How long should the aiste be?

0mega

If you're looking to get as high a mark as possible in the essay, how much should you write?

Can you be marked down for writing too much?

The essay that I'm preparing at the moment is heading towards 800-850 words.

Canard

I wrote ~814 in my mock and got 96/100. I dont know how I managed to make absolutely no mistakes because I wasnt even that lucky in writing them in the first place, but it goes to show that somehow, writing that amount perfectly wont actually net 100/100 :pac: My advice is to write everything you can but once you hit 500/600, be extra careful of grammar and spelling. It'd be a pity to needlessly lose marks!

Gumbi

Quality over quantity. I've been told otherwise, but it simply isn't true. The exam paper specifies that between five and six hundred words is sufficient. You shouldn't, however, be marked down for writing more than that.

Togepi

Can they penalise you for writing too much? All going well, I'll have loads to write, and I just won't be able to leave stuff out if I know it. :P I'll make sure I leave time to read over it at end, so the grammar should be pretty accurate, not 100% though as I'm sure I'll make a couple of mistakes on the day. :cool:

Luno

The way I see it is they say write approx 500-600 words (well they did on the mocks not sure how they'll phrase it in the actual thing) so I can't see how you can be penalised for doing what they ask! I wrote around the 4 pages in my mock and I got 85% despite not having any spelling or grammatical errors and having my essay completely linked to the title...

Gumbi

M&S* wrote: »

The way I see it is they say write approx 500-600 words (well they did on the mocks not sure how they'll phrase it in the actual thing) so I can't see how you can be penalised for doing what they ask! I wrote around the 4 pages in my mock and I got 85% despite not having any spelling or grammatical errors and having my essay completely linked to the title...

Tbh, I can't see anyone writing 4 pages and not having a single spelling or grammatical issue (unless it was a rote learned essay).

I will concede, however, that some markers tend to not want to give 95% + (near perfect) where it is due in the mocks.

Gumbi

No, they can't penalise you for writing too much, as long as you stay on topic. If you go off topic, they'll likely thinks it's rote learned, and mark you accordingly.

Luno

Gumbi wrote: »

Tbh, I can't see anyone writing 4 pages and not having a single spelling or grammatical issue (unless it was a rote learned essay).

I will concede, however, that some markers tend to not want to give 95% + (near perfect) where it is due in the mocks.

I never found out where I lost my marks, my essay was learned to an extent. Of course I had topics prepared and picked the question that suited what I knew best. The only reason I could find for losing 15% was that maybe it was a bit drawn out...

Gumbi

M&S* wrote: »

I never found out where I lost my marks, my essay was learned to an extent. Of course I had topics prepared and picked the question that suited what I knew best. The only reason I could find for losing 15% was that maybe it was a bit drawn out...

If your essay was concise, to the point, and on topic, with minimal grammatical and/or spelling errors, then 85% seems a bit low. You should ask where you lost the marks.

Togepi

Anyone know how to bring up your language marks? Mine were awful low for the mocks (in the fifties I think), and I usually don't do as well as I could because of the language.

Canard

I'm almost sure language is only 20 marks? Its ideas thats 80, that what you mean?

Only thing to do is stick to the point and link it back :P

Togepi

Is language not 80 and subject 20?

Canard

Oh wait it is! Derp.

Then I'd advise idioms, seanfhocail and concise, impressive grammar structures

Luno

Gumbi wrote: »

If your essay was concise, to the point, and on topic, with minimal grammatical and/or spelling errors, then 85% seems a bit low. You should ask where you lost the marks.

It's a bit late in the day to be finding out where I went wrong, I don't think many others in my class done much better so I'll just go with that.

Togepi

Patchy~ wrote: »

Oh wait it is! Derp.

Then I'd advise idioms, seanfhocail and concise, impressive grammar structures

Such as...? :P

Gumbi

M&S* wrote: »

It's a bit late in the day to be finding out where I went wrong, I don't think many others in my class done much better so I'll just go with that.

?? Learning where you went wrong is one of the most best ways to improve at anything.

Luno

Gumbi wrote: »

?? Learning where you went wrong is one of the most best ways to improve at anything.

That's great...

asdjklf

M&S* wrote: »

The way I see it is they say write approx 500-600 words (well they did on the mocks not sure how they'll phrase it in the actual thing) so I can't see how you can be penalised for doing what they ask! I wrote around the 4 pages in my mock and I got 85% despite not having any spelling or grammatical errors and having my essay completely linked to the title...

Omg. What? Four pages?!
My teacher has us doing approx. two :eek:
Christ on a bike, I'm going to cry.

Togepi

How much do people consider to be 'too much'? I'll probably write at least four pages, just out of habit from last year. Is the word count the exact same as last year or shorter?

Luno

asdjklf wrote: »

Omg. What? Four pages?!
My teacher has us doing approx. two :eek:
Christ on a bike, I'm going to cry.

My writing is a lot bigger than most peoples, if I had wrote neater it'd probably hit 3 pages. Quality over quantity don't worry about it!

Canard

Togepi wrote: »

Such as...? :P

Welllllll I dont have a huge list but for grammar, things like 'toisc go/gur' are much more impressive than 'mar' imo :P I seemed to get a good reaction from the mock corrector with questions like "Isn't this awful?" :pac:

Idioms are kinda hard to find online because they're almost always mistranslated. One I like is 'glacann gach dath dubh ach ni ghlacann dubh dath ar bith' - think it means that its necessary to be optimistic because a closed mind (dath dubh) doesnt let good things happen I wrote it in an essay so I'll find out soon enough

your teacher might be able to give you some but pm me if not and ill try help

Gumbi

Knowing and applying the genitive case correctly would impress a correcter.

Gumbi

Patchy~ wrote: »

Welllllll I dont have a huge list but for grammar, things like 'toisc go/gur' are much more impressive than 'mar' imo :P I seemed to get a good reaction from the mock corrector with questions like "Isn't this awful?" :pac:

Idioms are kinda hard to find online because they're almost always mistranslated. One I like is 'glacann gach dath dubh ach ni ghlacann dubh dath ar bith' - think it means that its necessary to be optimistic because a closed mind (dath dubh) doesnt let good things happen I wrote it in an essay so I'll find out soon enough

your teacher might be able to give you some but pm me if not and ill try help

That's not an idiom. It's a seanfhocal. I tend to avoid seanfhocals, apart from a select few that I use in speech.

Togepi

Gumbi wrote: »

Knowing and applying the genitive case correctly would impress a correcter.

Do you mind explaining what that is?

Glee_GG

Gumbi wrote: »

Knowing and applying the genitive case correctly would impress a correcter.

Isn't that a German tense, not an Irish?!

LoonyLovegood

My teacher's been warning us not to write more than 2.5/3...

earwax_man

My mock was corrected horribly; I wrote about Fukushima and the environment. I got about 6/7 pages out of it with no grammatical errors whatsoever. I tell you, when I can fully translate computer games into Irish Gaelic, I have no problems with languages. The corrector gave me 66% and marked correct items incorrect. I checked it by myself and 3 teachers. They agreed I should have gotten ~96% if they wanted to be tough! I've been speaking Irish since I was 2!

Glee_GG wrote: »

Isn't that a German tense, not an Irish?!

You speak a language for 15 years, yet you have never talked about grammatical possession by nouns and prepositions? :P
Also, it's not limited to just German, it exists in English and every other language in some way. "Whose", "Of whom" (although technically a dative object...) or even the agglutinative suffix "...'s" from Anglo-Saxon should ring a bell in English

Togepi wrote: »

Do you mind explaining what that is?

Here's a small present.

ehshup

Glee_GG wrote: »

Isn't that a German tense, not an Irish?!

What do you think tuiseal ginideach means? In english it's the genitive case - and most of those cases exist in all european languages. But yes, it'd be a good idea to learn off a few generic phrases with some use of tuiseal ginideach just so they know you can use it.

Canard

Oh, well I mix them up sometimes I guess. Same idea in my opinion, it shows a high standard of Irish, I dont know why you'd avoid them.

Also, I dont know why youd limit your essay if you can write more? You're given tons of time like!

Genetive case is probably similar to the German but I dont speak German - its just possessive, e.g. 'hata an fhir' is the man's hat, 'mala scoile' is genetive, things like that

Gumbi

Patchy~ wrote: »

Oh, well I mix them up sometimes I guess. Same idea in my opinion, it shows a high standard of Irish, I dont know why you'd avoid them.

Also, I dont know why youd limit your essay if you can write more? You're given tons of time like!

Genetive case is probably similar to the German but I dont speak German - its just possessive, e.g. 'hata an fhir' is the man's hat, 'mala scoile' is genetive, things like that

Yup that's it. Also, this may sound trivial, but make sure you have a general idea of the gender of words. My teacher never explicitly specified this is Irish; it's amazing how many lenitions ('h's) one can miss. It also affects the genitive. Eg hats an fhir BUT hata NA mná

If this is confusing anyone, look up a guide or something on it.

dmca93

The Tuiseal Ginideach is an essential part of the Irish Language which you are going to have to use many times throughout your essay. If you don't fully understand the Tuiseal Ginideach and don't have time to learn it between now and the exams I would advise that you make sure you know all the various forms of certain important words that are guaranteed to come up e.g theres is a 90% chance you will need to use the word "fadhb" therefore make sure you know it inside and out:

Fadhb, an fhadhb, na fadhbanna, croílar na faidhbe etc