Project Maths sample paper

whadabouchasir

Podge_irl wrote: »

I couldn't care less about what grades this paper produces. They can mark it like the devil himself and that won't do a thing to change the problems with it.

I'd agree with that.i really don't see how this is project maths is so revolutionary.It's just the LC dumbed down severely.There didn't seem to be any new concepts,it just seems like they took all of the a) and the odd b) part from old LC papers and made it into a new exam.

einshteen

I understand and applaud the attempt at practicality. However, anyone doing Maths in college is going to be screwed, as they will have no background in the "language" of maths or the idea of abstraction.

rebel girl 15

einshteen wrote: »

I understand and applaud the attempt at practicality. However, anyone doing Maths in college is going to be screwed, as they will have no background in the "language" of maths or the idea of abstraction.

I totally agree that people going doing college in maths are screwed - the colleges are gonna have to completely overhaul their courses to compensate for this

dan_d

Podge_irl wrote: »

I couldn't care less about what grades this paper produces. They can mark it like the devil himself and that won't do a thing to change the problems with it.

Well said. It just increases the already big jump from secondary level maths to university level maths.There's not much the colleges can do - it's not their responsibility to teach second level maths to first years. It's likely they'll just keep going as is. I know UCD eng dept were very concerned about 5 years ago at the poor level of maths in students coming into their courses in first year - and they would have been getting those who were good or excellent at maths, due to the fairly high requirements.It just makes it more work...but then why would the Dept of Education have joined up thinking about stuff like that???

knockraheen

The second project maths sample paper should be treated with caution as it was not set by the examinations commission (SEC) .But the good news is the Coordinate geometry proofs will not be asked.


The project maths sample (higher) shows for the first time how the SEC intend to dumb down the Higher Leaving Cert maths in order to get more people to take higher maths .
It just reflects the opinion given in the 2005 chief examiners report that they want to increase the % doing higher maths from 16% to 25% and increase the number doing foundation level to 25% and then the minister comes along and asks the 3rd level institutions to accept people who fail H maths


If you are doing project maths here is some news
The following proofs will not be asked
(i)The perpendicular distance formula from a point to a line
(ii)The Tan of the angle between two lines .
(iii)The tangent at a point on a circle centre (0,0).
You can be asked to use the formulae but not to derive them.


Introducing Project maths in 5th year in 2010 is just a bad idea .The syllabus is not finalised .There will not be proper textbooks.I have no problem introducing it in 1st year but to bring it in in 5th year is totally wrong .The proposed syllabus is top heavy with Geometry/stastistics/Probability .Topics such as vectors/Linear transformations/Integration/matrices are all vital for 3rd level have been removed.
The object is to get more students doing foundation level and Higher level (see chief examiners report 2005)

Ashashi

Oh, it is ridiculous. Colleges are complaining about a huge failure rate in first year maths, and this is how they recitify it, by bringing this stuff out.

It is a farce, there are rumours that the 2010 HL will be marked extremely difficult, to make Project Maths look like a step forward.

Expect high failure rates this year in Higher Maths.

If they want to encourage people to take Higher Maths, bring back double points, not dumb it down to a monkey's level.

Crow92

double points would be sexy:p

Dunno9

As much as people are enjoying complaining about project maths, you are not the ones stuck with it! I would absolutly love to see people who have already done the old maths paper 2, to do the project maths one!! It is dumbed down, although the marking scheme and the way in which you are expected to approach questions is harder in ways!
It is completly unfair that it's 3 weeks before the LC and we only have 1 exam paper to work from..!
So although people can complain about it, it is not as easy as people seem to perceive it!:)

Ruski

knockraheen wrote: »

The object is to get more students doing foundation level and Higher level (see chief examiners report 2005)

Why would the examiner want more people to do foundation level?

randylonghorn

knockraheen wrote: »

If you are doing project maths here is some news
The following proofs will not be asked
(i)The perpendicular distance formula from a point to a line
(ii)The Tan of the angle between two lines .
(iii)The tangent at a point on a circle centre (0,0).
You can be asked to use the formulae but not to derive them.

How do you *know* that?

L.C.Deirdre

I'm doing it and, while the idea of it is good (that we think for ourselves, understand things better), they have gone too far trying to simplify...What annoys me is they are cutting out stuff that some people will have to cover additionally in 3rd level!

myfatherrsson

I was just having another look over the sample paper and was wondering if the whole paper is made up of Strands 1&2 or are there elements of the old syllabus still in there? Comparing it to the old Paper 2's it would seem to me that it is all Project Maths, am I right?

RHRN

Being in one of the 24 schools, I was also hoping to apply for maths in Cambridge... doubtful now.

They told me they consider LC to be equal to AS Further Maths, but I dont think they mean project maths, and honestly im three weeks into 5th year, and we've been going through the book just putting big X's next to things we're not doing...

And it was all those sections that looked like they might be 'C' parts in the old course, its just ridiculous.

If they're going to have this to all schools, at least get some sort of equivalent to Further Maths for students who want to study Maths or Science at 3rd level...

There is Applied Maths, but thats really just Mechanics (although there is differential equations) I mean a Further Pure Maths subject, like the A-level subject in England.

Seriously, I mean what about matrices and vectors?

rebel girl 15

Being honest, what I would have liked to have happen is leave the Higher level syllabus, bring in project maths as an alternative to dropping to ordinary level maths. I know a number of students in my year when I was doing higher maths that would be well able for higher maths, but didn't do it because of the time it takes. Students that need maths for college courses will have the subject that they need, student who don't need HL maths would have an alternative. OL would be too easy, but doing project maths HL would give them a good maths grounding. Maybe give extra points for HL maths, leave the same points system for Project maths HL.

dan_d

Rebel girl that is actually an excellent idea. Big thumbs up:D:D

I glanced over the priject maths paper and thought there was too much language in it...ie, there were too many words to delve through to get to the point of a problem. Also that it was top heavy with probability and statistics.

I did engineering, and matrices and vectors were huge parts of maths course. In fact, matrices were a huge part of my overall engineering course. So in answer to RHRN, I don't know how that would work. It is actually necessary information....not being smart, but maybe you should write to the Dept of Ed, or whoever makes these decisions and ask these questions. Although I know you've more than enough on your plate. The one person that is not being consulted in all these decisions is the student - as was pointed out in (what I thought was) an excellent letter a couple of weeks ago....

http://www.examiner.ie/archives/2010/0913/opinion/one-expert-who-is-never-consulted-about-our-school-system-ndash-the-student-130590.html

Chuchoter

They didn't need this course. Our system is so heavily language based it makes it near on impossible for more mathematically/spatially inclined people to do well at all, and bringing this in has just gotten rid of the one subject you didn't need to be able to write an essay for.

The whole system, not only of maths but of all subjects needs to be overhauled. There needs to be foundation, ordinary then lower honours and higher honours. There is too big a difference between honours and ordinary, its JC work at senior level. It means that someone like myself, who is reasonably good at maths but maybe not quite good enough for honours, has to drop down to a class way below my level. Where the ordinary a1 gets you 60 points, a lower honours could get you 80 and then a higher honours would get you 100. Everyone wins.

mathsgrinds

Does anyone else think the PM papers have introduced a very complex overall marking scheme, and that it makes timings for questions in the exam very complicated?

e.g LC O Maths, paper 2.

Up to now, you would be marked out of 6 questions, 50 marks each, in 2.5 hours.

So, timings are relatively simple e.g. 20 mins per question, leaving 10 mins at the start to read the paper, and 20 at the end [just one way of doing it].

Broadly speaking, it is logical to allow roughly equal time for every question, as they have equal marks.

Now, for PM, the overall scheme is as follows:

Do 9 questions, with marks as follows:

50, 25, 25, 25, 25, 25, 40, 40, 45.

Using the same logic as above, this means one might allocate the following times to the questions:

20, 10, 10, 10, 10, 10, 16, 16, 18.

Compare that with Paper 1 timings:

20, 20, 20, 20, 20, 20.

I realise this is not an exact science, and Q7 , Q8 and Q9 could be rounded off to 15, 15 and 20 minutes respectively.

But still – I think its unfair to have students trying to give roughly proportionate times to questions that have such variable values of marks.

I can’t remember ever doing an exam, at any level, with 4 differently valued questions within one paper.

I know its a maths exam, and in theory students should be able to work it out, but they will have enough to think about.

What do you think?