Few questions about Further...

[Stick]

I've done my headstart week for this subject but upon reflecting on my time learning it so far, I've got a few questions...

• Are you allowed to take a bound reference into your SACs? I know you're able to take one into the exams.
• Is it necessary to have a 100% average for your SACs in order to attain a score of 45+? Almost always, I get a score in the A+ region but I don't tend to get 100% very often. I also know you cannot afford to lose more than a few marks in the exams if you want any chance of getting a study score in the 40s.
• How important is your ranking in your class and year level? I've got a very strong cohort in my class this year, consisting of Year 11s and Year 12s (I'm a Year 11). This year for Methods 1&2, I got rank 2 in my class, but I don't know my ranking in the year level (although, our class was the strongest group). This year, I can see myself being anywhere from rank 1-5 in my class and I've got no idea of where I'm likely to be ranked in the year level (again though, my class is by far the best group). How greatly will this affect my study score?

Thanks for your help.

[Special At Specialist]

In further maths, you're allowed to take a calculator and summary book into every SAC and exam. There is no such thing as a tech-free assessment in further.

You don't need 100% average in your SAC's for a 45+. Infact, you can get a 50 without a 100% SAC average, and in a very strong cohort, you don't even need rank 1 SAC average.
The reason for this is because some schools give harder SAC's than others. For some people, it might be just as hard to score 80% on a SAC in your school as it is for other schools to score 100%. Also, if you're in the same class as a few geniuses that end up with a 50 study score, they might score higher than you but you could still end up with a 50.

As for the exam, from 50 to 45 it is generally 1 study score lost per mark. So if you are rank 1 in SAC's and you lose 5 marks in the end of year exams, you can expect a 45.

[Hodgeyhodgey]

I've done my headstart week for this subject but upon reflecting on my time learning it so far, I've got a few questions...

• Are you allowed to take a bound reference into your SACs? I know you're able to take one into the exams.
• Is it necessary to have a 100% average for your SACs in order to attain a score of 45+? Almost always, I get a score in the A+ region but I don't tend to get 100% very often. I also know you cannot afford to lose more than a few marks in the exams if you want any chance of getting a study score in the 40s.
• How important is your ranking in your class and year level? I've got a very strong cohort in my class this year, consisting of Year 11s and Year 12s (I'm a Year 11). This year for Methods 1&2, I got rank 2 in my class, but I don't know my ranking in the year level (although, our class was the strongest group). This year, I can see myself being anywhere from rank 1-5 in my class and I've got no idea of where I'm likely to be ranked in the year level (again though, my class is by far the best group). How greatly will this affect my study score?

Thanks for your help.

- For your sacs is depends on your teacher but typically, they'll let you have notes/open book for your tests in order to replicate an exam situation.

- It's not necessary to have a 100% average, but it would be nice to have something close to that or at least be rank 1/close to the top so that other peoples' performance on the exams won't affect your scores.

- There's so much talk about rankings and how it affects your end results but rather than going through all of that and worrying about it before the year has even begun, just focus on doing your best in sacs and trying to achieve rank 1 or close to it

[REBORN]

Pretty sure you can be rank last, get 100% both exams and get a 50.

[Special At Specialist]

Pretty sure you can be rank last, get 100% both exams and get a 50.

This would be quite an extreme situation, but if you go to a good school, it is entirely possible.

[Stick]

Thanks for your answers, everyone.

I don't really go to a good school, but they've put all the accelerating Year 11 kids and the smart Year 12 kids in one class. Our teacher's aim is to be the first VCE class in our school's history to have a median score in the 40s. I think his desire to achieve his personal goal will help us in his class achieve our personal goals.

[s...]

Lucky...
I'm the only yr 11 in my class... others are all yr 12 and they're not really that great either...
The cohort isn't that great too...
 
so you're pretty lucky.

How come your school allows 'all the accelerating Year 11 kids' to do Further?? Did they all do methods 1&2 (yr 10 kids )in 2011?
s.

[leejieun94]

I've done my headstart week for this subject but upon reflecting on my time learning it so far, I've got a few questions...

• Is it necessary to have a 100% average for your SACs in order to attain a score of 45+? Almost always, I get a score in the A+ region but I don't tend to get 100% very often. I also know you cannot afford to lose more than a few marks in the exams if you want any chance of getting a study score in the 40s.

Thanks for your help.

nope, as long as you're "up there" in terms of rankings and as long as you don't lose too many marks over both exams (approx 4-5 marks) you should be able to score >45
as for a SS of 50 you'd prob need to be rank 1 and if youre lucky you can probably get away with it losing 1 mark over both exams! hahahah

[Stick]

Lucky...
I'm the only yr 11 in my class... others are all yr 12 and they're not really that great either...
The cohort isn't that great too...
 
so you're pretty lucky.

How come your school allows 'all the accelerating Year 11 kids' to do Further?? Did they all do methods 1&2 (yr 10 kids )in 2011?
s.

Yeah, we did Methods 1&2 this year. Our teacher felt as if none of us were 'ready' to do Methods 3&4 in Year 11 (we haven't done GMM, covering Trigonometry and Logs and Exponentials), so most of us are doing Further 3&4 instead, along with General Maths Advanced so we can cover the topics we missed out on and continue to practice the skills we learnt in Methods. Some have chosen to stop accelerating, however (mostly the kids who want to do Specialist, because they don't have room in their subjects to do Further next year). So to fill up the space, the smart Year 12s were also moved into our class.

And by a 'strong' cohort, I bet all of the class will get at least 75% on all the SACs. There will be a fair amount in the A+ region, though. There's roughly 16 people in our group as well. I don't know if that's considered a large cohort (our teacher thinks so) and there's two other Further classes as well.