What is the program about?

[ibibib1022]

So.. I'm finally starting IB next year.. I have:

HL English

HL Bio

HL Psychology

SL Math

SL chem

SL French

I'm in Canada btw..

I've been reading the posts and such and it sounds as if the key in suceeding is time management.. but I was wondering.. In order to prepare for this program next year.. should I get any books? When should I start my EE? what can i write my EE about? and what exactly do u do in IB? how do they mark you? and what do they mark? and what do u do in HL English??

Basically.. im just confused as to how IB really works.. haha

and really scared of HL English.. Do u guys have any suggestions on how to prepare or explain how IB really works?? thanks

[sweetnsimple786]

A lot depends on the school you go to. IB sets hard deadlines, but teachers have internal deadlines. Some people start their EEs in their first year, while others start their EEs much later. My advice to you is to not worry so much about everything. What you need to know now is that you should work hard in all of your classes constantly. Show teachers you're interested and try to learn what you can. Participate in activities that interest you. Get involved in the community somehow.

For the EE, some schools allow you to write about any subject while others limit you to subjects you take. There's not a point to think about that before you've started. There will be plenty of time, although choosing a topic is a hard task for most. In English, we mostly read books and discuss themes and literary devices. We look at different kinds of works of literature and analyze them. [i assume you're talking about English A1. Any A1 language is your native one, pretty much. A2 means you've spent 5+ years studying it. B means you've spent a couple/few years studying it. Ab initio means you haven't had any exposure to the language. Does that make sense?]

IAs are internal assessments. You're assessed by IB in two ways: internally [your teacher grades it and IB moderates the grading to ensure that the teacher hasn't been too easy/tough] and externally [iB grades it]. English is a little funny because You have the IA, which is an oral presentation and commentary--no need to worry about that right now, and then you have external assessments in the form of the actual exams [for English this broken up into 2 papers--Papers 1 and 2. how original. some exams have 3 papers. others have 2] and world literature assignments [if you take English A1 SL, you do 1 WL assignment. If you're taking HL, you do 2].

Each course is has its own assessments like that. It really doesn't make a difference at this point =)

How IB works... hmm. Well we have Advanced Placement which is similar to IB at my school. The difference is that AP looks more at what you specifically know and grades you taking points off for wrong things. IB looks more at how you're backing it up and gives points for what you say. And of course this is a generalization and changes for different subjects. Anyways, I assume you're not taking exams in May 2011 since you're starting IB next year. You're finishing exams in May 2013?

[Sonneteer_Trombonist]

I think sweetnsimple786 summed it up pretty well. If you're scared, the best way to think of it is that it's similar to any high school program, you learn stuff and write tests on that stuff and do labs in the sciences and essays in English and whatnot. The difference is that your teachers aren't the only ones marking you. They have to send specific assignments away to be marked by moderators, which means that everyone who takes the same IB subject has to do these specific assignments. This includes some extra essays and projects in each subject. Don't sweat about it too much, take it as it comes.

In English HL, you'll have to write two extra essays (these are the World Literature assignments, or WL assignments that sweetnsimple786 mentioned). World Literature means that it's literature from around the globe and translated in English. For example, my class read Madame Bovary. You also have to do two oral assessments, so you just talk about the literature.

As for preparation and the EE, I'd say don't worry about it right now. Reading a history book or learning extra math just so you feel like you're prepared will probably stress you out more than it will help you. If you are transitioning between Junior High and regular High School, you wouldn't try to learn everything beforehand or attempt to learn how everything works or every assignment you're going to be given. This is no different. Just take it as it comes for the first little while and see how things work. Your teachers will explain how they will do things.

[bLub]

should I get any books? When should I start my EE? what can i write my EE about?

Don't worry about it all too much now. Just get going and it all will come as you go along!

The books will usually be set by your school, so you can't really prepare for English. But hey, if you want - if you've already decided which courses to do - you could get some related books to get an idea about the subject. E.g. for Biology, "Biology for the IB Diploma by Andrew Allott". And really, nooo need to think about your EE now. You haven't even started the IB!! Your teachers will introduce you to the EE and explain everything to you. And you won't be able to make a good decision in which subject to write it in until you've actually had lessons, where you can find out which subject really interests you the most etc...

Anyways: be warned! The IB is quite hard and there's lots to do and you'll probably find yourself "just living for the IB" at some point and your social life might get a bit disregarded...

good luck

[ADH]

Well where do I start? My journey through IB will be over in a few months and I will say that it was probably the most stressful times of my life. However, it comes with a territory. Well in IB my school never really gave us textbooks for the course. They kinda created the material on their own by following the syllabus. However IB Chem is a different story. If you want your own resource for that class, I would recommend Geoffrey Nuess' IB Chemistry Course Companion. It helped me out a lot in that class. But the key to IB Chemistry is STUDY STUDY and I mean STUDY! Depending on how good at Chemistry you are I would study at least an hour a night and also use the IB Chem syllabus. That's what it's for. I see you're taking IB Bio as well. I didn't know you could do that, but if I had the choice I would stick with one science. As for you EE, I would start that as soon as I can, however depending on your school you should get tons of info about that during your TOK class. Usually your TOK teacher will give you the outline of how everything is to fall into place. And you can write your EE about pretty much anything as long as it's not too broad. And it's an "investigative study." So your not just writing a narrative research paper. You're writing with a purpose. I was misinformed by my former instructor and scored a D on mine. I was really disappointed. HL English is a whole nother battlefield my friend. Personally I don't like English so I went for SL English. But basically a quick overview is that you read all these books and poetry and at the end you're required to do a World Lit 1 and 2 paper and And Oral Commentary. Now oral commentaries are huge. They'll give you a random passage from one of the works you've read and you'll have 20 minutes to write a commentary. It sounds really intimidating but as long as you prepare in advance you should do fine.

Things I may have missed.

CAS Hours ---> Required to keep a log of all the activities you do. Make sure you have proof of some of them.

EE---> Max of 4,000 words but a good paper is at least 2,800 but theirs no word minimum.

TOK Essay--->About the ways of knowing, you'll learn about that in TOK.

TOK Presentation---> Using the ways of knowing, you'll learn about that also in TOK.

English---> WLA 1 and 2. Oral Commentaries. Read a whole bunch of books.

History---> Not your normal history. You write essays and I mean real ones where you have to analysis historical data, so days of regurgitating information is over.

Chemistry---> Lab Reports, Lots of studying, Notes, Sometimes confusion and Group 4 assignments.

Math SL---> A watered down version of Math. If you have the chance I would take AP Calc in conjunction with this especially when you get to the Calculus unit. You'll thank yourself in the long run. But if you do, wait until you've covered the Calculus unit before you take AP Calc unless you've taken Math 140. Also for little rules that your bound to forget, write them down on little index cards.

Spanish---> Lots of IB texts, quizzes and test. Then at the end you have a IB Spanish Oral on a topic of your choice, but I'm pretty sure this goes for French as well. My advice to you would but to read some French online news articles to expose yourself to words you've never seen before.

OH AND FINALLY......PLEASE AND I MEAN PLEASE DO NOT PROCRASTINATE!!!!!!!!