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Really Struggling in math SL!


chloeolut

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Hey! I'm taking math SL and I'm really struggling right now. I try my best, but when it comes to exam type questions, I blank out. Are there great any ways that I can improve because I can't switch down to math studies as my school only offers HL and SL and if I had to switch down, I'd have to change schools, but I don't want to because the university I want to attend doesn't accept math studies..
 

 

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There are some good resources that you can aim to consolidate your fundamentals with online. Khan Academy, for one, explains almost everything you're covering in the Math SL Syllabus succinctly. Further, search up 'Mitch Campbell' on Youtube; he covers a few topics as well and is easy to follow. As I mentioned in another post, the only way to get good at Math is to attempt Exam Style Questions. The textbook is fine to do your homework, and to read up on stuff you're learning, but to study and practice, past paper questions should be your best friends. 

 

Further, if you can afford to invest in a tutor, I'd do that. Before I had a tutor, I was consistently getting 5s in all my Math Classes in the MYP. But after spending quite some time working with one (realize that my tutor was very good), I raised my score to a 7. There's something very good about sitting down with someone and actively doing math; it instill confidence within you, and from what I can tell, you seem hesitant in your ability to continue.

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If you need motivation to practice, this is what I did

 

I found a TV show with relatively short episodes and keep it as a reward for when I study math. The more hooked on you are, the more you will study! 

I started out with this YouTube series called Most Popular Girls In School and gradually moved on to short TV shows as I increased my workload. 

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  • 3 weeks later...

Check out how markschemes award marks. The math markschemes are typically not generous at all. Know where you lose most of your marks. If you find yourself losing more marks due to silly mistakes or not enough time, then you should practice LOTS of non-IB, very straight forward questions; if you are not familiar with a particular technique (transformation of graphs, for instance), then some videos or notes reading will help before tackling such questions.This split is not always clear but these are two basic ways. Once you know non-IB problems and concepts then you can focus on IB problems. You should progressively time yourself to limit to 1 minute per mark.
That should be able to get you to a 6 with very high likelyhood. 
It's very hard to prepare to go from 6 to 7 because of many curveballs they throw you in some of the final questions on the paper.

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A big thing with IB maths questions is that it's not just about knowing how to do something, but knowing when to apply certain skills. Often, they'll mix up some topics together so you have to use skills from both topics and recognise that. For example, we're doing series and sequences and you can often use simultaneous equations to solve them. A simple concept, yes, but it goes over the head of plenty of people in our class.

 

I'd recommend going over some past papers and trying them. Also, try to make a list of notes of things you need to look out for, and what to do if you notice them (e.g. if you are given the shorter side and the angle opposite the side you're trying to work out, it'll be a case of ambiguous case). If you note details like that, it should help.

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  • 2 weeks later...

There are some good resources that you can aim to consolidate your fundamentals with online. Khan Academy, for one, explains almost everything you're covering in the Math SL Syllabus succinctly. Further, search up 'Mitch Campbell' on Youtube; he covers a few topics as well and is easy to follow. As I mentioned in another post, the only way to get good at Math is to attempt Exam Style Questions. The textbook is fine to do your homework, and to read up on stuff you're learning, but to study and practice, past paper questions should be your best friends. 

 

Further, if you can afford to invest in a tutor, I'd do that. Before I had a tutor, I was consistently getting 5s in all my Math Classes in the MYP. But after spending quite some time working with one (realize that my tutor was very good), I raised my score to a 7. There's something very good about sitting down with someone and actively doing math; it instill confidence within you, and from what I can tell, you seem hesitant in your ability to continue.

I found a tutor a while ago and she's really good at mathematics but she wasn't helpful. She made me open the textbook and just work all the problems and nothing else. In the area I live in there are absolutely none who, I think, could help me. The nearest one would be about 2 hours away – across the boarde to Dubai or all the way down town to Muscat. Could I find online tutors somewhere?

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