First up, let me just say that English Extension 2 is awesome! Congratulations for choosing it.
Most of the time when people start, they have absolutely no idea what they want to do. Either that or they're already really passionate about something. To be honest, it doesn't matter, as long as you just take a few weeks to think about things, explore, be creative, look at the stars, do Englishy stuff - you know what that means by now...
Play around, don't restrict yourself too early - chances are you'll change your idea a couple of times. But once you've got one that you're happy with, stick with it. Because you need to show people that you care about your project, and that you have confidence that it's going to be awesome, especially in things like the Viva assessment. And I can tell you right now that it will be awesome, just believe in your project.
Because there will be times when you doubt yourself, when you think you shouldn't have bitten off so much, especially when you've got assessments - the EE2 assessments are always on when all your other ones aren't, which kind of puts you in permanent assessment mode....And yes, the shine of your project will wear off. Something you found amazing in November might not be amazing come July. And that's OK. You just have to know whether or not to stick with it. And in general, unless your teacher strongly dislikes it, you should stay with it. Because there was a reason you wanted to do it when you had the idea, and that reason should keep driving you now.
At the same time, make sure your original idea isn't too ambitious. You're not going to be able to write the major novel of the 21st century in 8000 words, or an essay that revolutionises critical theory or a film that...whatever. So just choose some target that you can reach within the word limits set by the Board of Studies. Because at the end of the day, this is your HSC, and so that spectre of 'marks' and 'ATAR' will unfortunately play a role - we try to minimise this as much as we can, but it's something to be aware of. Remember that you're not submitting something for a young writers' competition, or writing something for your own enjoyment - at least not entirely - at the end of the day it will be marked and there are syllabus dot points and criteria you need to check off.
This mainly matters in the assessment stages. Because the Board dictates to some extent how your school assesses your 'process of construction'. What this essentially means, is that your final results will depend significantly on how well you can write
about your project, not just how well you can write
in your project. That means you have to be constantly aware of things like: Concept, Purpose, Audience, Style.....You need to be able to have something you can say about each of these.
A friend of mine quit quite early because he couldn't get his project to fit the Purpose/Audience dot points. It was going to be a great piece of crime fiction, I thought, with a psychological bent, and yet he was writing for himself, and didn't have any real identifiable message. Which sucks, because I don't think that an identifiable message is the be all and end all of writing, and in fact, that was what my Work was about, but it formed an impasse between himself and his teacher and he had to drop EE2.
At the end of the day, as long as you have firmly in your mind an idea of 'why' you are writing, then you'll be fine. Just be aware that technicalities will be thrust upon you by the Board. There are quite a few good threads around this forum about what you need to do in each of your assessments to tick the dot points. Make sure you read these, because the worst thing that could happen would be for your awesome Major Work to be penalised for technicalities.
Journals. You will try to update it regularly. You will not be able to. You will claim you have. People will say they believe you. But everyone will know that this is a load of bollocks. Now keeping a journal would be great. It's a good way to get your ideas down. It can help you voice your concerns about your project - problems faced is a dotpoint - so that you can evaluate what difficulties you had to get past. I was not a regular journal updater. But every now and then i would write pages and pages and pages of stream of consciousness. Just do what works. And remember, if you love your idea, you'll love your journal, and you'll love your EE2.
The writing process. It takes ages. Some days you'll be inspired. 99% of days you won't. I wrote my work in about 8 bursts. I scrapped 3 of them completely and reworked the rest. If you don't know what to write, write something. You can change it later. Maybe it'll actually be good. Get people to read your work. Friends, family, teachers whatever. They're trying to help you, not to take marks off. They want your writing to be awesome. Enlist their help. Ask them what they think your work means (if it's a creative of some kind).
Read what other people have written. Other major works, other published writers/playwrights/poets...This can give you ideas about: what style you want, why you want that style, maybe even plot ideas (don't copy too much!) - inspiration over plagiarism...Write about this in your journal. Try to analyse a short piece of writing/multimedia/... every week (or two. I know you'll get lazy. and that's OK)
But the most important thing, if it hasn't come through, is to have fun. Because stressed writing is terrible, and passionate writing is amazing. Keep your wits about you, don't neglect the dot points, follow your dream, and help others - see if you can get a few friends to help eachother with your works/reflection statements. You'll love to read theirs, I know, and if you can get past the fear of failure, of other people seeing your work and criticizing you, you will profit immensely. Remember that confidence is crucial, and if you're having fun, you'll have it.
Lastly, if all this seems too much, disregard it completely. This is English after all, not Maths. Go for it! Write your heart out, and you will feel amazing afterwards. At least, you will for the few months until the results come out
