Matric Maths disaster looms

eltherza said:
:wtf:

So you went about your day discussing things such as set theory and p.h.p, yet couldnt factorise 10x + 5?

Sounds like you just got bored of the work because there were more fun (and abstract) things to think about
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I was bored with it. I scored 27% for always just filling in the first page, so it looked like I actually did do something.

I was only at school on Wednesdays and Thursdays mostly, since I preferred to go ice skating to chat up girls, or surfing.

When I said I was leaving school, Mr.Larkin, the Toti High School principal, asked me to reconsider and stay, since he felt that I would fly though matric. All my marks were high and I got through 1-2 non fiction books per day. I'd even read in class. Teachers eventually gave up on trying to catch me out, since I could always answer questions relating to what they were discussing.

The girls and the waves got the better of me... ;)

scotty777 said:
I'm a heavy sleeper, but I could do it while I'm very drunk if that counts :)
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I dislike maths so much, that I'd have to be drunk to do a paper... :p
 
The 2009 finals papers were not difficult per se, but they were more difficult relative to last year's papers (which were mindnumbing easy) and this year's exemplars (which were also mindnumbingly easy). This year's final paper is much more on standard (still easy, but harder), but the department of education gets faulted for not at the very least issuing a warning by setting the exemplars on similar standard.

So, considering "everyone" was expecting the same standards as previously and studied (or were taught) up to the point where they would pass by the "historic" standard, suddenly the reason for the problem is obvious: they were caught inadequately prepared.
 
Wiehan said:
The 2009 finals papers were not difficult per se, but they were more difficult relative to last year's papers (which were mindnumbing easy) and this year's exemplars (which were also mindnumbingly easy). This year's final paper is much more on standard (still easy, but harder), but the department of education gets faulted for not at the very least issuing a warning by setting the exemplars on similar standard.

So, considering "everyone" was expecting the same standards as previously and studied (or were taught) up to the point where they would pass by the "historic" standard, suddenly the reason for the problem is obvious: they were caught inadequately prepared.
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Well, my teachers told us "at the meetings we were told that this year exams will be tougher..." I don't know what the other teachers were doing then...
 
DreamKing said:
question is "is that the paper of grade 12 students could be answered"?

If yes, what the hell you guys are complaining about? Go study, stop complain! :D
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Well it depends on what you define as an 'average' Grade 12 student though. There is little use asking a bottom-set Grade 12 student or a person who does well in Maths Olympiads.
 
DVD007 said:
Stop complaining and be glad that the standard is high. If people fail its because they are not ready to move on. Our economy needs people with strong math skills, not a couple hundred thousand that think they are good in maths and really don't no that 2+2=4.
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its racist to have high standards ;)
 
Lightscribe said:
I was bored with it

----snip-----

I dislike maths so much, that I'd have to be drunk to do a paper... :p
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same here. thats only reason why i didn't really preform in maths, book keeping or science. i mean school such a collective waste of time ;)

though i did however do the necessary thing and got my matric pass in the end so that life can go on as it should.
 
scotty777 said:
Well, my teachers told us "at the meetings we were told that this year exams will be tougher..." I don't know what the other teachers were doing then...
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My teacher also informed us of that and the exemplars (which are meant to be an accurate indication of the difficulty distribution of the final) were "tougher", but not nearly to the same degree as the final paper was, which is the only thing I'm complaining about.
 
some people on here are over doing it a bit...i understand that you think the system is a bit on the down side of things but let me put it to perspective.

For trials maths paper 1 , i had 134 out of 150.

as a revision i did all of last years papers in exam conditions and got it marked by my private tutor. i scored 145+ in all of the 2008 papers( trials , nov , add exemplar and exemplar)

i went into the exam room knowing that i can score full marks for maths paper 1 , but i came out not being able to do marks equivalent to 12 marks. also there was a question asked for a further 6 marks that didn't make sense to me. my first language is english btw :)

i normally get a 70 in paper 2 but get my 90 in paper 1 and therefore end up with an A for maths...

however i think i scored 70 % in both papers and now everything is ruined for me....

stupid idiots.
 
UltimateWarez said:
some people on here are over doing it a bit...i understand that you think the system is a bit on the down side of things but let me put it to perspective.

For trials maths paper 1 , i had 134 out of 150.

as a revision i did all of last years papers in exam conditions and got it marked by my private tutor. i scored 145+ in all of the 2008 papers( trials , nov , add exemplar and exemplar)

i went into the exam room knowing that i can score full marks for maths paper 1 , but i came out not being able to do marks equivalent to 12 marks. also there was a question asked for a further 6 marks that didn't make sense to me. my first language is english btw :)

i normally get a 70 in paper 2 but get my 90 in paper 1 and therefore end up with an A for maths...

however i think i scored 70 % in both papers and now everything is ruined for me....

stupid idiots.
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Can you confirm that the link earlier is, in fact, the paper that your wrote?
 
UltimateWarez said:
some people on here are over doing it a bit...i understand that you think the system is a bit on the down side of things but let me put it to perspective.

For trials maths paper 1 , i had 134 out of 150.

as a revision i did all of last years papers in exam conditions and got it marked by my private tutor. i scored 145+ in all of the 2008 papers( trials , nov , add exemplar and exemplar)

i went into the exam room knowing that i can score full marks for maths paper 1 , but i came out not being able to do marks equivalent to 12 marks. also there was a question asked for a further 6 marks that didn't make sense to me. my first language is english btw :)

i normally get a 70 in paper 2 but get my 90 in paper 1 and therefore end up with an A for maths...

however i think i scored 70 % in both papers and now everything is ruined for me....

stupid idiots.
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That just tells me you don't know maths or were not 'educated' in the subject. Sorry to sound harsh but it is actually a easy paper.

I wish I could dig up a 1990 HG maths & advanced maths (separate 7th subject you took) papers, you guys would seriously sheet yourselves.
 
ponder said:
That just tells me you don't know maths or were not 'educated' in the subject. Sorry to sound harsh but it is actually a easy paper.

I wish I could dig up a 1990 HG maths & advanced maths (separate 7th subject you took) papers, you guys would seriously sheet yourselves.
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no offence dude...but we weren't thought that stuff , so we would not know.

based on what we where thought , the paper was unfair.

I hate it when people say imagine if you wrote this and that...if we learnt it then wrote it , it would be a different story.

Sometimes its great to show humility...
 
UltimateWarez said:
no offence dude...but we weren't thought that stuff , so we would not know.

based on what we where thought , the paper was unfair.

I hate it when people say imagine if you wrote this and that...if we learnt it then wrote it , it would be a different story.

Sometimes its great to show humility...
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Out of curiosity which questions are you refering to that you weren't taught in class? or wasn't in the textbook?
 
There were no real INSIGHT questions in that test. The questions covered the basic principles and that's all!

If you covered the topics, you should have aced it. If, as appears, you weren't taught the topics, then fair point. But then that's the school's fault.
 
sn3rd said:
There were no real INSIGHT questions in that test. The questions covered the basic principles and that's all!

If you covered the topics, you should have aced it. If, as appears, you weren't taught the topics, then fair point. But then that's the school's fault.
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We're not really taught to understand topics (some of us have good teachers and are, but most are not), or at the very least we were never required to understand them to do well in exams, because emphasis is placed on memorising methods that can be blindly applied. And it just so happened that that paper included a few questions (more than usual) that couldn't be solved by using (or marginally adapting) a method we were taught.
 
Chris said:
Well it depends on what you define as an 'average' Grade 12 student though. There is little use asking a bottom-set Grade 12 student or a person who does well in Maths Olympiads.
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I never said "average", what I mean is "could" students answer the questions.

In the other words the questions are IN or OUT the sillybus [syllabus :D].

No matter how tricky the questions are, if the questions were making within the sillybus, students should not complain about the paper, it is your responsibility to study harder to get a higher mark. :whistle:
 
Wiehan said:
We're not really taught to understand topics (some of us have good teachers and are, but most are not), or at the very least we were never required to understand them to do well in exams, because emphasis is placed on memorising methods that can be blindly applied. And it just so happened that that paper included a few questions (more than usual) that couldn't be solved by using (or marginally adapting) a method we were taught.
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Sorry, but I call BS on this. As mentioned earlier, all the questions were solvable using straightforward methods.
 
UltimateWarez said:
no offence dude...but we weren't thought that stuff , so we would not know.

based on what we where thought , the paper was unfair.

I hate it when people say imagine if you wrote this and that...if we learnt it then wrote it , it would be a different story.

Sometimes its great to show humility...
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Seems your English is also a bit rocky like your mathematics.

Like sn3rd says, it was a simple paper and the questions merely tested an understanding of the basics. Stop making excuses. If you weren't taught some of the material then surely you would've done something after having written the prelims?

Show humility? HUH? Bottom line is that this was a fair paper...whether it was set according to education "guidelines" is another matter but if it was up to me, this paper should be the BARE MINIMUM in terms of difficulty on matric level.
 
sn3rd said:
Sorry, but I call BS on this. As mentioned earlier, all the questions were solvable using straightforward methods.
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I don't think you're actually comprehending correctly. I'm not saying the methods weren't straightforward, I'm saying most people were not taught the exact step-for-step methods for *some* of the questions.

You don't *understand* the mindset of the average matric maths student and how we are taught. It doesn't matter how straightforward the questions is. If they are asked in a novel way, they might as well be impossible, because the curriculum absolutely fails to teach the masses how to think.
 
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