Should I do specialist Maths next year.

[Jacob Rodgerson]

Really Struggling to decide if i should do specialist maths next year or not.
This year i have just finished business management and next year plan to do English, Chemistry, P.E., Methods and (either Specialist or Further)

at the moment im doing general maths methods and methods and get B's to A's in both of them with minimal study(i will try and study next year a whole lot more). methods is my favourite subject at the moment which i do enjoy alot.

Aiming for a score in the 90's and i need to keep in mind that i struggle in Chem and English, probs only going to get 30-35 in both of them.

What are the benefits of doing Specialist??
Any suggestions to which i should do??

Thanks

[monkeywantsabanana]

Comes down to the type of person you are:

a) You are extremely meticulous and make very little careless mistakes - Further
b) You are somewhat negligent but you really enjoy a good challenge - Specialist

General Maths Methods, you should have been taught parts of the Specialist course, I know in our school, General Maths Specialist was pretty much identical to General Maths Methods.

If you haven't come across any of the Specialist material before, I think it would be a challenge. A very very hard challenge.

[Jacob Rodgerson]

i do make a few careless errors.
im leaning a bit towards specialist now.

thanks

[kensan]

What about your future career goals? If you want to be an engineer then specialist would be a good idea.
Also keep in mind specialist will be marked up ~11 and further will be marked down about 1~2

[Special At Specialist]

Further maths is easy to do well at but hard to excel at. It's relatively easy to get a 40 in further, though very hard to get a 45+ because there's so much competition at the higher ends.
If you think you're capable of getting a 30+ in specialist, then you're better off doing that. If you think you'll score less than a 30 raw score, then you're better off doing further.

[nubs]

Spesh makes methods that much easier

[paulsterio]

It depends what type of person you are, do you "enjoy" the challenge of maths, or would you prefer to just do easier maths but be so careful it'll send you nuts?
That's basically the decision - if you're good at maths, i'd say spesh, there's little loss in the end, scaling will even it out if you're an average (or above) maths student

think of it this way, a 35 in spesh will probably be equivalent to like a 45 in further

[abd123]

Do Spesh .

[LOLs99]

If you enjoy challenging and enjoy the worlaods that will be given to u in class, then do spesh..
If you wanna brush up ur chem and english to a score of 40(it is not too late to get this score if you
really invest your time to study this subject), then advise you to do further as
it just need formula and a basic overview+understanding which are very different from spesh so
it will contain less study and can go focus with other weak subjects..

[Bhootnike]

I did further last year.. all the crappy modules like matrices and business maths, and I'm doing methods + spec now... believe me - Further was rather boringly easy and not fun ! Apart from that, if you're reasonable at math then expect high 30s - low 40s., because theres a lot of people doing further who can't aren't great at maths...!  I know thats a generalisation but its the best way to put it.

Spec so far seems easy, but I think we all know were in for a big one!
Its not going to be easy, it will require a lot of work and dedication...  so its not just your math skills, is what im trying to say. Finally, if your maths skill isn't as high as it should be, i'd deplore the idea of spesh ! but im sure you'll cope!

[LOLs99]

I did further last year, and I'm doing methods + spec now... believe me - Further was rather boringly easy and not fun ! Apart from that, if you're reasonable at math then expect high 30s - low 40s., because theres a lot of people doing further who can't aren't great at maths...!  I know thats a generalisation but its the best way to put it.

Spec so far seems easy, but I think we all know were in for a big one!
Its not going to be easy, it will require a lot of work and dedication...  so its not just your math skills, is what im trying to say. Finally, if your maths skill isn't as high as it should be, i'd deplore the idea of spesh ! but im sure you'll cope!

Yea..further did scaled you down, but technically won't affect ur ATAR..enjoy the subject you like can give you a higher atar than you doing the subjects you don't like just coz the scaling were higher.

[paulsterio]

As long as you're reasonably good at maths, you won't find spesh hard, but it's extremely competitive because, look at it this way, there's A LOT of people who do methods just cause they need it for pre-reqs and aren't really trying, in spesh, only people who are pro at maths do it, and nearly everyone tries. It's not the coursework that kills you, but the competition

[Jacob Rodgerson]

Thanks everyone!

lots of help