honours maths

katiegordon

Hey im attempting to do honours maths in 5th year.Im finding it really difficult any words of advice from 6th years?Also we are only halfway through the 1st chapter whereabouts are other 5th years in the book, we seem to be movin really slowly?But at the same time its not as though im able to speed up.Im using texts and tests

Gazza22

I suggest you give honours a serious attempt. Even if you do it up to christmas in 6th year and if you can't take it anymore then just take ordinary...but doing that little bit more work at honours will equip you greatly for ordinary.

If you are capable, take honours straight through to your leaving. It will give you more points and open up lots of college courses that require honours maths. Though if there's any risk that you will fall, don't do it, it's just not worth it.

CrimE

Hey,

I do honous maths and am in 6th year. Personally i dont find it too hard but i know it can be difficult. However honours maths is always good to have. You have any idea what college course you want to go for as it might be an entrance requirement.

My advice would be that its earlydays yet so I think you should stick at it as long as you can. Work hard and look at your situation after your christmas exams and if you are still struggling then maybe a drop down is on the cards.

Remember you can go from honours down to pass but there's no going back the other way, so make sure whatever you decide is the right thing for you.

JackKelly

good advice given. Keep with it as long as possible. It's likely that you will find it getting easier as you do more, and than you can think about sticking it through. If not, the longer you do it, the easier it will be if you drop to ordinary.

4Xcut

halfway through the first chapter at this stage is too slow

katiegordon

Yea i thought so doesnt help that our teacher hasnt been in 4 two weeks and we a have a nice but crap teacher as a sub.Were doin surds.Theyre so much easier than the roots of the equation and alpha and beta and all.Did anyone else find them IMPOSSIBLE!!!!!

deisedolly

I lasted until the end of september last year! What a relief to get out of that class!

Funkstard

I'm doing probability at the moment, we have 2 chapters left to do on the whole course. Does probability seem like first year maths to anyone else?

Eg. "What is the probability of drawing an black ace from a pack of cards?"

Er...2/52

abercrombie

wel personally i love ordinary level maths...i jst fly thru that class

fair play to all of you doing honours!! i dropped down last year, not coz i cudnt do them, but coz there were other subjects that i NEEDED and that i cud give more attention to if i didnt do honours!!

i say stick at honours AT LEAST till easter of 5th year...if by then you are still finding the course really tough, drop down! if not..well done!!!

Aoibheann

Funkstard wrote:

I'm doing probability at the moment, we have 2 chapters left to do on the whole course. Does probability seem like first year maths to anyone else?

Eg. "What is the probability of drawing an black ace from a pack of cards?"

Er...2/52

the questions are not all as easy as that, especially if you're doing the probability option on section B of paper two.
Anyway, some people have a knack for it, some people dont. You may find it easy, whereas others dont. I quite like it myself, but there are a lot more challenging questions than your example.

Funkstard

Yeh I know, we're on the hardest ones now. I was a bit lost through the whole thing, although in general I find the chapter so so.

My teacher told us to be extremely weary of the question though, because its mostly just writing the answer and you're either right or wrong, so if you make a mistake here and there there's no attempt marks to save you. I'll probably stay away from the question tbh

Lord Oz

It gets easier later in the year, my advice would be to keep at it.

spinalsly

ya that alpha beta stuf is really mind boggling! im doing honours atm and finding it very difficult

rugbug86

stick with it, seriously. most courses in college need maths, some form of it. and the higher level ya can stick with before college, the easier you'll find it in college. even though you're only in 5th yr, buy the papers, practise some questions (on whatever chapter you're doing) and hand them up to your teach to correct. most teachers will do it no problem, they tend to be nice people if you make the effort! and with maths, practice makes perfect and there's only a certain number of questions they can ask, they just change the numbers and the wording.

Scarinae

Funkstard wrote:

I'm doing probability at the moment, we have 2 chapters left to do on the whole course. Does probability seem like first year maths to anyone else?

Eg. "What is the probability of drawing an black ace from a pack of cards?"

Er...2/52

I thought probability and statistics was a piece of piss tbh! But then again I noticed on this forum last year that people seemed to either love probability and hate trigonometry, or the other way round. So I guess it depends on the person
Regarding the OP though - stick with it as long as you can. Even if you drop down to pass at the beginning of 6th year, after that work you're pretty much guaranteed an A at ordinary level!

Trampas

I did honours maths for one year but I didn't think the work involved was not needed for my course so dropped out.

Do i if you need it but don't if you don't need it and means you will sacifice other subjects.

rugbug86

nothing should be too difficult in the 2nd month of 5th year

katiegordon

Think ill stick with it for a while anyway.we havent even had a test yet so i cant really guage how much im taking in.I might wait till the christmas exams and make a decision then!!

Jonny Arson

I tried honours Maths at the start of 5th year and couldn't hack it. It requires a huge volume of work and commitment. By the end of 6th year 2/3rds of the honours Maths class dropped to Ordinary level. Most of us who had the basic grounding in honours Maths did get an A1 or an A2 in Ordinary level so if you want to stay safe and your course doesn't require Higher level doing Ordianry level is a good option to bank 50 or 60 points.

tolosenc

katiegordon wrote:

Yea i thought so doesnt help that our teacher hasnt been in 4 two weeks and we a have a nice but crap teacher as a sub.Were doin surds.Theyre so much easier than the roots of the equation and alpha and beta and all.Did anyone else find them IMPOSSIBLE!!!!!

Oddly enough, that is the exact same situtation as me. The pass class are almost done with their second chapter, and (apparently) we'll finish chapter one this week.

lau1247

If anyone planing to do engineering..
Be sure that you have at least honours maths..

When I was doin LC back in summer 04..
I thought it is as hard as it gets..
But man.. in university it gets harder..

Just to prepare you guys..

JackKelly

Yea, it's been said, but if you don't need honours maths, or more importantly, if you don't like it, don't do it. It's SOOOOO much easier to do it if you enjoy it and don't mind sitting down and doing questions for a few hours. It takes a lot of time and effort.

EyeDeeOne

well im in 6th year now,
i tried keeping honours maths on during 5th year..
but in class i didnt actually do anything, and by the end of the year i only got 9% (after trying)
im now doing ordinary level.

My advice is to try and learn the stuff when your told to, and understand what the teacher is doing when s/he does out questions..
and dont do drugs !

cianclarke

Best advice I can give, coming from a now sixth year is do the work in fifth year, an extra half an hour each night or so just to keep on top of things - and pay attention in class. I only half did, and now i'll have to catch up as well as stay with the current topics. It's not the easiest, but yeah.

dundalk cailin

i did honours maths for my LC, at the start of 5th yr there was 2 classes, round 60 ppl doin it, in the LC there was bout 20 of us. my teacher went on maternity leave jan of 6th yr, so we had a new teacher which messed us up a bit jus b4 d pre's! (i had the same teacher for french n eng as well n she went on maternity leave jus after d pre's!!)

i advise u to stick with it, its worth it. A D in HL is the same points as an A in OL i think so u cant really go wrong. at least see how ur getin on at the end of 5th yr, if u find it to difficult then change. g'luck!

C.H.

CrimE wrote:

Hey,

Remember you can go from honours down to pass but there's no going back the other way, so make sure whatever you decide is the right thing for you.

When I started 5th year I was put into pass maths, I fought and fought to get put into honours. With the help of my Dad and some patience I finally got back into honours.

If you feel you can do it fight for it. I got a C2 in the leavin in honours the first time around, got me an A2 the second time around (needed to repeat for points, best decision I ever made).

Don't think its easy though, I worked really hard at it the second time around, but it did really pay off!!!! Got my first choice and am really enjoying it.

CrimE

Fair play, I stand corrected then

Taffy89

I,m not the best to give advice coz i asked to drop down to pass after one class!!Obviously the teach wouldn't let me and made try another month..
To be honest even though i could sort of manage it stressed me out sooo much it really wasn't worth it coz it started eating into my other subjects.
I dropped down and took on another subjeect which makes it a bit easier because next year if i,m struggling at another subject i can drop down and still aim for 600 *which isn't gonna happen but anyhu*

Sorry for rambling,,my advice is ask yourself do you really need it.If its really stressing you..drop but if you think you can manage keep going!!

doonothing

the best thing really is just pay attention in class and practice. it does get way easier in 6th, after all, your maths maaturity peaks at 18! (fact)

i hate probability. cant get my headaround it at all! gimme some trigonometric geometry any day!

dundalk cailin

damn i didnt turn 18 till halfway thru first yr in coll, that explains it!!!!

dr zoidberg

Honours maths is hard, but not impossible. However it does require a lot of hard work, and you can't really relax in any part of it. I did it in 6th year but dropped down to pass after the mocks (which were ridiculously held in March). I was too lazy for honours maths, and besides I didn't need honours for the course I wanted so the effort wasn't worth it. (Also, I only turned 17 a few days after the Leaving - so maybe maturity was a problem.)
I'd advise anyone who isn't sure to try and stick with it as much as possible, because pass maths is a joke compared to honours. I did honours maths for the JC and pass was the exact same in the LC. When you do pass, you keep expecting to be caught out in your answers - but you never are, the complete opposite to honours in that respect.

dundalk cailin

^^ our pres were in feb, thats crazy, we still had 3 full months left

OctavarIan

Honours is puzzling me. I've been fine up until this year, when suddenly I get tests back and see 40-45% marks. I don't want to drop down to pass cos I'm already doing pass in 2 subjects and maybe a third.

dundalk cailin

thats what happened me too, dont be put off by low marks, once your passin..i got a low D in pres, stuck with it and came out with a C1 in the *real* exams..at least see how the pres go

katiegordon

im kinda getting my head around it now!Im glad i didnt drop down.One of my friends did and she says pass is a COMPLETE joke.She sits there doing nothing in class and comes out with 100% in every test

dundalk cailin

there is a huge difference in honours and pass, my friend dropped down after the pores, and actually took a while gettin used to the completely different course!! pity bout your friend, she prob coulda stuck with hons

sully-gormo

To do well in maths you have to PRACTICE. Forget learning anything. 90% of what u do should be questions from the book and papers. If you cant do a Q go through the book and stuff u took down in class and try and figure it out yourself. Then if you cant do it go onto www.e-xamit.ie or ask your teacher. What you will be given in the exam will be stuff u havnt seen before so only practice will help you.
Maths is the only subj where learn HOW to do sumthin not just a pile of information. It tests your ability to think and you dont do that staring at a book. Ideally your head should be spinning after a maths exam because your brain should be goin flat out. Thats why the two maths papers are on different days unlike english.

Madge

I don't know about that... I did my LC a few years ago, but don't you have to learn the proofs and formulas? I had to try and REMEMBER HOW to do the actual sums themselves aswell- the sequence of the different steps involved.

sully-gormo

Madge wrote:

I don't know about that... I did my LC a few years ago, but don't you have to learn the proofs and formulas?

Yes thats true but you will learn the formulae by using them over and over. Itd be no harm to write the formulae and the some of the theory down on a page and look over it and learn it but at the end of the day the bulk of the marks are for doing the questions and at higher level(in a good few other subj's as well as maths) you are going to have to adapt your information to fit the question and practice is the only way you can improve your technique.
As for proofs; just do them as you come across questions asking for proofs in revision or whatever. Personally; my teacher is leaving out the proofs until the course is finished b/c theres no point learning them in 5th yr.
But as far as I know theyre only a relatively small part of the course.