How to Use AI in Your HSC Study (the Best Way)

I was part of the final HSC cohort (2022) to study without widespread use of generative AI tools. Honestly, I’m almost glad about that, studying felt simpler, and I am sure many teachers would agree with me. However, if you’re in Year 11 or 12 now, chances are you’ve already used AI in some form: ChatGPT; Grammarly; or even a quick summary tool.

I know that the HSC year is intense. You’re juggling multiple subjects, assessments, sport, part-time work, and the final years of school with your friends. So it’s no surprise students are looking for ways to study smarter.

This article breaks down where AI can genuinely support your HSC prep and where it still falls short. While it’s tempting to outsource your thinking to an app, your brain still needs to show up on exam day.

Here’s what my tutors and I have noticed from student experience.

What AI is really good at

Explaining tricky content in plain English

AI can be fantastic when you're stuck and need someone to break it down simply. Whether it's understanding the concept of diminishing marginal utility in Economics, breaking down the legal implications of a case study in Legal Studies, or explaining a metaphor in The Tempest, AI can go into depth and communicate clearly.

You can even ask follow-up questions until it makes sense. This makes it great for when you’re studying by yourself or reviewing late at night when your teacher isn’t around.

Tip: Ask AI to explain something to you as if you’re five years old, it will usually simplify a concept better than most revision guides.

Helping you plan or scaffold an essay

One of the most common roadblocks for students is the blank page. You might know the content, have your quotes ready, and even remember the rubric, but you don’t know where to start in structuring an answer.

In these moments, AI can help give you a structure. If you provide it with the essay question, your text, and your thesis, it can map out potential topic sentences or a paragraph plan. It won’t be perfect, but it can give you a place to start when you are procrastinating.

Tightening your writing

You’ve done the hard work of getting your ideas onto the page and now you want to make it sound better. AI is great for the editing phase of writing. It can help rephrase awkward sentences, clarify your expression and even adjust tone depending on the subject (more formal for Business Studies, more analytical for English, for example).

Just be careful: Don’t let it rewrite everything. It’s still your ideas that matter most. Use it like you would a second opinion.

Creating quizzes and study tools

If you already have solid notes, you can ask AI to turn them into flashcards, practice multiple-choice questions, or essay question examples. This is especially useful for subjects with lots of syllabus content, like Modern History or Biology.

You can also customise prompts to your study style. Want 6-mark Business responses to practise under time pressure? You can ask for that. Need essay questions that only focus on Russia between 1917–1924? You can do that too.

Summarising big-picture ideas

AI is great at synthesising. If you give it multiple texts, concepts or topics, it can help spot links and themes. For example, in Module A English, it can help you track how two composers represent power differently, and what aspects of it are universal over time. In Economics, it might help you summarise how macroeconomic policy shifts over the business cycle and WHY.

These summaries are helpful when you’re in revision mode, after you have preserved your initial learnings in class.

Where AI falls short

Sounding like you

Outputs of generative AI models will NOT sound like you. They might sound good at first glance, but will usually read as generic, over-formal, and lacking a personal voice and sustained argument that markers look for.

They often miss the nuances in a text or oversimplify a complex idea. Worse still, they often reuse phrases that sound impressive but are ultimately vague or meaningless.

Your teacher doesn’t want to read something a thousand other students could have submitted. Communicating ideas succinctly and in clear English to real people will usually create the best outcome.

Doing deep analysis

In English subjects especially, depth is everything. You’re not just identifying techniques in texts anymore, you are exploring how those techniques construct meaning. Why does this moment matter? What does it reveal about context, purpose, or human experience?

AI can help get you started, but it rarely pushes the analysis far enough. It might mention a theme or label a technique, but it doesn’t show insight in the way a real student can.

Practising under pressure

You can’t copy and paste your way through an exam. For students across NSW, you have compulsory English, meaning you WILL need to write three essays in two hours, under time pressure, without prompts. That takes practice, speed, endurance and a calm head, not just good ideas.

No matter how many essays AI helps you generate, nothing replaces handwritten timed practice. Even the best ideas won't be communicated well if you can’t write them down clearly in 40 minutes.

Being syllabus-specific

AI is trained on general knowledge and pattern recognition, not the NESA syllabus. It doesn’t know your exact Module B prescribed text, or the specific learning outcomes for PDHPE, or which policies are currently being taught in the updated Economics syllabus.

Sometimes it’ll get lucky and sound aligned. Other times it’ll go on tangents or use outdated examples. You need to be the one cross-checking everything against your syllabus dot-points and assessment requirements.

This is where your teacher or tutor is still your best resource.

Helping you grow as a thinker

The most important part of HSC study isn’t purely memorising content and the syllabus, it’s growing your skills as a thinker. Learning how to think deeply, write clearly, and reflect on feedback. Generative AI can offer shortcuts, but it can’t teach you how to persevere when a paragraph isn’t sounding quite right. It also can’t help you interpret the look on your teacher’s face when you’ve almost formed a good idea, or coach you through bouncing back from a disappointing exam result.

At Drift Tuition, we support and coach our students alongside syllabus content to create improvement outcomes.

What we tell our students at Drift

Use AI with purpose. It's there to support you when you're feeling stuck, whether that’s helping you understand a tricky concept, giving you a few example sentences to get your ideas flowing, or making sense of a question that’s just not making sense. But it shouldn’t be something you use to outsource thinking for yourself.

Disclaimer: Just a quick note, I'm not a school teacher. I have worked with a lot of senior students over the years, and I’ve seen firsthand what helps them grow, not just in their marks, but in their confidence too. Your teacher is always your first point of contact for your studies. See our article HERE

Also, your assessment notifications will guide the permitted use of AI, please follow those!

- Bella

Founder, Drift Tuition