[brastu]

HELP FROM A HISTORY TEACHER PLEASE!

Hi,
I have an IGCSE paper 2 this friday. It is a source based paper and the topic is" The Decline of soviet control over Eastern Europe". I have not studied this topic in class as I have focused mainly on the peace treaties after the war, the work of the league and russia.
I absolutely adore history and so have set myself the target of achieving an a* grade for the exams. But today I had a depth study paper on Russia and although i knew its whole history i panicked and did do as well as i had wanted.
I am starting to become a little desperate as I realized that I do not have a lot of skills at answering sourcee based questions. I was hoping a history teacher could give me some advice on how to tacke this source based questions and how to prepare for my coming exam when i have barely ever even heard of soviet control over eastern europe.

I would really appreciate some advice! thank you very very much for your time!

[Mr. D. Bryant]

There may be a problem giving you advice in time, as we don't have any teachers who teach this course - I assume CIE - on the forum. However, another student with a similar problem did get some help recently in this thread.

I will put a notice on the History Teachers' Forum, but I cannot promise to get results.

Otherwise, I would suggest that you do a forum search on 'IGCSE'and 'Sources' and see what you can find.

We will let you know if we find out anything else relevant.

[L Cowan]

brastu, on Oct 27 2009, 06:24 PM, said:

HELP FROM A HISTORY TEACHER PLEASE!

Hi,
I have an IGCSE paper 2 this friday. It is a source based paper and the topic is" The Decline of soviet control over Eastern Europe". I have not studied this topic in class as I have focused mainly on the peace treaties after the war, the work of the league and russia.
I absolutely adore history and so have set myself the target of achieving an a* grade for the exams. But today I had a depth study paper on Russia and although i knew its whole history i panicked and did do as well as i had wanted.
I am starting to become a little desperate as I realized that I do not have a lot of skills at answering sourcee based questions. I was hoping a history teacher could give me some advice on how to tacke this source based questions and how to prepare for my coming exam when i have barely ever even heard of soviet control over eastern europe.

I would really appreciate some advice! thank you very very much for your time!

Hi
I don't, I'm afraid, teach Russia but can give a little advice on attacking sorce-based questions. It isn't anything complicated or clever but students often lose sight of the basics in exams.
1. Make sure you actually answer the question! Is it asking for a judgement? Do you have to assess the success or progress of something?
2. Evaluate the sources. How useful is it/are they for answering this question? Is it/are they reliable? Can you trust what you are seeing/reading? What is the nature of source? For whom is it intended?
3. Follow the PEE principle - make a Point, Explain how it answers the question, support your explanation with Evidence.
4. End with a conclusion that directly answers the question and prioritises 2-4 of your most important points, explaining why they are the most important.

It is rather late in the day if you really don't know much about Soviet control in eastern Europe but try not to let panic take over, you may well know more than you think.
Good Luck

[brastu]

L Cowan, on Oct 27 2009, 05:58 PM, said:

brastu, on Oct 27 2009, 06:24 PM, said:

HELP FROM A HISTORY TEACHER PLEASE!

Hi,
I have an IGCSE paper 2 this friday. It is a source based paper and the topic is" The Decline of soviet control over Eastern Europe". I have not studied this topic in class as I have focused mainly on the peace treaties after the war, the work of the league and russia.
I absolutely adore history and so have set myself the target of achieving an a* grade for the exams. But today I had a depth study paper on Russia and although i knew its whole history i panicked and did do as well as i had wanted.
I am starting to become a little desperate as I realized that I do not have a lot of skills at answering sourcee based questions. I was hoping a history teacher could give me some advice on how to tacke this source based questions and how to prepare for my coming exam when i have barely ever even heard of soviet control over eastern europe.

I would really appreciate some advice! thank you very very much for your time!

Hi
I don't, I'm afraid, teach Russia but can give a little advice on attacking sorce-based questions. It isn't anything complicated or clever but students often lose sight of the basics in exams.
1. Make sure you actually answer the question! Is it asking for a judgement? Do you have to assess the success or progress of something?
2. Evaluate the sources. How useful is it/are they for answering this question? Is it/are they reliable? Can you trust what you are seeing/reading? What is the nature of source? For whom is it intended?
3. Follow the PEE principle - make a Point, Explain how it answers the question, support your explanation with Evidence.
4. End with a conclusion that directly answers the question and prioritises 2-4 of your most important points, explaining why they are the most important.

It is rather late in the day if you really don't know much about Soviet control in eastern Europe but try not to let panic take over, you may well know more than you think.
Good Luck

Thank you very much for your source advice! I really was a little worried about anwering source based questions. I have always used the same method. What I usually do is:
First I interpret what the question wants. For example if it is asking me about the realiability of a source or the success of a policy according to a source.
Than I look for evidence in the source to support what my answer will be.
I read the source in parts and copy extracts into my answer explaining each individual quote.
In the end I close it all with a conclusion.

However I have continuously found that this method is too time consuming and becomes a little 'monotonous' after having answered 10 sourced based questions.
I am trying to find different formats of anwering source based questions. May be concluding and than picking out just a few references from the source.. but i have trouble organizing my answers if the evidence is not in order of appearance in the source.
I was wondering if any history teacher has any comment on this, on what is the best structure to answer source based questions... or may be an example of a good source based answer?

Once again, thank you very much!

[MrJohnDClare]

Have you seen this webpage?

And, for more detail, have you looked at this webpage on utility questions?