That may be my bad, in which case I unreservedly apologise.

The actual comment was a reply to Edmund’s first post above. i corrected the mv^2 and dealt with the “plugging numbers into formulae”. Both of these have been addressed so it’s essentially too late.

Edmund,

Re your (3) above. How is this different from plugging numbers into formulae? More importantly, any marking scheme that does not have in large letters at the top “No method, no marks” is worthless.

Hence your (1) above is also wide of the mark. The use of the wrong mean at the top of the calculation will be largely irrelevant – it is the workings that get you the marks.

We are straying from the mark a little in this context, though as we are dealing with a multi-guess where, obviously, different rules apply. Perhaps, however, that is the essence of the point. There is a role for multi-guess in Chemistry for example, where one does require to rote learn the catalyst for a particular reaction or whatever.

Physics is nothing without understanding: there is almost nothing useful to be gained from a multi-guess. You wouldn’t have a multiguess for Maths, neither should you have one for Physics.

(3) A candidate might see the question and just write down the mean, without showing any working. By writing the question in the form shown above, the signal to the candidate she needs to show working and demonstrate the ability to calculate the mean.

I don’t see this as a problem: surely if one could do an A level and and forget it all the next day, this would hardly be the mark of a very good education system! I am certain with revision you could get 95% – after all, you are not an 18 year old , juggling 3/4 A levels, and have the maturity, disapline, and time management skills that an extra 20 years bring. If A level maths were a sort of innate ability rather than a set of skills that people learn, it would be different.

“Another massive change is they give you a lot of the answers, even in A-Level maths. This is a huge advantage as you know whether you’ve got the answer right or not.”

Regarding ‘giving the answers’: As you note, this is and was common practice in maths and physics exams.
[When I was at school, our rather eccentric maths master used to set us a page of problems each week from an 1860 text called something like "Mathematics Problems for Boys". In all of these, you were told what the answer was, although it could be quite challenging to do the algebra to get it in the form the question asked. Likewise, when I sat Finals papers in physics several years ago, most of the answers were "given" to you. This did not make them any easier.]

I haven’t seen the maths paper you refer to, but two points I’d make are:

(1) That sounds like the first question of a several part statistics question. If you get the mean wrong, this would screw up the calculation of standard deviation and all that follows it. Now, the way this is dealt with in exam is “error carried forward”: the examiner has to whip out his calculator and work out what the answer would be if the mean were [whatever the candidate wrongly wrote]. This could take a long time: easier to give them the answer and save marking time and expense;

(2) The ability to do elementary arithmetic is implied by the fact it’s an A level. It isn’t the skill the question is testing. The candidate is showing she knows how to calculate a mean – something the candidate will do in the real world with a calculator or a spreadsheet.

If your browser has eaten said sensible comment, then by all means repost it.

Wouldn’t do to show your opponents being sensible would it?

LIBERTARIAN FIZIKS:

UR DOIN IT RONG

Which is what these papers do, except they give you the formulae. There is no ‘understanding’ anywhere AFAICS.

It is true that the Foundation papers are very simple. Problem is, so are the so called ‘higher’ papers.

I had a go at the A-Level Maths papers. I haven’t done any A-Level Maths of any sort for over 25 years. I reckon I got, with no revision or anything, about 60%. Revision and practice would push that to 95%, no problem.

Another massive change is they give you a lot of the answers, even in A-Level maths. This is a huge advantage as you know whether you’ve got the answer right or not.

So instead of

(i) calculate the mean of 1,4,6 and 5.

the question is

(i) show the mean of 1,4,6 and 5 is 4.

Maths has always done this to some extent, but this paper does it where it is completely unnecessary.

It’s even easier in some of the science. Labelling a diagram (for example) is much easier if they give you the labels themselves. All you have to do is figure out which one goes where ; this you can do without knowing anything about the subject.

Anyone who seriously believes these are remotely comparable with 1981 O-Levels – in knowledge OR understanding – even the “highers” – has no knowledge of those papers.

The main problem (which some smart students have) is “no, it can’t be that obvious, it’s a trick question”.