Leaving Cert English: post-mortemWhen 57,000 students saw their English Leaving Cert papers yesterday, most soon realised that they had nothing to worry about.
Ann Gormley, English teacher at Laurel Hill and a skoool.ie contributor, said that both the morning and afternoon higher English papers were easy, predictable, offered great scope for creative answers and were "easier than the mocks".
The Leaving Cert English papers showed "a good will in the Department for students to do well," said Joan Donnelan of the Institute of Education.
After what was generally regarded as an easy morning, speculation that the refreshingly straightforward morning paper would be followed by a torturous afternoon paper was quickly disproved.
Some higher achievers even complained that the afternoon's three-hour plus exam hadn't enough bite, said Ms Donnelan.
John McGabhhann, education research officer with the TUI, described the papers as "generous spirited".
"They were lovely papers that should have been a pleasure to do. Both papers recognised their target audience very well by tapping into the experiences of young people," he said.
The day started with an ordinary paper on the theme of entertainment. It featured a description of a U2 concert as the first essay question.
The morning's higher paper had a theme of travel, a subject with which many students can relate - particularly since they are making plans for travelling as soon as the Leaving is over.
In both morning papers, students were offered choices of many different writing styles.
However, not everyone agreed that the English papers were easy. Sheila Parsons, teacher in Skerries VEC community college and a representative of the ASTI and the NCCA (National Council for Curriculum and Assessment) said: "The first higher paper was very challenging and restricted choice in the essays, in so far as they were difficult ones. For example, a question asking the student to try to convince people of the meaning and importance of heroes in life would have been difficult."
Another question, asking students to write a newspaper article, serious or light-hearted, on the part played by story-telling or gossip in every day life, was also quite difficult, in Ms Parsons' view.
Rosita Boland, feature writer with The Irish Times, was featured in the afternoon's higher paper alongside Seamus Heaney, Sylvia Plath and Shakespeare, while Jennifer Johnston was amongst the modern Irish others in the ordinary level paper.
The day started with an upbeat and streetwise English comprehension and composition paper. The ordinary level paper had an entertainment theme so accessible that watching MTV and soaps could nearly be counted as studying. U2, Sinead O'Connor, Home and Away and The Simpsons featured.
The higher paper focused on travel and amongst the tasks was an entirely visual text which gave students the option of writing diary entries on "The Holiday from Hell".
Ms Gormley described the tone of the higher paper as " challenging, straightforward and easy to follow". In both of the morning English exams, the texts and the questions that followed were very relevant, very media-orientated and accessible without being "dumbed down", she added.
"Engaging and inviting questions that allowed room for self-expression," was the analysis of Cian Hogan of St Killian's German School and the Institute of Education.
Mr McGabhann said that at Tallaght Community School all the students were pleasantly surprised with the "unseen poetry" section in the afternoon's higher paper. This featured Rosita Boland's poem Butterflies. "A beautiful paper," said Ciara O'Brien of Laurel Hill Coláiste.
The presence of Sylvia Plath's poetry in the afternoon exam pleased many students, while those who had boned up on Shakespeare's Macbeth were rewarded with open-ended questions, such as the one on the nature of evil.