Guide to success in VCE Physics
A simple task
Make a list of ten elite athletes who you admire.
Place a T beside each athlete if you think they train hard.
Place a C beside each athlete if they have a coach.
Example: Lleyton Hewitt (T C)
Hopefully, your list highlights that success in sport is linked to dedication and technique.
Success as a student is no different. There are no easy shortcuts and there are no substitutes
for hard work and refining of skills.
To continue the sporting analogy, coaches often refer to the ‘one-per centers’, the little things
that seem insignificant but, when combined with other little things, serve to make a significant
improvement to performance. Sporting teams strive to monitor diet, to choose appropriate
accommodation, to acclimatise to new venues, to trial new technology and to study opposition
players. In the same way, students need to focus on all aspects of study if they are to achieve
their potential. For Physics, these areas include the following:
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Start early.
Prepare a home study area.
Establish a study routine.
Know the course and how it is assessed; be familiar with the study design.
Prepare for SAC tasks.
Maintain a calendar of key dates.
Complete text questions.
Accumulate resources.
Refine exam techniques.
Complete past papers.
Starting early
VCE Physics Units 3 and 4 build significantly on the concepts learnt in Units 1 and 2,
particularly Unit 2. Many students find the movement waves topics of Unit 2 difficult.
Frequent revision of these is an important facet of learning. Students should spend a few days
in January revisiting these areas so that they are ready to move on to new material when
school starts. Many schools run a Unit 3 orientation program at the end of Year 11 and they
supply students with materials from which to work. Failing that, most Unit 3 texts start with a
review chapter that provides appropriate questions. If your performance on the Unit 2 exam
was disappointing, it might also be useful to work through this again.
Students usually find the first month of the year the easiest time to maintain study, as teachers
have yet to cover enough new material to be setting SAC tasks. It gets more difficult to find
time later in the term for study when you are preparing for significant SAC tasks.
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Home study area
Create a workspace that is ‘yours’. You can leave stationery, resources and notes set up.
Lighting needs to be adequate and you must be able to limit external noise. You might choose
quiet music but definitely no television.
Use folders and labels to separate notes from each subject. A master planner attached to the
wall near your desk helps maintain an overview of what is coming up. Be prepared to attach
further concept maps and charts to the wall or pinboard.
Know your strengths and weaknesses as a student:
• If you are typically disorganised, buy a diary and make a point of using it. Allocate time to
file notes.
• If you day dream at your desk, take the time to write out a list of tasks you need to do.
• If you are daunted by tasks, break them down to chunks and attempt a piece at a time.
• If you struggle with Physics, ensure you have solutions to questions so that you can solve
problems and that you have access to someone who can help you.
Balance
As much as you might like to, you cannot study all the time. VCE is all about balance and
looking after yourself.
You need to maintain some physical activity. A completely sedentary lifestyle leads to health
issues. Many studies have shown that students concentrate better after mild physical activity.
If you find yourself sitting at your desk for long periods but achieving little, you need to take
steps to stop this. Students studying long hours are prone to illnesses like glandular fever
because their nutrition and sleep patterns are not appropriate. If your part time work is
leaving you too tired to study, you also need to cut down on the number of hours you have
allocated to this. It is all about achieving a balance.
Know the course
The course is outlined in the VCE Physics Study Design but keep in mind the following
overview.
Unit
3
4
Areas of study
1. Motion is one and two dimensions
2. Electronics and photonics
3. Detailed study
1. Electric power
2. Intersections of light and matter
3. Detailed study
Preparing for SAC tasks
SAC tasks count for one-third of your mark. Keep in mind that the nature of the task and the
assessment criteria are outlined in the study design but the task itself, and the correction of
the task, is conducted by your teacher. Therefore, preparation includes:
• reference to the study design for the scope and sequence of the task
• questions for your teacher. These should include:
– When will the task be?
– Is it an experiment or a report?
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– What are the assessment criteria?
– Is it open book?
– Can you see a similar task from previous years?
– Is it completed under test conditions?
– How should we prepare for this task?
• ensuring that you have studied relevant theory. Some of the questions will be predictable.
Some study guides will include similar tasks to yours.
During the year
The better you learn things as you go, the less you have to learn at the end. A big challenge
for students is to be able to maintain a consistent study routine.
A good study routine encompasses:
• reviewing class work soon after a lesson. Read relevant textbook pages to see if this adds
to the understanding you have picked up in class.
• attempting set questions from the text. You do not know if you understand a topic until you
attempt questions relating to the topic.
• making diagrams and graphics that highlight links between concepts and help simplify
concepts
• working with other students to tackle more difficult questions
• finding questions from other sources. Your textbook is not the only source of questions.
Revision
Start your revision as early as possible. Reading notes is rarely effective as it does not involve
a high level of concentration. Revision can be as simple as completing the harder questions at
the end of each chapter in your text. By now you should be picking questions from different
topics so that you have to consider what method to apply to the question.
Chapter summaries are probably not as useful in chapters that involve calculations but it
might be useful to make a flowchart of the typical steps in a calculation.
Some revision should be in groups and some should be independent. Groups can help by
pooling ideas and exposing you to different approaches but it is also important not to become
too dependent upon others.
Flash cards
Go to http://www.flashmybrain.com/demo.php to see a demonstration of how flash cards can
work. Make a series of palm-sized cards:
• Write a question on one side and the answer on the other.
• Write a word on one side and a definition on the other.
• Cheat sheet: You can take a double-sided A4 sheet of notes into each exam. Make your
own cheat sheet, taking into account your strengths and weaknesses.
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Past papers
Past papers are essential to Physics. Ensure that you complete a minimum of ten before the
real exam. These can be downloaded from the VCAA website or purchased from commercial
suppliers.
Past papers are important for the following reasons:
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They show the scope of the material you are covering.
They show how physics exams involve unfamiliar contexts.
They allow you to practice under time pressure.
They provide you with a range of new questions.
Examiners sometimes use past papers for ideas for new questions.
When using past papers well before the exam, you might allow yourself use of text or
solutions to help. As the exam becomes closer, you should treat each past paper as a real
exam. The VCAA past papers have solutions provided by the chief assessor. These solutions
provide valuable advice on common sources of error. You should save the VCAA paper from
the previous year until you have developed your revision skills.
Exam technique
Reading time
The Physics exam often includes a lot of material within the 90 minutes. It consists of:
Section A (Core Questions) and Section B (Detailed Study). It is crucial to use the 15-minute
reading time to do the following:
• Glance through the whole exam to check that the format matches expectations.
• Read through the instructions to both Parts A and B. These should be available on the
VCAA website before the exam.
Writing
• Timing: You have 90 minutes. The exam is worth 90 marks.
• Significant figures: The data given in the question dictates the number of significant
figures to use. An answer should contain the same number of significant figures as the least
accurate piece of data supplied in the question. Only the answer is checked for significant
figures so leave them in your calculator during the process.
• Calculator: Be sure that you are familiar with how to handle exponentials and logs on the
calculator you are going to use.
• Mark allocation: The number of marks allocated to each question is a measure of how
important a question is and how much time to give it.
• Show all working: Marks are given for correct steps even if the final answer is wrong.
• Use sketches and point form: It is often easier in science to explain a concept with a
sketch.
• Consequential marking: If your answer to Part A is wrong but you have used your
incorrect answer correctly in Part B, you will be given credit for this.
• Descriptive answers: Take care with these, they need to be accurate.
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