During the HSC, I was so confused by how to work with examples in partner with the subject content. This is especially annoying when we’re constantly told that examples are “so important!”
Post written by Clare Faulkner (1st in the state PDHPE and 3rd in the state Ancient History). See all articles first and personally get in touch with our state rankers here
The aim of this post is to develop an appreciation not only for how examples will improve your answers, but how they can help you engage with the content in a more memorable way. I also want to guide you on how and when to use examples, and the best types of examples to use.
So why are examples important?
Examples are often a part of the marking criteria, meaning individual marks are allocated to detailed and helpful examples.
This is a sample of the marking criteria for a 4-mark health priorities question:
Makes evident the relationship between the reorientation of health services and an Australian health promotion initiative
Provides a relevant example of an Australian health promotion initiative
Not only this, but:
- Examples help explain your answer and show that you understand the content so you can maximise your marks.
- Examples show relevance of the PDHPE course to the outside world
- Examples make your answer memorable, allow you to leave an impression on the markers, and they make the content more memorable to learn.
Good vs bad examples
Examples that explain your answer = GOOD
You want your example to help you show the marker that you really understand the content.
Take the question:
“Explain the role of the government in addressing the health requirements of the ATSI community.” (3 marks)
Instead of just saying something such as, “The Australian government has put forward multiple initiatives to try reduce the health disparity for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders,” it is much better to then offer a supplementary example to help show the nature of these initiatives, and how they help. For example, “One such initiative is Close the Gap which supplements education and health care for these populations, as well as introducing mobile cancer screening. These actions reduce many of ATSI’s specific negative health determinants such as poor education, decision making and limited access to preventative health services.”
Examples that are just thrown in for the sake of it = BAD
For Core 2 for example, it is important to illustrate content with detailed, physical examples.
Take the question:
“Analyse how the principles of training can be applied to aerobic training.”
You must illustrate the principles of training in action in a given training type. Your example needs to be specific. For e.g. if discussing progressive overload in aerobic training, instead of saying “increase intensity,” a better example is “moving from training at 70% max heart rate to 80% max heart rate by increasing speed of jog on treadmill.”
Think about trends not complicated figures.
This is crucial for two reasons:
- Trends are easier to remember than statistics and complicated figures.
- Trends will impress the marker because they show you understand the broader picture and are socially aware.
Example 1: in 2016, it is estimated that CVD was the cause behind 480,548 hospitalisations in 2013/14
Example 2: CVD morbidity is increasing, affecting 1 in 6 Australians, and mortality is high at about 30% of all deaths.
The second example allows you to identify the broad trend and engage with both morbidity and mortality specifically, without excessive figures.
Incorporating examples into your answers
It is important that you are able to weave examples into your answers to help you respond to the specific question. My biggest tip for this is to structure your paragraph as such:
- Answer the question using the content of the course
- Support this statement by following with your example
I recommend having an example for each new point or paragraph that you put forward in an answer. Use the following outline as a guide:
1–2 Marks: 1 idea, 1 example
3–4 marks: 2 ideas, 2 examples
5–6 marks: 3–4 ideas, 2–3 examples
7–8 marks: 4–5 ideas, 3–4 examples
10–12 marks: use number of ideas as outlined in syllabus, one example per paragraph.
Example Question:
How can the skill and performance attributes of athletes be validly and reliably appraised?
Answer:
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Validity is when an assessment measures what it actually intends to measure. By making sure the correct fitness component, energy system, duration and skills are involved in the test, this ensures validity. For example, a long-distance runner who needs to develop their cardiovascular endurance must perform tests like the beep test because it utilises running skills, movement patterns and the cardiovascular/aerobic system. Another example is a tennis player, who would need to complete an agility course such as the agility T-test and running in different directions to validly measure their ability and skill required for such a fast-paced sport reliant on quick reactions.
Reliability ensures that the same results are achieved regardless of who, where or when the test is administered. It is an indication of consistency between two measures of the same skill. This ensures that the performance attributes of athletes are accurately recorded to correctly understand skill progressions. For skills to be reliably appraised, the assessment must use the same conditions, surface, tester and weather. For example, 100m sprints on different surfaces would be unreliable as difficulty is changed. Tests are also unreliable if the athlete is not in the same state of mind, for example, running two beep tests on consecutive days would be unreliable because of the impact of fatigue on the testing result.
To improve the validity and reliability of the appraisal of skill and performance attributes, objectivity of tests can also be increased, and personal opinion decreased. Objectivity is not based on human interpretation or analysis because it uses accurate tools, for example stopwatches, electronic timing devices, measuring tapes or point scores, making it the fairest form of reliability. Improving objectivity can also occur through the use of set criteria. Set criteria both enhances the reliability of judgement by providing consistency, and increases validity to ensure that judgement is focused on the skill components critical for the performance. For example, aerial skiing has a judging criteria based on landing (30% of score), form (50% of score), and air (20% of score) which more validly and reliably interprets each movement component for an accurate understanding of the whole performance.
Rationale:
- Different points are split into separate paragraphs to provide structure and flow to the response
- Each point is supplemented by 1 or 2 very specific examples that explore what is and isn’t valid and reliable, and therefore HOW these measures can be improved, specifically.
- The examples, such as aerial skiing, expands on why judging criteria improves objectivity because it explains how a sport can be broken down into specific measurable components to give a score for the overall performance.
Examples from the news
For some parts of the PDHPE course it is crucial to use examples that are up-to-date and taken from recent headlines. Try and incorporate these into your notes as soon as you find them, and learn them as if they were content.
Health Priorities
- Look at websites such as AIHW and Department of Health to find recent trends, and look up recent initiatives such as the National Tobacco Strategy.
- Find recent technologies such as screening, genetic engineering and personalised health machines (e.g. fitbits).
Furthermore, many of the options, such as improving performance require you to stay up-to-date with the use of drugs and technology for example. For example, I used the 2016 cyclo-cross world championships as an example of technological-doping which disrupts the equality and mentality behind sport.
Cheats to examples: flexible and broad examples
Find examples that illustrate more than one dot point. Consider these two Core 1 dot points on the health system:
- Health care expenditure vs. expenditure on early intervention and prevention
- Impact of emerging new treatments and technologies on healthcare
A good example for both of these dot points is the development and subsidising of mammograms and keyhole surgery to detect and treat breast cancer in its early stages. This is an example of expenditure on early intervention (first dot point) and also the development of a new medical treatment (second dot point).
Things such as mammograms and mobile breast screening are very good flexible examples because they are preventative, new technologies, are subsidised by the government, and help alleviate health disparities for communities such as ATSI and low-SES (a MASSIVE part of the health priorities syllabus).
Incorporating examples into your syllabus notes
It is crucial that for each sub-section of the syllabus, you have at least one clear example written into your notes.
For example, take the dash point “progressive overload” under the dot point “principles of training” in factors affecting performance. My notes would look something like this:
A training effect is produced when the system or tissue is worked harder than it is accustomed to working.
- As adaptation occurs, loads should be increased — if a load is too small, performance will plateau.
- Must be progressive to avoid injury or fatigue.
- E.g. increasing weight or resistance for strength training over a period of weeks; increasing training distance by 500m each week for aerobic continuous training.
- Make it bold, underlined in colour, whatever will help you look at it straight away and remember it.
- Learn it with the other more factual-type content so that your understanding of one syllabus dot-point not only includes content, but includes a decent example.
This way when you use the content you’ve memorised to answer a question, you’ll also have memorised an example so that including it into your answer becomes automatic.
When memorising the syllabus (more on this later) and trying to write out each syllabus dot-point from memory, write your example next to the dot point. This helps you remember what the dot point is about, and drills the example into your head.
Post written by Clare Faulkner (1st in the state PDHPE and 3rd in the state Ancient History)
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