‘It’s pretty unusual’: Inside the creative ways HSC students are studying

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The water at Dee Why is crystal clear, the waves begging to be surfed. But HSC student Thanos Kingsley sits on the sand, his surfboard ditched to the side, head buried in notes. On the other side of the city, in a Marrickville pizza shop, another student sticks his English quotes around the store and solves maths equations between orders.

Across the state, thousands of year 12 graduates are grappling with how to balance study for their final exams with their newfound freedom. With HSC exams beginning on Thursday next week, we spoke to students about how they were navigating this unstructured new world.

Thanos Kingsley from Parramatta Marist College travels to Dee Why to study at the beach.

“The horizon can seem infinite” for students who have just left school, says Andrew Martin, a professor of educational psychology at the University of NSW. Overnight, timetables and school uniforms are replaced with hours of free time.

While it’s tempting to “really stretch your wings”, Professor Martin said, this sudden lack of routine can be a major challenge.

He recommends students “create a timetable for yourself to create a bit of structure, just for the next few weeks as you navigate the transition”.

“There’s a lot of real freedom and life on the other side of these exams,” he said.

But there are still ways to have fun – in fact, Martin encourages it: “Getting a study-life balance is important.”

It’s the reason Kingsley, from Parramatta Marist College, travels 45 minutes to Dee Why beach, to catch some waves and study for his exams.

“It’s outside, it’s calm, there’s always something going on,” said Thanos. “A repetitive environment doesn’t help me. It’s nice being outside – it helps me focus. Home is the same environment every time. I get more distracted at home.

“I mean, who doesn’t like to look out on the water while they are doing some work?”

Marrickville High School graduate Marlow Ross has been squeezing in study at his casual pizza shop job.

Marlow Ross from Marrickville High has stuck English quotes around the pizza shop where he works.

He tries to stick to his school timetable, starting at 9am and finishing at 4pm. When he goes to work, he continues revising.

“I will look at maths questions and then solve it in my head while I do other things,” he said. “For English, I wrote all my quotes down and put them all over the store. Now when I am writing exams and [remembering quotes], I can see the store dishwasher.”

For some students, the best way to avoid the temptation is to revert to what they know best.

After a week of enjoying “waking up a bit later” and “going to the beach”, Matraville Sports High School captain Dennis Taukafa has chosen to go back to his school, where his teachers are holding a study bootcamp. He said it has been a game-changer.

“It’s sort of starting to hit us that we need to knuckle down and get straight into studying, and we need to stick to the structure of how we were in school,” Dennis said.

“Closer to the date I feel like it’s better for us to be in this environment, stuck with our teachers.”

He said it’s been a hard adjustment. “Now we feel like we don’t really need to wake up at eight o’clock to get ready for school, but we still need to have that structure of getting up to get work done because we still have exams to do.”

Matraville Sports High School students Silvana Kennedy and Dennis Taukafa have been going back to school for study sessions.

It has also allowed him to see friends. “I feel like everyone is excited and happy but deep down, everyone is missing seeing everyone every morning and going to classes and seeing each other in the hallways.”

Dennis has been dedicating an hour of study to each subject every day.

Structure has also been important for classmate Silvana Kennedy, who follows a strict to-do list and studies at UNSW library’s quiet section. To “lock in”, she plays music: jazz for written subjects, upbeat house for maths and old school rap for ancient history and biology.

Shauna-Lee Young, from St Luke’s Catholic College in Marsden Park, studies by teaching her mum, Belinda, the content.

Shauna-Lee Young, from St Luke’s Catholic College Marsden Park, studies by teaching her parents the content, holding lectures in her lounge room.

“It’s a pretty unusual study habit, but I want to be a teacher, so I get my family and friends and teach them what I have learnt. If I can thoroughly teach someone the concept, then I know it,” she said.