15 minutes planning + 120 minutes writing. Everything comes from Unit 4: respectful relationships in the post-schooling transition. You get a stimulus book (about 10 items: tables, bar charts, star ratings, feedback panels) and exactly two questions:
For 2026 the conditions no longer print a word count, so follow whatever your paper says. About 400 to 500 each is still the right size for the time you have.
The wall: never carry data across. Context numbers stay in Q1, innovation numbers stay in Q2. Signpost every claim: "Stimulus 2 shows 41% in 2025..." A number the marker cannot trace earns nothing.
THE RULE OF TWOS (AND ONE THREE). The marking pays in twos, with one exception: THREE resource or stressor relationships in Q1. Then two barriers + two enablers, two data trends, two determinants, two RE-AIM steps, two diffusion variables. A third RE-AIM letter earns literally zero. Inside 500 words: pick your best two of each, go deep.
These are moves, not marks. Every paragraph needs all four, but each part of the marking pays for something different:
| Part | What lifts the mark | Top |
|---|---|---|
| Analysing, relationships lands on: the impact on these students | a count: one described = 2, two explained = 3, THREE with insight = 4 | 4 |
| Analysing, barriers + enablers lands on: ease or dis-ease | one = 2, one of each = 3, two AND two, each pushed toward ease or dis-ease = 4 | 4 |
| Interpreting (each trend) lands on: a named resource, stressor, barrier, enabler or determinant | trend + conclusion = 2, add the values = 3, insightful conclusion = 4 | 4 |
| Critiquing (each determinant) lands on: respectful relationships OR the transition | "factor" = 1, named determinant + link = 2, explained + significance = 3, insightful = 4 | 4 |
| RE-AIM (each step) lands on: a judgement of the innovation | plausible point = 2, significant point = 3, critical evaluation (strength AND limit) = 4 | 4 |
| DPVs (each) lands on: uptake | lever or concept = 1, real DPV described = 2, explained as evaluation = 3 | 3 |
| Justifying impact lands on: respectful relationships as a GRR AND the transition | first half: BOTH impacts = 3, only one = 2 · second half: strengthen, maintain or adapt for the SECOND region = 3 | 3 |
| Action strategy lands on: uptake in the second region | built on a diffusion concept = 3 at best, named DPV + second-region reason = 4 | 4 |
The river of life. The syllabus asks you to picture health as a swimmer in a river: "we are all, always, in the dangerous river of life. The twin question is: how dangerous is our river? How well can we swim?" Everything else in the subject hangs off that picture.
Use it as your checking question on any Q1 paragraph: is this making the river more dangerous, or making them a better swimmer? If you can answer that, you have your movement-towards-ease-or-dis-ease sentence.
The Ottawa Charter sits on top (new for 2026). It used to be one framework among several. From 2026 it is the overarching charter, and the other two top-level frameworks were removed. Its three strategies are the language your recommendations should land in:
| Strategy | Means |
|---|---|
| Mediate | Get different groups working together in the pursuit of health |
| Advocate | Speak up for health, to create the conditions health needs |
| Enable | Give people the skills and resources to reach their full health potential |
Two more sit alongside it as overarching resources: health literacy (functional, interactive and critical) and social justice (diversity, equity, supportive environments). If a recommendation can be framed as mediate, advocate or enable, frame it that way.
| Letter | Asks | Counts |
|---|---|---|
| Reach | Who did it actually get to? Was that the target group? | People reached |
| Effectiveness | Did it work? What changed, by how much? | People changed |
| Adoption | Did settings take it up? | ORGANISATIONS saying yes |
| Implementation | Delivered as designed, consistently? | How faithfully it was run |
| Maintenance | Did it last after the launch buzz? | Whether it kept going |
The trap that catches everyone: "lots of students downloaded it" is REACH, never Adoption. People reached or changed = Reach or Effectiveness. Settings saying yes = Adoption. How faithfully it ran = Implementation. Whether it kept going = Maintenance. The formula for marks: a number from the stimulus + a RE-AIM letter + a judgement word.
The five characteristics:
| Characteristic | The question it answers |
|---|---|
| Relative advantage | Is it actually better than what exists? |
| Compatibility | Does it fit how people already live? |
| Complexity | How hard does it LOOK to use? (hard = slow uptake) |
| Trialability | Can you try it without committing? |
| Observability | Can people SEE it working for others? |
Stages: innovation development → dissemination (four levers: communication, persuasion, resources, regulations) → institutionalisation (it becomes routine).
Adopter curve: innovators → early adopters → early majority → late majority → laggards. Opinion leaders and champions speed everything up.
DPV or just a "diffusion concept"? This is worth marks. The guide pays up to 3 for explaining a diffusion process variable, but only 1 for describing a general diffusion concept. The syllabus lists exactly four kinds of DPV:
The three STAGES and their four levers are a different part of the model. Great for the action strategy, but if you name a lever as your DPV you drop to 1 mark out of 3. Rule: name the variable, do not gesture at the idea. You need TWO DPVs, and picking them from two different families of the four is the safest way to look like you own the model.
The footy version (for memory, never for the exam page): a new boot brand spreads through a league like any innovation: captains wear them first, keen players copy, most follow, one bloke refuses forever.
| Term | Means |
|---|---|
| Transition | One change in roles or status: leaving school, moving out |
| Trajectory | The LONG pattern across many transitions |
| Turning point | The change that bends the whole pattern |
| Reverse transition | Going back: moving home after moving out |
| Cohort | People moving through the same changes together (your Year 12s ARE one) |
| On time / off time | At the socially expected stage, or not |
| Emerging adulthood | The 5 features: identity exploration · possibilities · feeling in between · self-focus · instability |
Free marks: transition vs trajectory vs turning point, crisp. One change / the long pattern / the change that bends the pattern.
| Term | Means |
|---|---|
| Salutogenic approach | Strengths-based: what CREATES health, not what causes disease |
| General resistance resource (GRR) | What helps people cope through stressors. Respectful relationships are Unit 4's GRR, use that exact phrase |
| Barriers / enablers | What decreases / increases access to health resources |
| Determinants | Physical · psychological · social · economic. Name the category, then link it |
| Ottawa verbs | Advocate = speak up for it · Enable = give skills and resources · Mediate = get groups working together. Your recommendation uses one |
| Health literacy | The skills to find, understand and USE health info; predicts uptake |
1 · Mark up the stimulus before you write a word. The book gives you about ten items and far more than you can use. Selecting is the skill. Read once with a pen and tag as you go:
| Code | Means |
|---|---|
| R/S | a resource or a stressor |
| B/E | a barrier or an enabler |
| D | a determinant |
| T | a trend you could actually quote (two values, two years) |
| RE-AIM | evidence for one of the five steps |
| DPV | a diffusion process variable |
| N | a need a strategy could target |
Now your plan is just picking the best tags. Anything untagged, you can ignore with a clear conscience.
2 · The significance sentence: pick a destination. "Why does this matter?" is too big a question to answer under pressure, so do not answer it in general. Land it on one of four places. The part of the marking you are in decides which ones count:
Which ones count where: barriers and enablers land on ease or dis-ease. Determinants land on respectful relationships OR the transition only. Impact must hit BOTH respectful relationships (as a general resistance resource) AND the transition. RE-AIM, DPVs and the strategy land on uptake. Trends land on a named resource, stressor, barrier, enabler or determinant. (The "what lifts the mark" table up top has the full list.)
Four options is a decision you can make in three seconds. "Why does it matter?" is a decision you can lose five minutes to.
3 · Check every paragraph has all three letters.
| E | evidence, straight from the stimulus, with the number |
|---|---|
| H | how it works, the relationship or mechanism |
| S | significance, the why-it-matters sentence, landed on one of the four destinations |
No S means the paragraph is not finished. That one habit is the difference between a 3 and a 4, everywhere on this paper.
The self-check, when you are not sure your last sentence counts:
"Have I explained something that is not already obvious from the stimulus?"
If your final sentence just repeats the number, or says something vague like "this affects their health", it is not a significance sentence yet. If it explains the consequence for this group, in this transition, through a named Health concept, it is.
One more link. When an explanation feels finished, add one more causal step. Watch it climb:
Rising living costs create financial stress. → Financial stress puts pressure on family relationships. → That matters because most graduates stay in the family home, so weakened family support removes a key social resource exactly when the transition is most unstable.
Same fact, three sentences apart. The last one is the one that gets paid.
The data-trend formula: value + year TO value + year, a trend verb with an adverb, then a conclusion tied to a determinant, resource, barrier or enabler.
"Stimulus 3 shows weekly club participation fell steeply from 64% in 2022 to 31% in 2025, a significant barrier because clubs are a key community resource for practising respectful relationships beyond school."
That one sentence shape, twice, is 8 of Q1's 24 marks. The drills train it.
Rough day? One drills run on your phone, lying down, counts. Or just blurt the five RE-AIM letters and what each counts. Keeping it warm beats doing it perfectly.