Home Economics: Homes and marriage on an unpredictable paper

This year's Leaving Cert home economics paper was anything but predictable, according to Sandra Cleary, a home economics teacher at the Institute of Education.

“While the questions asked were clear and straight-forward, this was not a predictable paper,” she said.

“Small areas of the course were given quite a lot of weighting, and students who were relying on specific topics to appear may be disappointed. Students who left nothing to chance and covered the course in its entirety, will do very well in this exam.”

Ms Cleary said that the short questions were not too challenging but they related to topics that students may not have been expecting. One of the more surprising questions was on the topic of cheese and it has not been asked before, while a part on artisan producers has not appeared since 2009.

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“Question three, on the taste experience and sensory analysis testing is a small part of the course, but this whole question was devoted to the topic. This may have caught some students out. Housing seems to have been a theme throughout this paper, and it appeared in this question, with reference to the social housing strategy and mortgages. It was surprising to see marriage appear on the paper again, as it appeared two years ago,” she said.