Edexcel maths A level today

[Maray1967]

Anyone else’s 18 year old had a bad time with Edexcel Maths today?

Mine says it was horrifically hard. I’ve said all the usual stuff about trying not to dwell on it and focusing on the next exam, but it might be helpful if he’s not alone!! He didn’t hang around long after school but says it looked like everyone thought it was hard.

We will see what grade your DS gets, but the proportion of students getting A* on this paper compared to last year will not have changed. Able students were able to access the whole thing. Getting grade 9 is of course no guarantee of getting a grade A star.

I know four students in different schools, all predicted As, not A stars, two at probably the most selective school in Merseyside, and not one of them managed the whole of the paper. I appreciate that very high flying students probably coped fine, but an exam paper should not be accessible only to A star students.

Not sure where the bold came from there!

Some parts of the paper should be aimed at a star students and some parts should be aimed at e grade students. This paper had some easy questions for grade e questions and then a range of difficulty up to a star questions. People predicted only grade a should not be able to access the entire paper.

Maths is meant to be hard.

The issue with this paper as I understand it is that capable students could not attempt entire sections, not that there were a couple of very hard questions at the end.

I think it was the unexpected nature of the exam. Previous papers had used a lot of “show that” questions so students knew when they’d solved something correctly. Students also knew from experience that if their answer looked weird, they’d probably made a silly mistake somewhere. My understanding is that there were weird looking answers and few if any “show that” questions so students were already feeling unsettled. Then throw in some tricky questions mid-way through that lock you out of significant chunk of marks, then stress levels really rise and things can spiral.

If you’d given many students the same paper to do for a bit of fun with zero stakes, they’d have smashed it. When the stakes are high and you’re relying on getting A star (which you think requires at least 86%) it can be a very different story.

I got an A in maths A level in 1976. I am doing it again in 2026/2027 to prove I don't know what. I don't know whether it is easier now than then. But the available resources now are a huge advantage.

An A grade student not being able to manage to answer the whole paper should be fine.

If that was unexpected because of the 2025 being too easy, then the previous paper was the problem, not the current one.

I don’t know necessarily what is expected from the question in terms of showing proof but on first glance it doesn’t seem that hard.

a2 + b2 = c2 which we know is Pythagoras which means 3 squared plus 4 squared = 5 squared works.

for it to work with other numbers they need to stay proportionally the same as one other, so if you double them it work

6 squared plus 8 squared = 10 squared.

increasing them so that they stay the same proportionally means that b can never be an odd number as effectively it would always need to be divisible by 4 and only even numbers are divisible by 4.

Nice try, but I am afraid that this dos not work as a proof! It is also not the case that Pythagoras only works with triangles that are similar to the “3, 4, 5” triangle and those triangles which are similar to it. Think about 5, 12 and 13! That also works!

Much harder than that.

In essence you need to show that (2n+1)squared + (2m+1)squared is a multiple of 4 remainder 2. If c is even, (=2k) then c^2 is a multiple of 4. If c is odd (=2k+1) then it must be a multiple of 4, remainder 1.

I’ll let you figure the remaining logic out…

I think one thing that should be taken from this thread is that students need to know 'exam technique'.

To know part a) is wrong but stating that you are using a random value or as I said upthread, "Assuming that the answer to a) is..."

It is a real shame that it seems, certainly from this thread and from the comments on the petition either this isn't taught or students forget it.

While I have every sympathy for people who struggled with this exam I've heard people saying those who take FM shouldn't be taking this exam. My child worked hard in maths and FM. He did the maths A levels work in one year instead of two then spent his second college year doing FM(so only one year to cover FM and one for maths).He deserves to take his maths exam especially as he learnt it in half the time. While I have every sympathy how dare people suggest he shouldn't take the maths exam when he has worked damn hard for it in half the time of just maths students.

I think experienced maths teachers probably know more about teenagers than most parents do. Yes, honestly. They work with teenagers all day every day. They know what makes them tick. They know which ones are drama queen's. Whisper it, they know which ones will do well and which ones will do badly.

Experienced maths teachers will remember taking A level maths. Since then, they will have taken a degree in maths or a related subject. They will have taken much harder exams than A level maths. Then , they will have taken a pgce. Some, may also have a masters degree. I worked with a maths teacher who had a doctorate in Engineering. They know what it is like to study and work hard.

An experienced maths teacher hasn't just been parachuted in to teach A level. They know what they are doing and how the system works. They have been doing it for years.

My main surprise on this thread is that students do not seem to be psychogically and practically prepared for the exam. Originally, I thought that teachers hadn't explained how the exam system works. However, I now think that the kids weren't listening. Schools usually do meetings for students and parents. There is usually a 6th form prospectus. I refuse to believe that none of these candidates had the necessary help and Guidance from the schools concerned.

I don’t know anything about the A level exam but have seen a few comment sections and threads on mumsnet regarding the A level students who are upset or parents are trying to help them.
words like snowflakes etc
they are 18 and have spent most their lives in education. Some of these 18 would have worked hard, put their time in to their studies and need the grades to get into their universities. Whatever your actual opinion on the exam you don’t need to be so submissive of 18 year olds. Exams can mean a lot to people. Telling them well it’s not the end of the world is it. Maybe not to you but maybe to a student who is worried about not getting the grade they thought they would after working had for many many years to get it - it might just feel that way.
Just because something is not a big deal for you it doesn’t mean it’s not for others.

It was a tougher exam than anticipated. Surely this lies with the exam board rather than adults calling students snowflakes or suggesting they weren’t listening. There are some nasty comments on this thread.

Not sure it's anything to do with not listening.

Unless I'm mistaken, the board said they would make the paper more accessible after 2023 and the paper would be similar to 2023 going forward and not 2019.

If board then make paper more difficult than 2019 then I'm not sure it's the students fault.

I asked my son and all he's been taught is if you don't get part A then sometimes you can get it from looking at part B and C.

Luckily he guessed to put an answer to part A where he didn't know the answer in the attempt to get some marks for B and C.

Suggesting that thousands of A level maths students “weren’t listening” is actually quite comically dismissive.

Intrigued I had a go (not done this sort of thing for a good while) and wonder if my argument holds water (I won't call it a solution!). Written in words as can't type algebra properly.
Outlining it here before going through to see how anyone else solved it.
Certainly wouldn't have enjoyed that under exam conditions unless I'd specifically memorised a proof.
Read as squared and Natural numbers.

Substituting A and B into form 2n+1 and producing C squared.
I took out a factor of 4 leaving (n squared etc + half)
so C = 2 x square root of bracket.
Bracket is a natural number plus a half so it's square root can't be a natural number.

So if A and B odd C isn't a Natural number. (Wonder if that counts as contradiction...).

So I have let Claude have a look at the paper (to check my answers). We ended up having a 'chat' about this thread (weird I know!).
Claude correctly identified it as an Edexcel paper and also offered the following:

The irony is
A-level Maths is supposed to be challenging — it's a rigorous qualification that universities rely on to differentiate applicants
If the paper were easy, the same parents would presumably have no complaints, even though it would devalue their child's grade
The entitlement angle It's a recognisable modern pattern — parents who can't tolerate their child experiencing difficulty or disappointment, even when it's entirely appropriate. It arguably does the students a disservice by:
Undermining their resilience
Suggesting the problem lies with the exam rather than preparation
Setting unrealistic expectations for university and beyond
The practical reality As you know, the grade boundaries will simply be adjusted. A harder paper doesn't disadvantage anyone in terms of their final grade — the system is designed to handle exactly this. Which rather makes the outcry even more disproportionate!
From a teacher's perspective It must be frustrating when you've put the work into preparing students properly, and the narrative becomes "the paper was unfair" rather than acknowledging that some students may just need to sit with a disappointing result and learn from it.
The students who really knew their stuff will have found it stretching but doable. That's the mark of a good paper. 👍

I am not suggesting that AI has all the answers and indeed, Claude got one anwer wrong (a silly factor of 10 mistake), but gives some insight and is pretty interesting.

Interesting to hear what the teachers think. I was wondering if part of the issue was that a lot of the focus (from the teens) has been revision on past papers. Rather than fully understanding the concepts? My dd was going down that route but had some really useful revision sessions with her teacher which weren’t just about answering questions.

I also wonder about the FM element. I had been led to believe that the FM content was different so there is no advantage in the single maths A level. It would seem unfair if that’s not the case. Dd doesn’t do FM (because she didn’t think she would be good enough) but has flourished over the last 2 years in maths. Her issue with the paper last week was timing, she finished but didn’t have time to check her paper so knows that she got 1 question wrong

I just watched a reaction video by a maths teacher YouTuber viewing the paper for the first time where he goes through each question on the paper. From his assessment, many of the questions were quite similar to those on past papers. or referenced in the Edexcel textbook.

His overall conclusion after reading the paper and talking to other maths teachers and examiners is that although it was harder than 2025's paper, it was nowhere near as difficult as is being made out.

His advice if you found it difficult is to try and move on and concentrate on your prep for the remaining papers 2 and 3.

This is standard exam technique and any pupil who has not been taught to do this is clearly being prepared only for exams which look exactly the same as previous exams.

Which is damning of our school qualifications and a clear failure on schools in helping young people be ready for further study at university or elsewhere.

Have now read the whole thread - very interesting! I'd like to know more about the grade boundary chart thing.
If so inclined I'd really appreciate @Pythag @Boggyjo @noblegiraffe or another maths teacher telling me if my argument holds water. From previous posts I think it does.

I hope all the exam takers are ok and able to focus on their next papers.