50 in further maths. tips??

[some dude]

Ok so its three months from exams an i have recently finished the further course. The modules i did were Graphs and relations, Geo & Trig and Matrices. Can anyone with experience with the subject (preferably those who scored very high) or current students please give me some tips or study techniques that can help me get that 50. Also i would appreciate it if you share your own personal routine etc. Thankyou for your help

[b^3]

Spam as many practice exams as you can, and don't get lazy like I did last year. You should get to the point when you will be able to predict the tricks when you see the question, and know exaclty what you need to get the mark. And when you get into the exam, most importantly breath, and read questions clearly, don't do what I did and misread a simple graph.

[some dude]

thanks for the reply.
what modules did you do if you dont mind me asking? should i consider learning another module?(my school picke mine) thank you

[b^3]

Core (obviously) - didn't like - too many stats sacs: 85-90ish
Linear - easy sacs: 95+
Trig - loved it sacs: 95+
business maths - wish it didn't exsit sacs: high 80's to low 90's

I wouldn't suggest relearning another module, as you still have to do the sac on the one you don't do. Only do a different midule if you really think you are going to gain something out of it, but I would probably say stick to what you have done.

[Greatness]

I did the same modules. My tips:
1. Read the question/graph twice - make sure you know what youre asked to do
2. Work hard and i mean work really hard!
3. MAKE SURE YOUR CALC IS IN RADIANS!!!! -> This cost me a lot of marks for trig & geo exam 2 :s

Also try getting rank 1, that will help you A LOT.

[b^3]

I did the same modules. My tips:
1. Read the question/graph twice - make sure you know what youre asked to do

If you are quick, you can basically do the exam twice and pick up those stupid mistakes.

2. Work hard and i mean work really hard!

Thats an understatment. Further is really competitive at the top.

Also try getting rank 1, that will help you A LOT.

I don't really think there is a chance of a 50 without rank 1.

Good luck

[REBORN]

^ What about at MacRob or MHS?

[onur369]

Well at my school rank 4 got 50 so its not really certain that rank 1 will get 50. Top quartile have a chance of 48 if they have a flawless exam.

[pi]

^ What about at MacRob or MHS?

Yes, well, those are exceptions But I bet there are many others too

[some dude]

yep i forgot to mention that i am ranked number 1 so far... not by much though(2nd and 3rd are 1 mark behind) my cohort isnt particularly strong so that no1 rank is essential for me. thanks guys

[some dude]

when you say 'work hard' how hard do mean specifically like 1hour a day maybe increase to 3hours before exams? upto now ive probably only done 1 hour a week average for further. seeing as exams are approaching i want to bump up my fm study time. im willing to do anything for a high score.. so wat 1? 2? hours a day? im in y11 so i can afford to focus primarily on fm

[Greatness]

Dont waste your time in class. That's where you can get a  lot of work done. Other than that, just do as many exams as you can.

[jasoN-]

Yeah in class do as much work as you can, understand the concepts etc..
you should be able to do every question in the book (doesn't mean do them all! but obviously it helps)

After that, spam exams from different companies + vcaa (10-15 of each exam is in the ballpark)

The main thing is to completely understand the fundamentals, then every question should simply be a build on from those concepts

And yes being rank 1 helps, gives you a bit of leeway on the exams

[some dude]

After that, spam exams from different companies + vcaa (10-15 of each exam is in the ballpark)

How many practice exams did you do exactly and would you mind giving me some names of companies that make good practice exams? thanks

[jasoN-]

hmm I don't remember which exams I did (threw away my further stuff), but I was supplied the exams from my teacher
Heffernan is pretty similar to VCAA style exams from what i recall (Itute was pretty hard and annoying, not really indicative of VCAA exams)
I must have done around 7 or 8 of each exam, most of them during class
try and save VCAA ones last, make sure you do them under exam times and try not to look at answers and convince yourself that you know how they did the questions (need to discipline yourself)
I guess i was pretty lucky that the VCAA exam wasn't particularly tricky and I didn't make many silly mistakes (except on that 1 networks MCQ.. damm - changed the right answer to wrong after looking at it for way too long!)
Anyways you should just try and do as many as you can/want, you'll know which ones are far-fetched and unreasonable