End of year exam problems

[Guest]

This isn't the actual IB exams but....

When I do tests throughout the semester for HL Math, I do really well. I get straight 7s. (tests and exams are based on past IB questions)

But every time I do a semester exam, I completely mess up.

For semester 1, I messed up on my exam and got a 6(overall semester grade is a 7).

And this semester, I messed up as well. I thought I had prepared enough but the questions were ridiculously difficult. I don't understand why this happens. The level of difficulty is just so different. I had never come across questions as difficult as the ones I did on the exam I took today. Will this like be in the actual IB exams?

I'm worried that I could get a 6 or even a 5 for this exam. It was this bad. I need a PG of a 7 in HL Math for Economics in the UK and the PGs are based mostly on semester exams. I'm worried as $%^& now.

Do any HL Math people know how to deal with the end of year exams where every topic is in a big ugly cluster%^&$?

Advice and anything else much appreciated right now. I'm having a complete mental breakdown.

[Nabz]

Yes, in mathematics, that is what happens with everyone. What you do during your semester is called practicing the techniques but in examinations you're exposed to situations where you have to apply them and that is where you have to use your brain to work out the problem. I hated that fact during my first year but i realized that practicing exercises won't do any good, only past paper questions will get me there...

[Guest]

Yes, in mathematics, that is what happens with everyone. What you do during your semester is called practicing the techniques but in examinations you're exposed to situations where you have to apply them and that is where you have to use your brain to work out the problem. I hated that fact during my first year but i realized that practicing exercises won't do any good, only past paper questions will get me there...

The thing is, I completely solved every past paper question I could find. I thought I was used to IB style questions but....... I got completely screwed.

[yii yann]

Yes, in mathematics, that is what happens with everyone. What you do during your semester is called practicing the techniques but in examinations you're exposed to situations where you have to apply them and that is where you have to use your brain to work out the problem. I hated that fact during my first year but i realized that practicing exercises won't do any good, only past paper questions will get me there...

The thing is, I completely solved every past paper question I could find. I thought I was used to IB style questions but....... I got completely screwed.

School exams tend to be tougher than normal IB exams. It is to ensure that the top students improve and develop, average students to realize that they need to do better to get their 5s, and to scare the crap out of underachieving students.

Don't worry, I am sure your teachers will take into account the difficulty of the exams when putting up your PG. However, to help yourself, it helps to do questions from the textbook by Fabio Cirrito (IBID press). The exercises stretch you more than what IB expects, and this way you can train yourself to be able to apply your knowledge, instead of simply going through a bunch of processes for each question on the exam.

[Guest]

Do you know where you can get the book, the textbook by Fabio Cirrito (IBID press), in Singapore? Kinokuniya? Borders?

[bluedino]

^You can easily find that out by doing a quick Google search… or you could always buy it online from eBay or the Book Depository or other sites like that.

You are not alone. I don't know if this will apply to you, but it certainly applies to me: one possible reason could be that when you're practicing past paper questions you're doing them by topic? So you already know what area to focus on, whereas in the actual exam you have to identify and recognise what's needed for the question. What I'm saying is, I kinda study topic by topic, so I'll do past paper questions only on Series and Sequences, then I'll do past paper questions only on Probability, then I'll do questions only on Differentiation. When it gets to the exam, I sometimes get stuck by having no idea how to approach the question. It's kind of like I have different hats for different topics and I can only wear one hat at a time, whereas in an exam, you need to be able to wear multiple hats at once and combine all the knowledge you have about all the different topics.

As for doing well in tests, it might be the same thing? For me anyway my tests are done topic by topic, so your mind is really fresh having just learnt that topic and just done practice questions on it. When it comes to the final exam, I struggle to remember the topics that I studied earlier/first, and to combat this I think it's all about practice and constant revision.

Don't lose hope though, you seem really organised and capable having done all the past paper questions you could find! Remember that practice makes perfect! Just keep going over the concepts, make sure you know how to use all the formulas and constantly practice. Hopefully that helped a bit..