History is pretty feasible without a teacher... that being said, the new system's syllabus is pretty scattered, and you can't just use the 'Enjoyment of Music' textbook. But when I have time, I'm typing up all the notes for History 3 and 4. You can also get practice exams and the Frederick Harris "Exploring Music History" series is kinda useful. I hate studying history. I did very well on History 3, but it's so time consuming, I think it would be hard for me to prepare for the exams if I didn't have the pressure of having to regurgitate facts to my teacher. History is basically memorizing all the little facts ever. You have to memorise the terms associated with the eras, stuff like Sonata Allegro Form and its features, the features of Mass, the instruments of the time, how the Industrial Revolution and the French Revolution led to the Romantic Era, and other stuff like that. That's the easy part. The second hardest part is memorizing composers' lives. You have to know numbers. For Bach, you need to know when and where he was born, when he composed for certain churches, what he composed while he was at which institution, how is compositions evolved, and what major pieces he wrote, and his style in general. For me, the dates are the hardest. Then the worst is learning the pieces. For something like the Four Seasons, you'll have to know which instrument plays which theme, what the themes represent, whether they're disjunct or flowing, or arpeggiated, or other really ridiculous stuff like that, and then the worst is memorising key modulations. The exam doesn't actually test you on all the stuff that you memorise, but you never know what they'l ask. History 3 is basically an overview, with some of Baroque, Classical, Romantic, and 20th century. History 4 is early music, Baroque, and Classical, and History 5 is Romantic and 20th Century, including pop music trends.
Of the harmony exams, I think Counterpoint 4 is the worst. I'm proud to say I passed, but I ran out of time and just wrote in random stuff for the inverted counterpoint one. There were so many 7ths and 2nds and 5ths and octaves that if I actually played it, it would have made me gag. Harmony 4 is easy (for me, at least, I just don't like History). It's just writing chords, following rules, and naming keys. Harmony 5 is counterpoint and harmony, and I found it rather challenging, but maybe that's because my teacher loses her train of thought easily and forgets what she's trying to teach sometimes. Analysis is perhaps the easiest of the bunch. And you even get to use creative words to describe sonatas (The bass line moves in an ascending pattern of alternating solid thirds and accented octaves while the treble presents a flowing, chromatic melody of ornamented eighth notes - this isn't any piece in particular. It's fun making them up).
If you're creepy and are good at improvising, you can do keyboard harmony 3, 4, and 5 instead of the written test. There, they give you a melody, and 30 minutes to think, then you play for them that melody supported by a bass that makes sense and has the proper cadences. Basically, it's the written test, but you play it instead of writing it. I don't know anyone who can actually do that.
For History, you can get away with doing it yourself. For Harmony, unless you already have a strong background in composition, get a teacher. And you don't have to do Harmony 3 because if you can do Harmony 4, they assume you know your harmony 3.
And in order to apply for the ARCT teacher's, you have to get 70%+ on your grade 10, but you're comfortable playing in exams, you shouldn't have a problem with that.
I think the ARCT exam is split 50/50 between performance and pedagogy, but I'm not certain. It should be written in the syllabus.
Topic: A little input please - ARCT or no?