A level further maths - why is it treated so differently?

[TheBeautifulVisit]

I'm just wondering about further maths. In further maths A level 58% achieved A or A grade versus 12.7% achieved A or A grade in ICT in 2013, source here: www.telegraph.co.uk/education/leaguetables/10247947/A-level-results-2013-national-results-by-subject-and-gender.html

Why are students discouraged from sitting further maths if it seems likely they'll go on to achieve anything but the top grades? Why are schools unhappy for students to countenance a C or a D grade in further maths but are perfectly happy for students to take ICT, even though they can reasonably expect to achieve a C or D grade?

It makes no sense to me at all. We are short of computer scientists and a further maths at C or D grade would be very useful, possibly much more useful than a similar or higher grade in ICT.

Why do we support this system? Surely we should be encouraging children to study as much maths as possible for as long as possible?

Can somebody please explain to me why further maths is treated so preciously?

Maths is a subject that builds on itself. More so than almost any other subject that I have studied. If you don't fully understand GCSE then you will struggle with at least some of the A2 content. If you don't understand the A2 content then A2 FM will be a struggle. Similarly a poor grade at FM A2 would indicate that you would struggle at degree level. The amount of remedial teaching available at university will vary depending on the ability of the intake.

Maths (at least at school level, I am not sure about university) is also a subject with right answers. If you have got a C or D grade at FM A2 then you will have spent quite a long time getting wrong answers. It would surprise me if anyone wanted to study maths at university following that experience. I can see that studying a subject with lots of mathematical content would be different, though you might find maths a limiting factor in how far you could get.

As far as University Maths goes, I think it depends on whether you want to concentrate on Pure or Applied Maths. You might be perfectly secure at understanding equations and how to manipulate and apply them, but completely turned off by having to provide pages of proofs.

far fewer take further than take maths
and they tend to be the very brightest
www.psc.ac.uk/results/results.php?r=2
and lots give it up after the AS
www.psc.ac.uk/results/results.php

Cerisier when you say CIE or Edexcel IGCSE depending on set, which would you say was easier? I'm hoping it's Edexcel as that's what DD's doing and maths isn't her strongest subject!

bruffin - That all sounds very promising. Good luck to him for his Bristol interview. As a matter of interest what did he get in his other subject AS results?

This article is interesting,inlcuding some of the comments(Cambridge maths students). www.theguardian.com/education/2011/feb/01/step-extra-exam-hurdle-university

Further Maths isn't always counted as a seperate A' level if you plan to study medicine. SEE HERE for info on The Student Room (which is usually but not always reliable)

That's a good point YATR. I don't know if things have changed, but when I took A levels, it was almost unheard of to take Maths, Further Maths + 1 other subject. So I imagine that few students taking FM drop down to the standard 3 A2 levels. Therefore you have to be someone who can cope with the workload. If you are an able mathematician, then A level Maths will take you far less time than if you struggle with it. It isn't like a humanities or arts subject where an essay will take 2 hours to write irrespective of your aptitude and it is only the quality of the output that differs.

Our higher sets sit the CIE Marni. They also sit the additional Maths FSMQ.

I think it's only medicine for which FM isn't counted as a separate A level when presented with maths as one of three A levels. But it can fulfil the AS grade as some medicine offers are AAAa (UCL for example).

Lots of comp scientists, mathematicians and physicists drop to 3 subjects at A2 which include both maths and further maths. At my on's school he is one of only three pupils who are keeping going with 4 subjects to A2 yet there are 12 in the A2 FM class.

Medicine admissions want their students to be able to handle a large workload and maths, further maths chem to A2 plus physics to AS is a smaller workload than maths, chem, history to A2 plus biology to AS.

FM is only offered as a 5th subject to AS and as a 4th at A2 at DCs school

DD2 is choosing A level options at the moment. Her school only want her to do 4 AS subjects and 3 at A2. They are strongly discouraging her from doing FM as she is not intending to do a degree in maths and it would limit her options for other degrees - unless she wants to do engineering. She is probably going to opt for maths, chemistry, biology and physics at AS.
DD1 is doing maths AS this year - it does seem to be the case that they either 'get it' and are getting mainly As in the mocks or they don't get it and are getting Ds and below. I assume FM is even more like that.

Further maths is an interesting subject, because, to my knowledge, it's the only A-level that builds on top of another A-level.

When dm did A-levels she did Maths: Pure, and Maths: Applied (what we call mechanics, you could alternatively do statistics). For each of those you did one ordinary maths A-level paper (like everyone else did), and one further maths paper.

When I did it, you did Maths: Pure and Applied (generally mechanics, but could do statistics) and further maths: Pure and Applied (the same as ordinary maths). So you did basically the same papers as dm did, but they arranged them differently.

When db did it (4 years later) it became much easier. Because to get maths and further maths you did Papers: Pure 1 and Pure 2 (as me and dm had done) but then you did statistics 1 and mechanics 1 ie the ordinary maths. And the syllabus for pure had been cut back so far that what he did in pure 1&2 was only slightly more than I had done in single maths.

I think there was at least one exam board that also introduced something called Decision maths. So then to do maths and further maths, you did: Pure 1, Mechanics 1, Statistics 1 and Decision 1. That is, it was no harder, but broader. Maybe to distinguish it, they should have called that maths and more maths!

For a maths degree would universities be content with maths, FM and physics at A level? That would then give them time to do well on STEP. Dd is considering this route, perhaps with an EPQ added in.
I'm a bit worried that if they are very able mathematicians it might not be seen to be testing enough to do the 3 a levels, 2 of which in the subject they find most easy.
Unfortunately her current school doesn't offer EPQ which is a slight hiccup in the plan.

At A2 yes, but she'd normally do something else at AS (e.g. another science, not just EPQ).

EPQ not likely to be useful at top unis, STEP performance and AS UMS mark are everything.

OhYouBadKitten DD2 did Maths, Further Maths and Chemistry at A level and History to AS. She is studying Maths at Bath. Most of her contemporaries have the traditional Maths, Further Maths and Physics. The university just wants good mathematicians they are not the slightest bit interested in breadth and would probably prefer the candidates who find the A level easy or else how on earth will they cope with university maths?!

That's very helpful thanks :) we wondered if an EPQ based around a maths subject would be useful in making her stand out. As she lives and breathes maths its good to know that she doesn't need to do extra at A2. We were a bit worried about FM not counting as a full a level.

Do you know the only place I have ever seen the fact that further maths isn't considered a full A level is on mumsnet. Yes some medical schools say maths/fm together doesn't offer enough breath but not that it isn't a full A level. If you aren't sure about an A level choice the best thing to do is to have a look at university course websites and see what subjects they are asking for.

webwiz - I agree. I know lots of people who got into all sorts of things at highly reputable unis with 3 A2 levels, two of which were maths and further maths.

Yes, but isn't that people who've done fairly well, visit?

Surely someone who gets a D in any of their A Levels might struggle with university? And if you get a D in Further Maths, you can't even claim you've three completely separate skills.

Do you know the only place I have ever seen the fact that further maths isn't considered a full A level is on mumsnet
Agreed
I think the heads of maths at the 6th form colleges might also take issue with that opinion

OYBBK - DD1 did Maths, FM and Physics, and an EPQ on a mathsy topic (which tied in to an extra curricular high level maths thing she'd done previously, which in turn became the first --killer- sentence in her PS, just in case anyone wanted to interview her, so a good answer to "why do you want to study maths at uni?"). However, I don't think it made any difference to uni applications, although it may prove useful on her CV later.

More important though is the STEP - even if you're not applying to the unis which ask for it. Lots and lots of past papers, sessions with teachers who properly love maths (not always the ones teaching it ), as well as aiming for A*s in the a levels..

Waves to Webwiz - how is your DD getting on? Is she on a placement this year, or is she on the MMath? DD1 is finding Y3 "challenging" but fun, fingers crossed for results this week though...

So much depends on where someone wants to go to Uni.

I can't offhand think of a maths degree course where you wouldn't need a B grade in mainstream A level maths to get in. So let's take that as the least competitive route. I just looked at De Montford, which recruit people with a B grade at Maths to do Maths, and they don't specify what subjects the other grades have to be in- you can do drama if you want to. So to be honest if DMU is typical I can't immediately think of a course where having a C or D in further maths is going to be an advantage to them over any other subject.

If the kid is aiming at a Uni where a grade B in ordinary maths plus whatever else will get you in, and they really want to do further maths, well, OK, why not.

But if the kid is aiming at a Uni where they tend to specify the other subjects and/or the other grades, then not getting an A at further maths is a bit of an own goal, because it kind of says, er, I want to do maths but I just proved that I find it difficult.

I think they organise your maths and further maths result to give you the highest possible grade in maths and then the remainder goes to further maths. So you could end up with A* maths and a C in furher maths but an A and B if they were reorganised. iyswim. So the results polarises the actual difficulty of further maths.

Ah, I didn't realize that beautiful. I thought under the new regs, you couldn't just put any combination of modules together and call it 'maths A Level' any more?

I may well be wrong/thinking only of one exam board - I only thought this was the case from passing conversations.