Maths teacher -trig identities

[tiredgirly]

DD has been off sick quite a bit and tryin to catch up this over half term.
She is tryin to make sense of the school textbook (OCR) and seems to be making rather heavy weather of the questions and very slow.

Does she need to memorise all the identities so she can quickly spot what to do in proofs.She thinks they will be on the exampaper or she can derive them,Also Could anybody recommend a good online resource.

sorry A level

In theory, all the basic trig identities are included in the formula booklet and it is possible to derive the rest. However, doing that will slow you down significantly in the exam and make it almost impossible to spot manipulation of trig expressions, which is crucial in order to integrate trig functions.

Don’t try to memorise them though. Keep doing trig identity proof questions and eventually, she will remember them. I used to teach the old OCR spec and their C3 trig questions can be quite tough and require a high degree of familiarity with all the identities. I imagine the new spec will expect similar standard.

I do not know about online resources, but dd used the CGP books. As GHGN said, lots of practice examples. Also if she is at the point of struggling to understand them, leave them then come back to them in a few days or weeks. When your dd returns to the topic it will seem easier.

Agree that sitting memorising trig identities isn’t the best way to learn them, but keeping using them over time. Relying on the formula booklet will make trig questions much harder.

As Just says, paced practice is also important here, it’s one of those topics that needs time to percolate. Some now, some at the end of half term, then refreshing every so often.

Loads of trig questions with worked answers here (scroll down): www.physicsandmathstutor.com/maths-revision/a-level-core-3/solomon-worksheets/

for info, what do you mean by 'trig identities' please?

These, Teen

Cheers noble . I'm sure they weren't called that in my day ...

Gosh, used to love a bit of trig identities at O Level. Haven't thought about them for years.

I think we just called it trigonometry, Teen

Google exam solutions. Fantastic website and amazing free resource for students - tutorials of every topic and video solutions to past paper exams broken down my exam board.

Use physics and maths tutor to access worksheets to practice from. Solutions can also be found on examsolutions.net. I am a maths tutor- feel free to send across any short questions you may have- happy to help!

Its a common area that students struggle with!

And teachers. I bloody hate trig identities

And teachers. I bloody hate trig identities
I have them written in whiteboard pen on the windows of my classroom!

Have a look on khan www.khanacademy.org/search?page_search_query=trigonometric%20identities