Due to the university reform I've almost forgot to follow the marticulations. Here's the second part of Finnish. Seems to me that it's a combination of the two exams I had and the previous one is a specific are of the former exam I had. I wonder what is the purpose of this change.
1. Rakkaus ja kuolema jonkin romaanin, näytelmän tai elokuvan teemana.
Okay, starts with a general topic for everyone. Not a good choice for those wishing to have a good grade due to originality. Or I suppose that's possible but it really has to be VERY original to stand out of all the other 50% of all papers. Interesting, though. Offers max. magna/eximia.
2. Mihin tarvitsemme Facebookia?
A given title that suggest clearly what's expected. I have an answer: we don't. Well, many I know have a Facebook profile but so far I haven't needed it. This might have been an interesting perspective on the matter and would have probably been somewhat unique amongst all the other papers explaining Facebook's benefits. Max. magna/eximia.
3. Kirjoita aikamme voittajista ja häviäjistä. Aihetta voi käsitellä esimerkiksi koulutuksen, talouden, politiikan,
median tai yhteiskunnallisen eriarvoisuuden näkökulmasta mutta myös yleisesti.
Had they left the latter part of the topic out, it would have been a whole lot more challenging and therefore an easier job to be original since most would have -probably- concentrated on the economic and employment and possibly educational point of view. I doubt many would have thought of media as a perspective for this and for those it would have given a good chance to get a high grade. Max. magna/eximia.
4. Miksi Lähi-itään ei saada rauhaa?
Another given title. Requires A LOT of background knowledge but for those who have that knowledge, this would be an easy high grade. A good topic for cynical pessimist bastards like me. Max. laudatur.
5. "Lukioiden oppilaskasteet ovat simputusta", kirjoitti eräs lukiolainen mielipidetekstissään syksyllä 2007. Mitä
mieltä oler koulun aloittamisrituaaleista?
All of them are. Another general topic for those that have little interest in anything but have to pass these anyway. Not what I would have ever chosen. Max. magna/eximia.
6. Mitä kilpaurheilu-uran jälkeen? Pohdi huippu-urheilijan elämäntilannetta urheilu-uran loputtua.
Also requires a lot of background knowledge and one's own experience if only possible. Matti Nykänen could have been used as a warning. But if someone indeed had had the knowledge and experience and good written skills... well, a laudatur it would be. Max. laudatur.
7. Suomalaisia moititaan erityisesti puhetavoiltaan epäkohteliaiksi, kun meitä verrataan esimerkiksi
keskieurooppalaisiin. Pitääkö käsitys paikkansa?
A general topic again. A boring one, too. The form of the question, however, does offer a tiny slice of originality if one so wants, as one could think of the definitions of politeness from different points of view. Obviously, from the Finnish point of view we're not impolite, we're just Finnish. From our point of view Italians and Spanish seem impolite, especially if they go invading our personal space... :) A moderate grade here. Max. magna/eximia.
8. Miten sivujen 4-5 runoissa on käsitelty musiikkia? Mitä ajatuksia runot sinussa herättävät? Kirjoita yhdestä tai useammasta runosta. Keksi oma otsikko tai ota otsikoksi Runo puhuu musiikista.
They've combined the use of material to this one. Boring material, if you ask me. Poems are a double-edged sword, really: on the other hand they are easily screwed up if one thinks they're "so easy", on the other hand they offer an excellent grade for those that have experience, knowledge and terminology on analysing poems. I suppose everyone who've been paying attention at classes should be able to do this. Magna/eximia/laudatur.
9. Pohdi todellisuuden ja mielikuvituksen suhdetta Joni Skiftesvikin novellissa 'Musta lokki' (s. 6-9).
Somebody kill me. Where do they get the material?! Same goes with analysing short stories as what I said about analysing poems: if you've paid attention to the teacher and what they're saying, you should be able to do this and get a pass. Laudatur would not be easy to get with this.
10. Onko nuorilla sananvaltaa koulussa? Kirjoita aiheesta kantaaottava teksti Mannerheimin Lastensuojeluliiton tiedotteen (s. 10-11) ja omien kokemustesi pohjalta.
General, general, general... is there a prescribed quota for these general topics? Well, at least this is somewhat interesting (I would have a lot to say about this nowadays!) but so easy that you would have to do Faustus and sell your soul to the Devil in exchange of a laudatur.
12. Pohdi ihmisen ja koneen suhdetta Jarmo Lehdon kolumnin pohjalta (s. 14).
So clearly a guy topic, though I don't doubt for a second that women would have much to contribute to this conversation. Alas, there's no gender quota in YTL. Damn... Max. magna/eximia.
13. Katri Merikallio vertailee (s 15) intialaista ja suomalaista kulttuuria. Miksi Suomessa -toisin kuin Intiassa- nuorten varhaista itsenäistymistä pidetään tärkeänä?
A very clear laudatur topic. Knowledge, overwhelming knowledge and good and witty writing and you have a laudatur.
14. Erittele ja tulkitse Markku Laakson maalauksia (s. 1 ja 16).
These painting/art analyses are for the artists. Come up with a surprising interpretation, give reasonable justifictaions, use clever language, throw in a few terms et voila! you have a laudatur. Not an easy achievement, though, I think for most.
11. "Ikijää ja ikirouta sulavat, valkoiset vuorenhuiput katoavat, entiset umpijäätiköt lainehtivat sulana vetenä ainakin kesäisin. Tulviva vesi uhkaa ihmisiä tulevaisuudessa myös valtamerten matalilla rannoilla." Näin kuvailee maapallon tulevaisuutta Jukka Ukkola reportaasissaan Suomen Kuvalehdessä 2.11.2007. Miten käy? Arvioi jäätiköiden sulamisen seurauksia sivujen 12-13 tietoaineistoa hyödyntäen.
Lots of knowledge, special terminology and things explained so well that even the most thick-headed redneck understood what global warming is about and we have a laudatur. Reading 'Billions & Billions' by Carl Sagan would help with this assignment. Would have been much better without the helping information provided in the material, then this would have been my choice of subject. But as it is...
Luckily there's the left side to the bell curve, too. ;)
4 kommenttia
millikan
24.3.2009 17:33
Hmm, frankly I guess there would be plenty of Facebook sceptics writing the essays, but on both sides this would be a topic which probably nets largest amount of crap essays. Kind of topic everyone thinks they know something about but few actually have wide enough view and knowledge to pull it off (like back in the day when reaali was not separated, geography famously had relatively large percentage of crap answers).
Poem/text/picture analyses are also tricky, I have always considered them cheap (magna) cum laude topics, if you have paid attention you can get c or even m easily but going above that is nigh impossible.
Were I writing these today, I would probably choose first or seventh, kind of generic ones but I guess I could pull an eximia out of either one.
On the first one I wouldn't pick Titanic or Romeo & Juliet though, that would be a failure...
Splenetic
24.3.2009 22:22
True words.. I don't remember at all the topics given to us the year I gratuated, I only remeber that there was no one topic that would have immediately risen above all others (unlike during the preliminaries... all preliminaries, to be exact...) which is why I only got an eximia (though I was only two points short of a laudatur). There's no THE subject amongst these, either. I suppose if I absolutely had to I'd write on number four from women's point of view since that is the thing I know a lot about; eleven would have been nice topic to show off with knowledge if they only had left out the material... damn! If there's a quota for the general topics, there should be a quota for the laudatur-focused special knowledge students, too.
Romeo & Juliet. Titanic... you know, I didn't even think about those. And besides, the majority writing this year were born 1990, they don't know Titanic like we old fossils do (we actually went to see it from school!). Would have been a nice touch to write on the first topic by treating death as abstract, not literally the death of an individual. How about writing number one of 'Huojuva talo' by Maria Jotuni, from the point of view of the dead baby? Perhaps a bit (okay, a lot) macabre but probably the sensors would have remebered that one.
millikan
25.3.2009 13:58
I cannot really remember what I wrote in the exams, I do remember that i wrote probably the least inspired essays during high school then. I got just magna cum laude, and considered going back later to redo the exams...but never bothered.
I wonder if I had dared to go even more abstract treatment of death and write about Three Sisters by Chekov, with their life as living death...
Splenetic
26.3.2009 11:44
I recall my other essay having to do something with material by Lasse Lehtinen (curiously enough, I remember very well the topic of my preliminary exam though I had a 39 degree fever that day... just couldn't miss the exercise exams...) Yes, the risk dilemma: to take an ordinary and safe topic with a higher likelihood of doing "fine", or to take a risky approach and risk not only the "doing fine" grade but on the other hand taking the risk of getting a very good grade. The Chekhov idea is nice! Probably not very many would have chosen Chekhov but some mainstream Hollywood movie. Belgium... imagine writing the essay using Harlequin novels... can NOT be taken very seriously...!