Specialist Help

[Evolio]

Hello everyone.  I hope you're well.

I've just started exam prep for Specialist Maths and in one particular paper, I haven't been able to do many of the questions because they seem difficult. When I look at the situations, I try and understand why they did what they did and why my method was incorrect but I'm not sure whether looking at the solutions for all the questions I'm finding difficult is the best way to go about it. My question is: what do you do when you can't do most of the questions and how should I minimise that from happening? Go over those topics? Even when I do, I still don't understand how to do those questions. I'm not really sure how to approach exam prep because last year for Methods, i simply spammed lots of practice questions without targeting my weaknesses and I don't want to do that this year. How do we structure/plan our exam prep to make it most effective and what is the best way to go about it?  I'm not really sure how to structure my exam preparation and I feel really lost, and I don't want to make the same mistake as last year as I didn't 'mindfully reflect' on my mistakes and how I could improve. If any past Specialist Maths students could give some advice that would be much appreciated

[S_R_K]

It sounds like what you're saying is that you're finding it tough knowing how to get started on the questions, you're not sure what is being asked or what method to use. In this case, it's easy to feel lost if you're trying to do entire papers, because you're just encountering one thing after another where you don't know what to do.

So one thing you might try is to narrow your focus on just one part of the course. Try using VicMathsNotes exam questions organised by topic: https://vicmathsnotes.weebly.com/year-12-specialist-maths.html

This way you can start to see patterns in how VCAA ask questions on the same topic, and that will build your ability to interpret the questions and know how to proceed. Make sure you also make notes on the things you find difficult, because that helps to more efficiently target your areas of improvement. Just gradually work through the topics, improving on one area at a time, rather than mixing them up.

Once you've gained experience with a range of topics and have more confidence with how to answer the questions, then move on to doing entire papers, where all the topics are mixed up.

[Evolio]

Thank you so much for your help!