The Lowdown: DOGS.

The Scholarship English exam went pretty bad actually. I'm not going to make excuses: it was the worst Section A/Unfamiliar essay I have ever written in my life. Not just because I have no experience with dogs and therefore found it hard to be perceptive: I JUST SUCKED. Loved my Section C essay (rippped into the "postmodernist debarcle" of Crash) and Section B was okay so if I don't get Schol.. which I'm not going to get, I know.. I think.. its because of Section A. I know that afterwards Jo will want to see my paper to see where others can learn from my mistakes but I am just so embarrassed by it! Technically it wasn't really three essays it was 2 and then Section A but it was short and awful but it did have an introduction and conclusion. Dogs.. Trust NZQA to come up with unfamiliar texts on Dogs. I think it will be a future always in-joke between ScholEng kids.. just say DOGS and they get it. I think the funniest thing is that Elizabeth Knox's son Jack had to analyse a prose essay of his Mums in his Schol exam.. and he was in the essay.. and the dog was called Jack.. and he is called Jack. He had to basically analyse a representation of himself. How strange would that be!?! Maybe NZQA should check out whether, in this small country of ours, whether the pieces of writing they pick have authors which have children who are Year 13 English students. It's likely. Like how at school Anna Mackenzie can't judge the senior short story competition because her son and niece (and daughter, next year) are at school. And she is a well known young adult writer. She could easily pop up in a Level 1 or 2 unfamiliar paper. NZ is so small. The problem with having lots of intellectual friends and contacts especially through debating is how it makes me feel stupid sometimes. And that means I'm beginning to put my worth in my grades again.. which is BAD! I am more than an Excellence on a piece of paper.