

Mr Lucey, of the TUI and Ballincollig Community School, Cork, said the illustrations and questions were fair. In the documents question, the language was very readable and the topics - which included the bombing of Dresden, in Germany, in 1945 and the Irish Women's Liberation Movement - were interesting he said.

He found no difficulties with the short questions or the people in history section, where candidates were pleased with the good choice.

He said while question 5 on the age of exploration was quite readable, the (c) part posed some difficulty.

'Usually, that's a difficult question to separate the A and B students, but weaker C and D students could suffer.'

Students also found a tricky twist in question 6 (a) (iv) where they had to write an account of developments in the areas of architecture, science and medicine, sculpture and printing, during the Renaissance. 'Students will have studied those from a biographical viewpoint so they would have to think quickly to convert their knowledge to a thematic question,' he said.

In question 6 (d) (iii), on World War Two, students needed to know their facts to answer fully, he added.

He described the ordinary level paper as 'very fair'.

- Katherine Donnelly

Irish Independent