The art of thinking...

The art of thinking...

Wednesday, June 1, 2016

Thoughts on the Czech Maturita - Literature

Thankfully, Petra was with me to help me compose myself after the traumatic History exam - next up was Czech Literature - and I picked J.R.R. Tolkien - Fellowship of the Rings! :-) What an awesome choice. The confidence I felt was fantastic after the nerves of my 'blank wall' experience! A book that I knew well, and a film that I've seen many times :-)


My 20 minutes preparation time flew by quickly, and armed with an A4 paper full of relevant notes, I breezed through the exam. I can hardly believe that I did that, and that I'm able to write that I did that!! Yes, there were some grammatical errors - I have never professed, and likely never will, that my Czech is perfect - but my ever-patient teacher was looking for detail & information, and that I had a grasp of the main themes, context etc, which I clearly did! 

Petra said that she could see that my teacher was very happy with my performance. What my History teacher failed to see in my performance, my Czech teacher gained! Out of all my exams, this was the MOST rewarding, and it gave me a real buzz. I knew then that I could do this! 


To get a 1 at the end, for this oral part, was a great joy - and a reward for both my teacher & I. Indeed, she mailed me the week before to say that having done the harder written exams, this would be the cherry on the cake - and it was :-) 


Interestingly, 4 students from my school failed in Czech Literature - and the reason? Simple - they didn't read the books! (One of the books was '1984' by George Orwell, which I find very hard to understand...!) 

And when I reflect back on previous failures in Czech Literature, it has always been the SAME reason - failure to read the book, or even watch the film! :-O Stunning...So, dear students who are reading this, and whose exams await them...learn the lesson! When you choose, yes, voluntarily choose! - your list of 20 bests, then make the effort to learn something about them, and all should be well ;-) Failure to do that is a bit like playing Russian Roulette with your exams...

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Teacher SGO

Teacher SGO