Here is the quote
“Not only has SmarterMaths saved hours of my life, but the statistical analysis on every topic and the marker's comments are features we rarely find elsewhere ... truly effective!"
Sylvia Park, Science/Mathematics Teacher, Girraween High School
Hi XXXX,
Thank you for subscribing to SmarterMaths!
We aim to continually improve our offering to subscribers and are pleased to announce a few significant enhancements to our VCE Teacher Edition programs.
Topic Analysis Roll Out
- You are now able to access the "Big Picture" analysis (see image below) of how important any subject is in the context of each exam section in the final examinations. Include it (or not) at a click! (keep your eyes out for this feature in FurtherMaths in the coming weeks).
Difficulty Band Icons enhanced
- We've moved from "Easy, Standard, Hard" icons to the more informative band icons (thanks to all the teachers who provided feedback on this development suggestion). A question's difficulty level will now be allocated a band level in the range 1-6, with actual state mean marks being a major input into this determination.
Other Question Icons
- All questions now have icons that clearly identify them as multiple choice or longer answer and calculator allowed or non-calculator with hover scripts to remind you of their meaning.
- Met2 longer answer questions now have a clear "MULTI" icon next to them to denote the likelihood of a broad cross-topic question - just in case the revision worksheet needs to be quite specific and the extensive content of these questions may not be appropriate.
For those of you interested in more details of our VCE Methods analysis, see below.
Thank you for choosing SmarterMaths, and you can expect more enhancements and features coming this year!
Best regards,
Matt Burgess
SmarterMaths
VCE Methods Analysis
We have painstakingly gone through the last decade of exams, eliminated areas that are no longer in the syllabus, and analysed and graphed contributions of each topic area. As a product of this dissection of each exam and its sections, we highlight common pitfalls and recommend key study focus areas.
If you haven't used this program feature before, examples of the information we research and highlight to teachers and students are included below:
- Logs and Exponentials (Met1 exam) - at least one dedicated question testing log laws or exponential algebra was asked every year between 2011-2015 but has been noticeably absent in the last 2 years and is worthy of attention. While generally well answered, most students struggle with recognising an exponential equation that is reducible to a quadratic (see 2015 Met1 Q7b and 2011 Met1 Q2b).
- Area Under Curves (Met2 Multiple Choice) - Area Under Curve multiple choice questions have been asked 12 times in the last 9 years. A significant contribution, albeit to the smallest "section" of the exams. The difficulty range of the multiple choice questions varies from standard to very difficult, with the 2 MC questions in 2017 notably causing major problems (and sub-50% mean marks).
- Probability Density Functions (Met1 exam) - Density Functions have been tested 5 times in Met1 since 2010 and are on trend to be examined in 2018 (after being left out of Met1 paper in 2017). This area has proven very challenging with half of the Met1 questions in this time producing sub-50% mean marks (and some much lower than 50%).
... and this is how it appears in your worksheets (at a click)!