This is the place to discuss the 2017 Mathematics Exam!! Was it good, bad, ugly? Register for a free account and scroll down to the Quick Reply window below to get involved in the discussion!
I'll be writing a set of sample solutions to this exam, but don't take them as gospel - I'm not perfect! If you think something is off give a shout below and we'll see if something needs fixing.
Link to Exam: Click Here!
Current Solutions Status: First draft uploaded!! I've done a 3 hour exam in 1 hour and 22 minutes or so, so I've made mistakes. Guarantee it. Spot them and I will be forever in your debt
Multiple Choice Solutions
MY THOUGHTSBrutal exam. I think it suited people who had done very specific forms of study, and those who are used to solving more challenging problems - MX1 students will likely flourish (at least a little) under the pressure, 2U students only - Whoa. This is a nasty one.
- The Multiple choice was okay, a trick in Q10 and a nicely challenging one at Q9.
- Stock standard in Q11 - That parabola question was interesting. Don't think I've seen it before, finding \(a\) was definitely not self apparent.
- Q12, also fine, though volume appearing so early was the first sign of trouble. Usually appears in Q14 or later - Gulp. What's coming?
- Q13 was the last reasonable one in my opinion, everything normal. Easy curve sketch. Lots of marks up for grabs here.
- Okay, so Q14 was alright. The Simpson's Rule question was cool, algebraic manipulation to use the estimation to find a value of \(\pi\). Nice little question, reasonable challenge. Stock standard exponential growth/decay question (easy 5 marks). The area between curves question was different, but the same method was expected as usual. Just finding an unknown in a different place, really.
- Q15, geometrical proof at the start was reasonable. The annuities question was ghastly - "We've run out of loan repayment and annuities questions!" "Okay, do BOTH AT THE SAME TIME LOLOLOL". Heh - Nasty stuff. But really, not too difficult, especially if you cleverly factorise. Motion question was on the upper end of difficulty, but should have been easy to interpret. No weird graphs or anything.
- Q16, just, wtf. Easily one of the weirdest/hardest questions we've had recently. I don't think my method of just brute force was what they anticipated, because I had done most of the work in (ii) for (iii) and (iv). Would be interested to see how you guys did it!
- Geometry question at the end was hard, for sure, but the very last part on angles was fine. Weird way to end a paper.
Overall,
tough exam. Lots of weird questions, lots of difficult algebra, definitely harder than last year imo. If you studied the sorts of questions from the 2000's, this would have been an easier exam, because it felt like an exam out of the 2001-2005 era. But there you go - What did you think?