Confused- what is the difference between higher maths GCSE,Foundation and advanced GCSE?

I think additional maths may be what my daughter will be doing next year; she's at a school where the top set do maths gcse a year early. It's important that they then continue with maths! I'm hoping she will want to do A level maths but since she's got such a wide range of interests I really can't guess at this point - so will be glad to see her maths taken as far as possible before she drops it whenever that actually happens!

As to maths ability; developmentally there is a cognitive shift around the age of 12 (I think), that allows children to really start to follow abstract reasoning and logic. There is quite a range as to when this happens, so I'd guess from year 5-9 any given class will have some who look at maths and "get it" and some who really need lots of examples and practical stuff to work with. A child who is not ready for abstract mathematics in year 7 but is in year 9, could make rapid progress at that point.

So Additional Maths is harder than Further Maths?

Our school only offers Add Maths for Yr11 (not Further Maths). Is it because the difference between the new Gcse and Further Maths isn't so big anymore?

Ad Maths has been around for ever historically it was an A/O level half way between the two at my school if you were good at maths you did Maths and Ad Marhs in what is now year 11 ( upper fifth), then A level maths in year 12 (lower sixth) and final further maths A-level in year 13 ( upper sixth).

FWIW... DC1 did GSCE maths and FSMQ Add maths this year. Got grades 8 and D respectively. I think that depicts the difference in levels!

They're now doing Standard Level maths as part of their IB. The FSMQ will apparently be a big help in preparing for that: similarly for those going on to A levels.

Noble I'd guess that the further maths grew out of what was called by my teachers "Paper 5" which (I think) was a pass/fail thing?

When I did GCSE my board had 4 exams 1,2,3,4.
Lower tier did 1&2
Intermediate did 2&3
Higher did 3&4

At my school most of the top set did the maths GCSE in November. Those who didn't in the top set (which was those not on for an easy A) would do it in the summer with the mysterious paper 5. I think you couldn't take it without doing the whole GCSE and then if you passed you got a little 5 next to the A. If you failed you would just get the GCSE grade.
I don't know how easy it was to pass.

Thanks for the background, noble.very helpful.

Circle theorems were always on the GCSE syllabus, as was completing the square and graph sketching, those aren't special to IGCSE. Calculus is on IGCSE but not GCSE although the new GCSE has pre-calculus.

Further maths GCSE is a relatively recent qualification. It was introduced because when they scrapped intermediate tier, higher tier became too easy. Students were then taking AS- level maths with a high GCSE grade but without a good grounding in algebra, and lots were dropping out or failing. Schools started entering able students for further maths for two reasons: 1) to extend the most able mathematicians who found GCSE trivial and 2) to try to bridge the gap to A-level and stop so many dropouts/students struggling.

The FSMQ is older, so perhaps schools who already used it carried on and new schools looking for a solution to the GCSE problem went for further maths. Or perhaps because FSMQ is harder, further maths GCSE presented enough of an extra challenge (and it's great).

Now maths GCSE has been reformed, it's much harder. The expectation is that it will be better preparation for A-level so a bridging qualification won't be needed. Some schools have already ditched the FM, others are seeing how it goes.

Circle theorems are definitely in the new higher maths GCSE. Not sure about the other things though.

I may be wrong but I believe there is also a Core Maths qualification, which can be taken in year 13 as an add-on to science or social science subjects?

That makes sense, Witchend. At our school Additional Maths is offered to those wanting to do Maths for Alevel. Supposedly it makes the transition to 6th form easier. But why do they choose Additional Maths and not Further Maths?

Ironing
I can only speak from dd1's experience: Bog standard comprehensive.

Her year's been messed about with the new spec for maths. The school also did an experiment of splitting the boys and girls for maths which was pretty universally a disaster in the top sets. They'd done it before with success in the middle sets, but they tried it across the board for dd1's year. It was effectively a year lost as far as maths went for dd1. No one seemed to think it worked and they haven't repeated it.

What the school used to do was top set would do maths GCSE a year early, then do additional maths.

In her year they decided it was no point getting the earlier GCSE, so the top set did statistics GCSE in year 10 and were going to only do the new GCSE (why didn't they give it a new name!) in year 11.

However some of the pupils (and I suspect dd1 was one of them) told the teacher they really wanted to have a go at additional maths. So he set up an afterschool session. It was meant to be once a week, but was less often than once a fortnight. About 1/2 of the top set went and also about 1/4 of the second set.

They got a good smattering of As, and then right down to Us. Equally well they got (I think) 20/30 9s in maths from the top set and about 5-6 9s from the second set.

I don't think anyone got an A in additional who didn't get a 9 in GCSE, and I don't think any of the second set got an A in additional, although there was definitely at least one C, because one of dd1's friends got that.

For dd1's year, the right at the top mathematicians has been pretty consistent since year 7. There was dd1 and about 5 boys who would score consistently above the rest.

However a number of the 9s at the GCSE are students who have risen from where they started. Whether that's because they were badly taught before, or suddenly something clicked, or they worked really hard at it I don't know.

Dm was a maths tutor and sometimes she had someone who wasn't doing particularly well and she found there was something they'd just got a mental block about. When she got them through that they soared. There was one lad who'd been struggling in set 8/9 for years. She did 6 months of tutoring with him and when they did the end of year exams he rose into 3/9-and was at the top of that.

Additional is an unusual exam. I'm not sure how many take it, but I think it's in the small 1000s rather than more. I'm sure Noble will know!
I did it in 1992, and it was referred to as an O-level (called A/O) rather than a GCSE. It's now treated as an A/S level. Most people don't seem to have come across it, so I wouldn't worry about your ds not doing it.

The children doing additional were mostly those who want to continue with maths, especially those who are keen on further maths. Plus some who wanted to do science A-level but didn't want to do maths in the hope that will carry the maths content forward.

I think that dd1 reckoned that the new maths GCSE covered about 60% of the additional maths syllabus, so she might as well do it. However if she'd been struggling with the new Maths I would have been reluctant for her to do it as it would take away the focus. (although she tells me she only really did 2 days of work for it, between the main GCSEs and that, which was her last exam)

I'm also interested to understand the differences. Our school offers FSMQ Additional Maths to about a quarter of Year 11s, to do alongside GCSE Maths.

I wonder why they choose Additional Maths and not Further Maths? Any ideas?

(Interesting: integration, circle theorem, completing the square and all the above were on iGCSE which Ds sat this year, but which certain mnetters insist is an easier qualification than even the old spec gcse...)

The real Science nonsense was Further Additional Science not counting in the EBacc bucket. Sometimes I feel there is no quote enough rigour on the selection of subjects...

Bah, further investigation says that Further Maths doesn't count any more either. But GCSE Statistics, which is a horrible qualification, does count. Makes no sense, especially when triple sciences all count separately.

Oh and I've just looked it up, the FSMQ won't count for progress 8 at all, even in the open slot, unless the student doesn't take GCSE maths.

Additional Maths (Advanced) Free Standing Maths Qualification counts for UCAS points - about as many as a single AS module as it's a level 3 qualification.

Further Maths (offered by AQA) is a level 2 certificate so equivalent to a GCSE but has it's own grading system: A^, A*, A, B, C, U.

I don't know much about the FSMQ, my school does Further Maths. In terms of difficulty, about half our top set got 9s, but less than a third of those who got a 9 got an A^, so it's something for the really elite mathematicians to go for.

I really like the Further Maths qualification, the exam paper is more fun than GCSE. However many schools will be ditching it to focus on the new GCSE which is much harder and also ditching it because it doesn't count as an Ebacc subject for Progress 8

Additional maths also counts as a A/S level rather than GCSE-results come out with A-levels (although dd1 didn't get the results until she got the rest of them.)
The boundary for A also went up quite a bit this year, dd1 read that a lot fewer did it because of the new spec in GCSE, but the people who dropped out were (naturally) the bottom end. So the same percentage got A/B/C etc, but as the bottom end had dropped off it meant the actual difficulty went up.

According to dd they crossover but the format is different Add Maths focusses on algebra, sketching graphs, completing the square, integration (1 paper with calculator), FM includes circle theorem, matrices(2 papers)

Vigorous : rigorous. Autocorrect!

Not sure but my DD has just taken maths gcse. Prior to this year her school did maths gcse and further maths (not sure if correct term) if you were really good at maths. This year they all just did the new edexcel gcse. The schools opinion was as the new gcse is more vigorous there was no need for the extra exam.
She went to a super selective grammar. Not sure what other schools do.

Is there LIZS? Learn something new every day.
What is the difference between that and Further Maths?

I'll let @noblegiraffe comment on that she teaches maths, I'm only an interested parent.

I can't see that taking FM makes the standard maths any less worthy.
Doing FM can add interest to the able mathematicians, and act as a bridge to A levels. Will also look good for anyone wanting to do maths at university, or apply to the top universities in general.

What year is your DC?