Leaving Cert history exam looked 'daunting' and rewarded students 'who avoided rote learning'
Jamie Dockery, a history teacher at Tyndall College in Carlow, said the Higher Level paper looked like a "daunting prospect" at first glance.
Advertisement
"Many will have been surprised not to see questions on Charles Stewart Parnell or the Montgomery Bus Boycott," he said. "Those who placed all their bets on these topics — undoubtedly a sizeable number — will be bitterly disappointed."
"However, there was much to be pleased with in this paper. The Documents-Based Question focused on the Jarrow March, a topic most well-prepared students would have covered thoroughly. The sources were engaging, and while the contextualisation question – asking whether the march was a failure – was slightly challenging, it was certainly manageable.
"The 'Movements for Reform' section featured an interesting question comparing the successes of Michael Davitt and James Larkin, two reformers with shared ideals but from different eras.
"Eamon de Valera was widely expected to appear on the paper, given that this year marks the 50th anniversary of his death—and 'the Long Fellow' didn't disappoint. The question was broad, covering his role in the Treaty negotiations, the Civil War, and World War II.
Advertisement
"Speaking of WWII, its appearance in an Irish context was welcome, as it hadn't featured since 2021. The topic 'The United States and the Wider World, 1945–1989' proved tricky, with challenging questions on the American Dream and the role of religion in American life. However, the inclusion of LBJ will have come as a relief to many.
"As with last year's paper, women featured prominently, with questions on Isabella Tod, Hanna Sheehy-Skeffington, Bernadette Devlin, Mary Robinson, Sylvia Meehan, Simone de Beauvoir, and Nadine Gordimer. Overall, this was an exam that rewarded the candidates who avoided rote learning, who didn't cut corners with their revision, and who were able to think on their feet."
Mr Dockery said the Ordinary Level exam will have been generally well received by students and teachers, with the Jarrow March also the focus of the Documents Based Question.
"In fact, the Ordinary Level exam had many similar (and in some instances, the same) questions to its Higher Level version across the entire exam – I very much welcome the Higher and Ordinary Level exam having similar questions, particularly considering that the average Senior History groups will have Higher and Ordinary Level students learning together in the one class.
Advertisement
Lifestyle
Leaving Cert: French exam used 'challenging vocabu...
Read More
"When teaching Ordinary Level students, my advice to them is always to focus mainly on the Case Studies for each topic and the key personalities. Candidates who followed this approached will have been satisfied with this exam.
"Many of the main personalities from Irish History found their way into the exam including O'Connell; Yeats; Davitt; Roscommon man Douglas Hyde; Collins, Cosgrave and de Valera. Women will also well represented in the guise of Hanna Sheehy-Skeffington and Countess Markievicz and Maureen O'Hara, among others. Eagle-eyed students will notice that many of these personalities appeared in the 2024 edition.
"The 'Europe and the Wider World' topics were also varied and offered the well-prepared candidate the opportunity to do well. Just like in the Higher Level paper, the United States topic was not without its challenges, but the inclusion of the Montgomery Bus Boycott here means that the vast majority of candidates should be fine. It was interesting that the Star Wars question included the parenthesis (the Strategic Defence Initiative) to hopefully discourage answers about Luke Skywalker (as opposed to – correctly – Ronald Reagan!)
"As a History teacher, my hope for any exams is that it will give the diligent and hardworking student a chance to show off all they know, and this exam certainly did that."
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
The Independent
7 hours ago
- The Independent
Student in Gaza unable to reach UK before start of term ‘refuses to give up'
A student trapped in Gaza who has been awarded a place at a UK university said she 'lost access to education overnight' but refuses to 'give up'. Dalya Ibrahim Shehada Qeshta was studying pharmacy at Al-Azhar University in Gaza while her twin sister Dalal was specialising in engineering when the campus was 'completely destroyed' in the ongoing conflict, she said. The 22-year-old, from Rafah city in southern Gaza and who has family in the UK, said despite this, the pair 'refused to let go of our dreams' and applied to study in the UK. 'Our university was completely destroyed, along with many of our personal belongings, and we lost access to education overnight,' she told the PA news agency. 'Like thousands of others, our lives were thrown into chaos. 'Education is not just a dream for us, it is our hope for healing, rebuilding, and having a future beyond war,' she said. Dalya has been offered a place to study pharmacy at the University of Manchester while Dalal secured a place at the University of Bristol on an aerospace engineering course. However, both are unable to leave Gaza as their way out is 'physically blocked' by the closure of borders and crossings in the region as well as a lack of financial support, Ms Qeshta said. Last week, the Guardian reported that a group of 40 students in Gaza are unable to take their places at UK universities in September despite being awarded full scholarships because of a Home Office requirement for biometric data for visa applications. According to the paper, the UK-authorised biometrics centre in Gaza closed in October 2023 and it has been 'impossible' for the students to travel to centres in neighbouring countries. For Ms Qeshta, continuing her education is 'key to breaking the cycle of hardship,' she said, adding that it would 'change our lives for the better'. During the early months of the war, Ms Qeshta said her family home was 'completely destroyed' and they have been 'forcibly displaced' 11 times since. They are currently living in a tent in Al-Mawasi. Of life in Gaza, she told PA it was a 'living nightmare' and that children were searching for 'water and bread, not toys or books'. 'Prices are unimaginably high, and basic essentials like flour, rice, or canned goods are almost non-existent,' she said. 'True hunger is not just a feeling, it's a daily reality. 'Medicines and healthcare are either unavailable or unaffordable, and the sick often go without help.' She said: 'There's no sense of routine, just survival.' 'Children in Gaza no longer know what childhood means,' she said. 'The war has stolen their laughter, their innocence, and their dreams. 'They search for water and bread, not toys or books. 'They are dying not because of illness or because they are hungry, but simply because they are children of Gaza.' One of 'the most terrifying moments' the family experienced was in Al-Mawasi when 'shelling began without warning' as they were gathering their belongings, Ms Qeshta said. 'My brother was injured, and my sister's young children were paralysed with fear. 'We were caught between life and death, fleeing under fire.' On another occasion, bullets pierced the family's tent as they were preparing a meal in a moment of 'terror' she will never forget, the student said. 'But through all this darkness, we hold onto hope – hope that we can survive, rebuild, and one day live in peace,' she added. 'Hope that we can still pursue our dreams like any other young people in this world. 'We refuse to give up. 'Even when everything is stripped away from us, we cling to our humanity, to our stories, and to the belief that our voices still matter.' As pressure mounts on the UK Government to take further action to help end the conflict, Sir Keir Starmer announced this week that the country could take the step of recognising a Palestinian state in September ahead of a gathering at the UN. The UK would refrain from doing so if Israel allows more aid into Gaza, stops annexing land in the West Bank, agrees to a ceasefire, and signs up to a long-term peace process over the next two months. Although this is an 'important step', recognition 'should not be used as a bargaining tool' but as a 'moral and political obligation', Ms Qeshta said of the announcement. 'We have seen many promises before,' 'What matters most now is action.' She added: 'I hope this move is real and followed by real change on the ground, because words alone cannot save lives. ' The student urged the international community not to 'turn away' from the suffering in Gaza and to push for an 'immediate end' to the conflict. 'We are not numbers,' she said. 'We are people, and we want to live.' Campaigners are reportedly calling on the Government to grant students with scholarships a biometrics deferral and assist them in finding a safe route to a third country where they can complete their visa application before travelling to the UK. Of this group, a Government spokesperson said: 'We are aware of the students and are considering the request for support.' Labour MP Abtisam Mohamed, who is campaigning on this issue, said: 'Gaza's education system, like so much else, has been all but obliterated. 'Schools have become overcrowded shelters, every university has been reduced to rubble, and educators have been deliberately targeted and killed.' The Sheffield Central MP added: 'Ireland, France and Belgium have acted to ensure their students can reach safety, the UK has not. 'This is not hypothetical, some of these students have already been killed while waiting and others remain in constant danger. 'I'm pressing ministers to address this as soon as possible, as every minute increases the likelihood that more young lives will be lost.' The University of Bristol said they were unable to discuss individual cases and the University of Manchester has been contacted for comment.
Telegraph
17 hours ago
- Telegraph
Sacred Mysteries: Out of the ashes, an artist in search of the essential
The fire that burnt down St Mel's Cathedral, Longford, in the early hours of Christmas Day 2009, was so intense that the limestone pillars each side of the nave spalled and cracked in the heat. As with Notre-Dame in Paris, the effects of the fire were unexpected. The roof was destroyed and the floor fell through into the crypt. But a 19th-century painting on canvas of the Holy Family survived unscathed. St Mel's Cathedral serves the diocese of Ardagh and Clonmacnoise. Both ancient foundations, Clonmacnoise was largely abandoned by the 13th century, and Ardagh had been ruinous since 1496, though the foundation stone for the cathedral at Longford was taken from the ruins. The dioceses were united in 1756. The neo-classical cathedral of St Mel's at Longford, begun in 1840, was large enough to seat 1,100 people. The architect was John Benjamin Keane, who had designed Gardiner Street Church in Dublin. The completion of St Mel's was delayed by the Irish Famine. After the fire in 2009, with the economy rocky and unemployment high, it could not have been rebuilt had it not been insured. It reopened for worship five years later, for Christmas 2014. The interior is white and light, with a barrel-vaulted ceiling. The most striking features are the 22 dark grey Ionic limestone columns dividing the nave from the aisles. Surviving from the old cathedral are two windows made in 1932 by the studio of Harry Clarke. A pleasant surprise to me in the new cathedral are the 14 Stations of the Cross. Because these scenes from the Passion of Christ are, in many churches, products of the 19th century, an era of uneven artistic merit, I seldom find them things of beauty. But Bishop Colm O'Reilly, who set about the reconstruction of the cathedral that he had known all his life, got Ken Thompson, born in Cork in 1946, to carve the stations that were to replace the burnt wooden paintings. Thompson had been influenced by the work of Eric Gill, and says of his own stations: 'The style of the carving is hieratic. My sympathies lie with early pre-Renaissance carving where the artist, in search of the essential, avoids over-realistic representation.' The Bath stone panels for the stations are 55in high and 46in wide. The technique is of bas relief, with the figures raised 1½in from the background. The background is painted a light blue and the lettering picked out in a terracotta colour. The dished haloes of Jesus and the saints are gilded. Each station is accompanied by a quotation from Scripture. 'The gestures of the figures in these panels are, in a sense, liturgical, acting out what has been prophesied about the Suffering Servant in the Old Testament.' A detail in several panels is of green shoots springing to life. They are visible on the hill of Calvary through the door of the tomb in the 14th station, which bears the quotation: 'Why seek you the living among the dead?' It shows Jesus being laid on a stone slab by his disciples. 'This stone slab represents the altar on which Christ's eternal sacrifice is re-enacted in every Mass.' An angel is shown coming from heaven bearing a plaque inscribed 'Gloria' – a memory of the Nativity, a record of what St John calls Jesus's glorification on the Cross, and a prophecy of the Resurrection. Above the door is carved Nika, 'Victor'. I learnt about the new cathedral from a Sister of Mercy, Angela Bracken, who lives in Longford; otherwise I wouldn't have known of it.
The Independent
a day ago
- The Independent
The downside of having summer-born children
Families seeking to delay their summer-born children's primary school entry face an "unfair postcode lottery" due to inconsistent council decisions across England. An analysis of Freedom of Information requests revealed that some councils refuse over half of parents' requests for deferred entry, while others approve all. Campaigners and parents are advocating for greater consistency, arguing that the current system causes stress and can disadvantage children not emotionally or physically ready for school. The Department for Education 's guidance states it should be "rare" for a request to be refused, as it is "rarely in a child's best interests" to miss a year of education.
