In year 11, I never really studied beyond the assigned homework on normal days as that alone would usually take anywhere between 1-3 hours. However, as exam periods rolled around, I would study anywhere between a day or a week in advance for each of my subjects, probably 4 ish hours a night just writing out notes and the like. For essay based exams though, I'd write my drafts atleast 2 weeks before the exam date so that there was more scope to hand in a draft to my teacher and take on their feedback. As the date emerged, I would just keep refining and refining the drafts, often this would consist of cutting down my word count without compromising the complexity and cohesion behind my arguments. In maths, studying must be done atleast a week before, if you do mathematics or anything above that such as Ext 1. I, like you, wanted to do the notes thing throughout the year but it probably lasted a week before I gave up. I think you underestimate the amount of homework you have to do, in addition to studying, because more often than not, you're so occupied with homework that you're not really able to transcend beyond that without burning out tbh. Because in year 11 you're on 12+ units, I think it is almost guaranteed that you'll "dropkick" one subject and leave it in the dust because either you trivialise its importance knowing you'll drop it anyway, or you think you can do well without studying. I have extremely academically rigorous friends and they all had that one "dropkick" subject. For me, it was Multimedia, I never ever studied for it and bludged all the assignments but maintained an overall mark of 93 because I had the knowledge of it before even being in the class. It is a real challenge to do well in every subject because all the assessments are usually squished together, so starting early would definitely be an imperative to success. I think I would have been way better off if I had done that. The off chances where I did start early, the reduced stress was honestly incredible for my mind and I had exponentially more confidence in my performance. I was also working 15+ hour weeks, which kinda forced me to organise my time effectively as there really wasn't any room for me to procrastinate (I still did though hahaha). However, I think studying effectively is more important than studying a LOT. In comparison to my aforementioned friends, I seriously think the amount of studying I did was quite slim. However, I ended the year with high 80s-90s across all my subjects, ranking 1st, 3rd and 4th in Multimedia, Legal Studies and English Extension respectively. I've taken these studying habits into Year 12 too, and am currently ranked 1st in Legal with a mark of 100% and 3rd in Mathematics with a mark of 95% and I haven't gotten anything else back yet. In prepping for my Legal exam, I was stressed as hell because I forgot to n/a for work and was rostered on for 24 hours that week so I finished my draft the night we got the notification and sent it to my teacher. I seriously thought my teacher would be disappointed in me because I estimated my mark for my first year 12 assessment would be max 80 when I had gotten 90s and 100s in year 11. The ability to work my shifts knowing I had gotten it completed though was such a relief and, in the end, I got 100% which surprised even myself hahah. Nothing actually counts in year 11, so don't be too hard on yourself! Embrace your last year of being able to wing shit without detrimental consequences to your HSC hahah. Seek out your errors and work on them, it pays off
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