UKMT Junior Maths Challenge

The scoring for the jmo is very complicated. There are two kinds of scales - a kind of pass/merit/distinction scale AND gold/silver/bronze medals, which I think depends on how well they did on part b. You can see this stuff on the ukmt website, but I still don't completely get it! My ds got silver + distinction last year, but thinks this year's was harder and he doesn't think he's done so well.

Ds found old exams and practiced - thank you so much for your advice! Mainly doing it for the experience. He was learning to write out his 'proofs' for the first time - a new skill, esp given his handwriting. On the day, he says he answered the 10 Qs in A but very quickly, then focused on B. He enjoyed the 'extra' time (2hrs not 1hr) and managed 5 of 6, but only felt confident about 2 of them. He said it was harder than the practices, but not too bad, less questions about the areas he knows best. Saw the solutions for 2017 came out. Does anyone know HOW the JMO is marked? Is it 1 mark for the 10 questions in A, and 10 each possible for the 6 questions in B? DS won't mind his results, as long as he understands why, and we're not expecting an excellent outcome the first time he tries. DS' school takes forever to return his papers - sometimes waiting to year end, in the academic assembly or somesuch. He'd really rather just know, and focus forward, so if anyone knows the way scoring is done it would be deeply appreciated. It's DS first time.

I just searched for maths challenge on MN out of curiosity. I didn't even know the name of it until today.

Dd had mentioned doing the initial test and then on Tuesday she said she'd done well so sat another harder test. This morning (well yesterday now) she gave me her certificates - best in year and gold award, I read the back and realised it's an actual thing, not just something her school are doing! She said on Tuesday she thinks she did okay in the second test so it will be interesting to see her results, especially as it's a different format, sounds like it could be a while yet though.

I'm really pleased with how well she's done but feel a bit bad I didn't even know what it was all about - her school have obviously not made a very big deal about it, I don't think she even knew about it until the day of the initial test.

The answers are already up on the website apparently

... oh and last year I thought the results came in about 3 weeks ...? They were good to have, as you actually he your hand-marked papers back with comments

My ds did exactly the same as Bettertochange''s. He did it last year and said that this year''s was harder.

DS did all A and 4 of B. These cost most of the time. As only 10 minutes left, he double checked A answers rather than carried on.

I coach a pupil who did it today. She did all A and 4 in B but one of those wasn't completed. She over complicated Q2 and wrote a very elegant but unnecessary solution to Q6 so did not have time to attempt the last 2. First time she actually takes an Olympiad paper so it can only get better I hope.

Last time I had someone who did it, it took nearly a month for it to be returned.

DS has just got out and said the Junior Olympiad was hard but no harder than he had expected. He did all the A questions and two of the B questions. Did anyone else's DC have a go?

Also does anyone know how quickly they are usually marked? The website says it is speedy but that's quite vague...

He needs to do the longer questions, ie part B from past papers of the JMO. They are available on the UKMT website I think. The following things would be useful:

• angle chasing technique
• modular arithmetic
• some simple counting techniques, colouring etc
• sum of consecutive numbers, properties of prime, triangular numbers, Fibonacci sequence, palindromic numbers
• divisibility tests

DS is very 'mathy' and has been doing PMC and JMC since YR3, he's now YR6 and found the JMC much harder than practices and previous years, left 6 questions unanswered. Total surprise when he managed a gold / JMO. So those who said don't guess must be too right. It will be his first time in JMO, literally just for the experience, esp since we have no hopes invigilators will be able to read his (atrocious) handwriting for proofs. But he's done CECM Pascale (YR9 for Canada) and Gauss (YR8), loved them - says good practice but relaxing, after JMC. He says there is a bigger jump between the sections, in CEMC - so that last 5 questions are rather tricky. What can he do to prepare for JMO, besides suddenly learn to write legibly?

Well done to your DS pacific!

I had never heard of this.... until DS1 just showed me his certificates!

The boy holds his card way too close to his chest!
Well done, everybody who participated

DS scored 76 getting a silver certificate

relaxitllbeok, I just checked UKMT website and have obviously remembered it wrongly. There does not seem to be a lower age limit for any of them. Thank you for that correction.

If your children are interested in doing similar papers have a look at CEMC from the University of Waterloo in Canada.

cemc.math.uwaterloo.ca/contests/contests.html

The actual competitions are open to schools anywhere in the world, I'm not sure about individuals though.

Hi Kitnkaboodle, on DD's school twitter feed which I haven't independently checked but have no reason to suspect the figures wrong mobile.twitter.com/NWSGMaths/status/864535784854089728

Pettswood - where did you get those stats from?? Just curious!

JustRichmal, who told you the SMC had a lower age restriction? I forget which year DS first did it, but it was definitely before y7. (With you on results varying and fun being important!)

DD in Y7 is pleased with her silver. She is in awe of a girl in her school in Y8 who got 100%. Apparently 24 out of the 250,000 who sat the test got 100%. Amazing.

There are medals available for the JMO too! Ds has a nice little collection

I only have students doing well in the IMOK and BMO before so didn't know the JMO has medals. I coach a pupil for the JMO this year so hopefully will see what a gold medal looks like :)

Ds didnt start doing them until year 7, think he got nothing first time. Then a bronze and then a gold in the senior one. He is the cautious type and wary about answering the ones hes not sure about

Dd has done quite a few of the test. She is now in year 9 so has not done this JMC. However, she started doing JMCs in year 5, IMCs in I think year 6 and SMCs (which is the only one with a lower age restriction) in year 7.
Her results vary widely. She has not had a slow progression of getting better each year.

More important than what result they get, is whether or not they find such questions fun. If they do, there are lots more on the UKMT website for them to try. The more they do, the better they will do in the test. However, not doing well in them does not mean they are no good at maths and will not do well in GCSE. Some are too young for tests or simply do not like doing these sort of questions

I just found out that my son got a score of 69 so a silver.
He's in year 5 and sat it in the head teacher's office with a chap also there from the local comp invigilating. He did no preparation at all and didn't even know he was doing the test.

He's already said he will go for gold next year (I'm not telling him about the Olympiad!)

They don't necessarily go up a band each year (eg silver this year doesn't mean you should worry if she doesn't get gold next year - she might do better than that or worse). Some children are more consistent than others, but they're all very young, and of course it depends how they feel on the day and what questions come up! DS has done all three challenges (JMC, IMC, SMC) for the past several years. This year he got (boast alert) full marks in the JMC; in the IMC follow-on, a worse result than he got in that the very first time he did it!; and a spectacular success in the SMC follow-on. You have to look at the trend - it's not like GCSE or similar where the questions, and hence the results, are very predictable. I think that's good, though - it's helpful for them sometimes to do a thing where they don't do very well, and know that the sky doesn't fall, and they can still try to do well on the next thing. School standard maths exams can have such low ceilings, for very mathy children, that they encourage a harmful perfectionism where they can end up thinking 89% is a catastrophe.