OCR AS Core 1 Maths today - DD in floods of tears

C2 was considered 'ok' here.

Statistics next, but not till June 15th I think.

At least C2 was easy... apparently!

That question wasn't in the exam as it is an old AQA question.

I know. I'm making a more general point, that dragging questions out of A Level papers and using them to say "how hard everything is" is silly.

I invigilated a fourth year Quantum Mechanics paper this week, which was sharing the hall with "my" paper. I glanced at it during the longueurs while my minions did the heavy lifting, and I couldn't make head nor tail of the questions, never mind think of answers. That'll be because I haven't spent four years studying for a Physics degree, I suspect.

Humanities students are too used to being able to name a few modish French writers, witter on about the death of the writer and mutability of truth, and then piss off to smoke Gauloises

That question wasn't in the exam as it is an old AQA question.

I hate those "look how hard these questions are, the poor kids, can you crack it?" things (implication, provincial journalist with a weak English degree can't do it, so it must be unreasonably hard, like all maths, and anywho who needs maths?).

Express x2 + 3x + 2 in the form (x + p)2 + q where p and q are rational is trivial: it's a two mark question because it should take a minute at most, and most students will do it by inspection and write the answer straight down. (p=3/2, q=-1/4). If it it's hard, you shouldn't be doing AS maths.

Does anyone want to have a guess at the grade boundaries? Or know when they'll be published?

I thought that some of you might be reassured by this article on the OCR maths C1 exam.

www.examiner.co.uk/news/west-yorkshire-news/students-left-level-maths-exam-11358536

I am sure any child who did the paper on monday will have seen this. Its light relief for what was a very difficult paper and this sketch (which contains swearing for those sensitive to those sort of things) and relates to the last question. Where A level candidates find time to do this sort of this is beyond me but good for them. My son was resitting C1 and for those that are facing AS for the first time it is true that C1 and C2 are much more easily understood by A 2 candidates which is why most retake and they all significantly improve their marks. The Board maybe wise to that an they have new paper coming in next year and this may reflect the new style. Three AS students left the hall in tears after not many minutes. My son was shell shocked by it. Let hope C3 and C4 are less demanding. having had 4 children in alternate school years go through a mix of GCSE and IB I have lived revision timetables for 8 years and cannot wait for the last one to finish.

I'm a maths teacher at a sixth form college and had similar comments from students saying it was hard. However we have similar comments from students every year. Doing a past paper is not the same as doing it in the hall with lots of others under pressure. Some of the questions ou did have to think about you needed to be strong at algebra for a lot of the questions. I think it was harder than last June. What I will say though is there are a lot of marks for methods and even if they haven't finished a question or done the whole question correctly they will pick up marks for method. A lot of students I teach tend to have the attitude I didn't get that correct so that's 7 marks off the total but they may have got 3 method marks. I sympathise with your teenagers taking them exams are horrible but nothing can be done about c1 and I started revising c2 half an hour after the paper with my students

My DS wants to be a biomedical scientist. I think that's pretty good.

The MEI OCR is a different paper so that is why your ds was fine GeorgeTheThird.

I felt sorry for the students as some people in dd's school gave up half way through the paper. It will favour dd in a funny sort of way as she persisted and worked out the answers. However I do think it is unfair to undertake such a dramatic change all at once.

SAHD - Really? Most teens I know doing A Level are highly motivated. They might not all be hyper academic but they do want to do their best.

Yes I've done the paper, yes it was much harder than recent years, yes the grade boundaries will be (much) lower to compensate. This isn't the usual complaint about a paper with a hard question on the end, this is a complaint about a paper which is significantly more complicated than previous years and given that OCR have been churning out near-identical C1 papers for over a decade now I think the students are justified in feeling aggrieved. C1 has been seen as the easy paper, the one that students feel most confident about. To totally knock that confidence by replacing the expected paper with a more complicated one (even if the grade boundaries compensate) is hard on the kids. If you go in expecting to get over 90% (an A) and can only do 80% (usually B/C), then you are going to come out feeling terrible. Learning later that everyone found it hard and crossing fingers for grade boundaries doesn't completely alleviate the worry. Kids need these grades for their future.

This is OCR's fault, not the students' fault.

deliberate trickery is downright cruel

You have some evidence that's happened, right? I mean, you've read the paper, found the deliberate tricks, that sort of stuff?

The step up from GCSE to AS is huge. The step up for maths, particularly for people who haven't done an FSMQ, is even greater. There is a huge difference between doing a past paper in your bedroom and doing it with 200 other people in an exam hall. For what it's worth, there was similar outcry about C1 and C2 last year, and three years ago (the years my children took them). ASes are hard.

These are highly motivated teenagers who really want to contribute to society

Really? Not many would fit that definition I suspect

I don't understand why they have to mess with our children's heads so much. These are highly motivated teenagers who really want to contribute to society and are compliant with the system. I realise that their ability has to be tested for universities to make decisions, but deliberate trickery is downright cruel. More children are being encouraged to take maths as a support for science and aren't necessarily gifted, just genuinely interested in gaining a fair qualification. This behaviour by exam boards is creating a generation of disillusioned and over-stressed young adults - and parents.

Re EDEXCEL being easier than OCR, if I recall correctly I was told by one of my UK teacher friends that the EDEXCEL questions themselves are sometimes marginally easier than the OCR, but the grade boundaries for EDEXCEL tend to be set slightly higher to compensate. But this was a couple of years ago so things may have changed. My other worry with changing syllabus would be even if the school allowed it, different syllabi often cover slightly different topics. Again, things might have changed.

I have to admit I don't understand the whole story of how UK exams are being messed with but I feel so sorry for the students caught in the middle, it's so unfair when they work so hard and get confronted with something totally off the wall compared to the past papers.

Feeling grateful that DS is doing AQA exam board now! He said their C1 was a little harder than expected and he did have to actually think about a couple of questions but overall it was easy as usual.

DS's paper is marked MEI on the timetable (not that I know what it means!)

My DD also found it was not what she expected.
Odd questions in her opinion.

Not MEI paper

That might explain why DSs experience was completely different then.

DDs called me to pick him up after the exam, the plan was to go to his friends afterwards i knew something wrong, as soon as he got in to the car he was clearly upset and angry . now the worried started about the uni application, the predicted grade, the resit , what to do next.. knocked his confidence down ..he needs the grade for medicine now he thought the whole world collapse , breaking my heart to see your kid so upset , try to give some support dont know if its will help

OCR Core 1 Maths 18 May 2016 (Not MEI paper)
Quote from Maths teacher on Studentroom - "This was definitely the most difficult Core 1 ever." He has provided answers to the paper and he also commented that he normally does C1 without thinking but even he had to consider some of these questions!
www.thestudentroom.co.uk/showthread.php?t=4096521

Well this is the twitter page.

twitter.com/search?f=tweets&vertical=default&q=ocr%20maths%20core%201&src=typd&lang=en-gb

My dd was fine too but I think a lot of people were phased by the exam.

My son is doing further maths (OCR). He said C1 was fine and no one at his school seemed to find it that unusual. He travelled home with a friend doing "single" maths and who is much less able than he is, so I think he had a good idea how his cohort found it.

I think a lot of students found it harder. There is already a Hitler youtube clip for OCR C1.