Itute exams difficulty/relevence

[TommyLie]

I know everyone always says Itute has the best practice exams because of their level of difficulty. But my teacher says that some of the questions are above the scope of VCE physics and that they use engineering notation or something like that which is only tought once you go to uni.

Atm I have done 8 practice exams, from STAV and NEAP and the 2008 VCAA exam. I'm going to do the rest of the VCAA exams up to 2011. My questions is, once I have done these, shoud I do Itute 2009 - 2012 practice exams or do older VCAA exams or another company althogether? How relevent is Itutes questions? are they unnecessarily hard? Or are they really worth it?

[StumbleBum]

From just glancing over a few of the questions in the 2012 itute one it seems that they are alot different to what the VCAA will ask. They are also overall quite a bit more difficult concept wise as in a bit harder to understand but they're still not overly difficult to do once you understand them. Overall they are probably good to do if you want to practise some harder questions that the VCAA could ask. Also they would i assume be much more tight for time as majority of questions are more difficult compared to VCAA and other companies where they have a few easier questions.
So, they are probably not a good indication of what to expect, but they could be of some use practising more difficult questions and maybe practising your timing as you'll probably need to work a little faster.

[b^3]

Really for me the situation last year was that there really wasn't a point in doing the itute exams, they are way too hard for what you are going to face, and as you've said, they go way off the course. I wouldn't day they are the "best" practice exams (I don't think they are that great), but a good practice exam is one that is close to, but a little bit above VCAA standard, that tests you on your understanding of concepts and asks questions similar to what you will be facing.

So in short, I wouldn't bother with itute at all, just keeping doing the VCAA ones/NEAP's and others, you'll get more out of them than doing itute's.

[Phy124]

For starters, I would necessarily say that iTute produces the best Exams. They do, however, produce Exams which commonly have rather difficult questions - comparative to most companies - which give those students who have a really good grasp of the content and a thirst for physics knowledge an avenue to really test their skills. Yes, the Exams do occasionally go outside the syllabus of the course (but only marginally), but If you feel comfortable with your knowledge and are performing exceedingly well in all the other practice Exams you have attempted then you might want to attempt some of the iTute Exams, but chances are the questions you attempt won't have much (if any correlation) to the real one you do in a weeks time.

Personally, I didn't do them because;

1. I was worried I would come across something I didn't know and would lull my self into a sense of insecurity (despite the chances of the question ever appearing on a VCAA Exam being practically none)

2. I wanted to take more time in consolidating my knowledge by putting time into reading notes and then undertaking questions which would be more relevant to the ones I would come across, rather than "wasting" my time on impractical questions

In the end, it's really subjective and a personal choice, I'm sure you'll do fine next week despite what you choose 

[TommyLie]

Well atm I have completed VCAA 2008 and 2009 exams. In the 2008 exam I lost 4 marks, and in the 2009 one I lost 2 marks. Both times I finished with 40 mins left. I found these exams to be very straight forward. If I keep going down this path for the 2010 and 11 exams, do you think it would be worth trying Itute out? I certainly don't want to "lull my self into a sense of insecurity", but once I have completed the next two VCAA papers I am not sure what else I can do?

[Phy124]

Well atm I have completed VCAA 2008 and 2009 exams. In the 2008 exam I lost 4 marks, and in the 2009 one I lost 2 marks. Both times I finished with 40 mins left. I found these exams to be very straight forward. If I keep going down this path for the 2010 and 11 exams, do you think it would be worth trying Itute out? I certainly don't want to "lull my self into a sense of insecurity", but once I have completed the next two VCAA papers I am not sure what else I can do?

Well I can't recall the difficulty of the said Exams but it appears you're quite a competent student and have the knowledge required regarding syllabus materials, so I doubt it would have a negative affect if you had a go at the iTute Exams. In the case you do come up across something you feel is rather foreign to you on the, it might be worth checking out with your teacher or the people here if it's relevant