How to Study for English (99.95 ATAR Tips and Tricks)

Main Ideas

• English is a skill that develops over time. Success depends less on memorizing terminology or essays and more on understanding texts and applying that understanding to new questions.
• Begin analysis with the author’s intentions, background, influences, and perspective. Then identify important themes and examine how techniques communicate them.
• Techniques matter because of what they reveal about themes and meaning—not simply because you can name them.
• Mind maps can help organize the connections between an author, their intentions, themes, and textual techniques.
• Working efficiently means thinking strategically, not just spending more hours on an assignment. A first draft can be rough; editing and refinement are where it becomes stronger.
• For exams, memorizing entire essays is inefficient and can make it harder to answer the question actually asked. Learn a flexible approach to analysis instead.

Preparing and Writing an Assignment

1. Investigate the author and text

   • Learn about the author’s background, influences, and perspective.
   • Consider why the text’s themes might matter to the author and its audience.

2. Build a mind map

   • Put the author’s background and intentions at the center of your planning.
   • Connect these to the themes you identify.
   • Link each theme to relevant techniques, quotes, and examples from the text.
   • Ask how the techniques connect to the author’s perspective and why the themes are significant.

3. Use inquiry-based questions

   • Why did the author use this technique here?
   • What idea or emotion is being conveyed?
   • How does the technique support a theme or the author’s broader purpose?
   • Why is this point important to the audience or reader?

4. Check the marking criteria

   • Understand what the teacher is assessing and make sure your response addresses those criteria.
   • Support claims with specific evidence from the text.
   • Make your argument clear and easy to follow. Elaborate vocabulary is not a substitute for sound analysis.

5. Write a fast, rough first draft

   • Use the FBR method: Fast, Bad, and Wrong. Get your planned ideas onto the page without trying to perfect every sentence.
   • Set a limited time for the first draft. The speaker invokes Parkinson’s law: work tends to expand to fill the time available.
   • Reserve time to edit, clarify, and polish the draft afterward.

6. Learn from strong past assignments

   • If examples are available, study how successful responses develop and support their ideas.
   • Focus on the writer’s reasoning and choices—not on copying their themes, examples, or finished response. In short, learn the process rather than copying the result.
   • The speaker also suggests searching Google Scholar for academic analysis of the text as a source of new perspectives and ideas.

Preparing for Tests and Exams

• Don’t rely on rote memorization of techniques or prewritten essays. Instead, understand what techniques do and be ready to apply them to the question.
• Analyze the text by asking:
  • What themes are present, and why might they matter to the author, audience, or reader?
  • Why was a particular sentence or passage written?
  • What point, emotion, or response is the author trying to convey?
  • How does the meaning develop across the text?
  • How do the techniques contribute to that development?
• Practise with past papers and examine strong sample responses. Identify the thinking behind their analysis so you can adapt the approach to a different question.
• The speaker notes that his own Year 12 English course did not require an exam, so his exam advice draws partly on research and discussions with other students, rather than solely on personal exam experience.

Speaker or Source Featured

• Archer Newton — the video’s presenter and only featured speaker. He describes his own experience with English and refers to ideas from Ali Abdaal, research, friends’ experiences, academic analyses, and past student responses.