Further Maths A-Level/AS-Level Self-Study options/help

[Mabs49]

DD has decided to try and self-study Further Maths A-level or AS-Level. She is in Year 12, just started. She is doing A-Level Maths but has been told she may be too slow to do Further Maths. She has no trouble understanding the concepts but they way it is being taught at her school is a bit odd and she is not getting it.

She is very good at self-study and learnt a lot for further Maths at GCSE using a lot of online resources and found again the teaching style did not suit her at school. However so far she hasn't found much for Further Maths A-Level and AS-Level in terms of online resources.

Having looked into it a bit, I have found that there are different boards.

This seems to be the most difficult board: OCR MEI?

I have found the AS Level specification but it says for assessment in 2017.

https://www.ocr.org.uk/Images/308764-specification-accredited-as-level-gce-further-mathematics-b-mei-h635.pdf

Is this still relevant to today? Or has there been an update?

Is there any point doing the hardest board?

Would anyone have any suggestions for resources for any A-Level or AS-Level Further Maths that are free for any board. It would be most gratefully received!

Thank you

@noblegiraffe may have some ideas?

Before you spend too much time and /or money on this have you found out where she might be able to sit the exams? If her school haven’t taught her they may well not want her taking it there and be included in their stats.

So many schools do not offer further maths.
As a result there are quite a lot of resources and a support scheme.

However if her school runs the course but thinks she wouldn't cope with it then I would be a bit cautious about taking it on.

It's also worth noting that it is literally further maths. That is it assumes you already know all of the a level content and it goes into more depth on it.

Schools that teach it often do a level maths in year 12 (whether the students actually sit it then or not) and a level further maths in year 13. Some schools don't do that but you have to be very careful with your curriculum if you don't do it that way round.

Edexcel is the one I am familiar with

qualifications.pearson.com/content/dam/pdf/A%20Level/Mathematics/2017/specification-and-sample-assesment/a-level-l3-further-mathematics-specification.pdf

But I believe most of the exam boards offer it.

The advanced maths support programme offer various support programmes -

amsp.org.uk

NRich has a lot of further content which is mostly pure maths:

nrich.maths.org/further-pure-resources

There are textbooks for the various sections -
Eg

www.amazon.co.uk/Edexcel-level-Further-Mathematics-Textbook/dp/1292183357?dplnkId=99d42392-b6e1-4d15-8128-3fabc2c0d685&nodl=1

I don't know much about FM tho I see others have some good points. But I wanted to flag that the spec you link @Mabs49 says teaching from 2017 – so yes, chances are it will still be relevant.

Very few schools offer AS but they are still available – I do external assessments for my subject (not maths!!) and I have assessed AS candidates this summer just gone.

Pupils in Welsh state schools still sit AS levels. Our school uses WJEC/ CBAC

Yes sorry I should have said very few schools in England thanks @Muchtoomuchtodo you are quite correct. But still they are still available to sit in England.

@Muchtoomuchtodo fortunately we are in a big city and I have now checked and it all looks fine. Thank you for this thought though, it was good to be certain.

Yes you're right, they would not want her to study on 'their books' if you know what I mean. DD would have to take the tests at an external exam centre so as not to potentially 'taint' their results!

Have you questioned why they don't think she's up to it? Self study is possible but if she struggles with an actual teacher it would be very difficult.
DS did some obscure additional modules to his FM course and self studied them. Overall he got A*s but but got lower marks than on the modules he did in school.

What grade did she get at GCSE? Further maths is difficult when being taught, self study would be even harder. I’d be wary of adding to her workload at the moment, presumably she’s already doing 3 A-levels ?

Mathematics in Education (MEI) has some good resources.

@Octavia64 thank you for the links and info, all really helpful and thank you too to @clary for clarifying that it all still looks relevant and that AS is possible!

@Poffy it is a consideration you're right. They say she's not up to it because she's a slow processor. This is true. They say it's not because she can't understand it but because they go at such a fast pace and she's struggling to keep up with it.

The thing is DD is not normal LOL. She's very up and down with stuff and sometimes finds it hard to find a rhythm. Probably undiagnosed ADHD. She's changed school and it's taken a huge amount of extra processing to cope with this. Fortunately she's settling really well. But it may take a while before the engines are properly up and running again. although she is slow, anything she does absorb seems to stay forever, or a long time and she doesn't need to practice things over and over again, it just clicks.

So i'm hoping with the right self-study tutorials she'll grasp things and then move on... but I don't know!

Thanks you @usernamedifferent she got a 9 in GCSE and 7 in Further Maths. She said if she'd watched just one extra video on Further Maths she found online, for paper 1 of Futher Maths her score would have been much better but she found it too late.

For GSCE she lost just 27 marks in total of the whole of the papers and came out at about 90% average mark.

She's the sort of person that prints out the specification and then just ticks off each topic as she goes, searching online for tutorials on each one to help her understand it.

And you are right I am very wary of adding to her workload. It is worrying me. But she's very sad to give up F Maths as maths has always been her strongest subject, comes easily. And I think it feels a bit like giving up a bit of her identity almost?

So I'm asking for her on here so when she's ready, if she wants to, she can really go for it and plunge into and put her all into it, if that's what she wants. She can be very focused if she has the desire. I'm doing the gathering together of resources as she is a bit time-poor at the moment and still recovering from the emotional hangover of changing schools and having the shock of having to give up FM. Probably she should have stayed at her old school who knew her well and how she worked but she wasn't happy socially there even though the teachers were really great with her. Swings and roundabouts eh? Life!

She's the sort of person that prints out the specification and then just ticks off each topic as she goes, searching online for tutorials on each one to help her understand it.
That's exactly how DS did it. He also did every available past paper and ticked them off on a spreadsheet.
This was a few years ago. He's a maths teacher now😂.

So looking at the further maths spec, there are some topics that kind of sit on their own and then some topics that really do need a decent knowledge of a level content.

Complex numbers, matrices, polar co-ordinates and vector equations of straight lines and planes are fairly accessible without a level content.

Differential equations, partial fractions, maclaurin series, and hyperbolic trigonometric functions need the easier a level content first.

https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/5a8185ebe5274a2e8ab54725/GCEASSandAAlevelsubjecttcontentforrfurthermathematicsswithappendices.pdf

Resources here:

mrmanmaths.wordpress.com/2023/11/20/pearson-edexcel-alevel-maths-checklist/

If TL maths has videos for further math I'd reccomend him. Used his videos for most of A level normal maths and he covered nearly everything in an organised way. Also has questions in the videos and then important to remember is to do questions after learning content.

Thanks so much for the breakdown @Octavia64 I have no knowledge of maths myself having given up at GCSE many years ago. I wouldn’t have a clue so this is very helpful.

I’ve now looked at TL maths @Medicalstudentandchemtutor and for a moment there I almost thought I might actually understand something 😆 he does have vids for further maths.

If he can get through to me, DD will hopefully find him ok. Thanks for this.

It looks like he does the OCR MEI course, which looks to be the hardest 😬

But anyway this lots to be going on with so thank you again everyone.