Edexcel C3,C4 June 2013 Thread

I don't quite understand your point here. You've done all the other past papers at home or in school, this is nothing like sitting for an exam for real. People always think their paper was the hardest, exam pressure makes all the difference here.

Which questions were particularly hard, anyway? Maybe part (a) of question 3 (though honestly, everyone should know that sin[x]=cos[90°-x], this is basic stuff), and the question with the mechanics context may have been a bit confusing for some. Doesn't seem too much different from your ordinary paper. It was more difficult than average, sure, but not significantly so.

I don't really care if you feel insulted or if you think I'm being patronising. It quite simply wasn't "drastically different". If anything, others could say they're insulted by your claim that the papers they sat for were significantly easier.

can someone help me with this question please, how do you simplify:

can someone help me with this question please, how do you simplify:$-ln|6|-ln|9|+ln|4|$ ? the answer is apparently $ln(| \dfrac{2}{27} |)$? I'm really confused!

-ln l6l is ln l1/6l. Subtracting lns means dividing so ln l1/6l -ln l9l= ln l1/54l. Then adding lns means multiplying so ln l1/54l + ln l4l= ln l4/54l=ln l2/27l

My tip is I usually put the positive ln first.

So ln(4) - ln(6) - ln(9)
then you use your log laws so ln(4)-ln(6) would be ln(4/6)

and then ln (4/6) -ln(9) would be ln(4/ 6x9) which is ln(4/54) which simplifies to ln (2/27)

can someone help me with this question please, how do you simplify:$-ln|6|-ln|9|+ln|4|$ ? the answer is apparently $ln(| \dfrac{2}{27} |)$? I'm really confused!

In what way did they change in January??

the paper was very different though! only about 3 questions out of the 8 were the regular questions that come up

it may have been easily done for some people, however the statistics say that it was extremely different. apparently edexcel have had thousands of complaints from students and teachers, this has never happened to this extent before of what I'm aware.

when the majority of people taking the exam were shocked about how hard it was something must be wrong. it's not like every single person was underprepared or freaked out due to the stress in the exam hall


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I haven't seen that anyone's posted any C3R answers yet, so here's my attempt.

Let me know about my mistakes, as usual!

I haven't seen that anyone's posted any C3R answers yet, so here's my attempt.

Let me know about my mistakes, as usual!

The had changed to some extant, the type of questions they normally ask never came up like the max value of the fraction.

I know why I struggled. I did understand the concepts before going into the exam very thoroughly, and had I had another hour or so, and had it not been such a shock I probably would have been able to do that paper. The reason it was a shock? Because up until now we've had easier papers in the same format. Is that right? No probably not, but the fact that had they not lost the original paper that was easier, and in line with all the other papers, shows that it's not even like they planned to make it harder because they thought the exams were not differentiating enough.

I agree with what you say about the UMS conversions, but what may have been "bog standard easy papers" for some people were clearly not for others otherwise we would all have been getting 100% and they would have already changed the system.

And what you say about silly mistakes, I can retaliate with silly mistakes. So many people will have made more silly mistakes than usual because of the shock of this paper, as well as losing the marks that they could not do at all. It's therefore in no way an accurate reflection of what people can do.

No, it is not Edexcel's job to prepare me, but when I buy officially endorsed textbooks from them, I expect them to be of some use. When I do past papers of similar format I expect the paper I sit in the exam to be of similar format unless told otherwise, which it would have been if we sat the original paper. Whilst they did not promise the papers to be of similar style and format, they know that schools are preparing students like this.

Essentially what you have said is that hard work is not worth anything because exams such be hard and test natural ability.

Edexcel are at fault because:
1) They lost a bunch of papers, were concerned enough to replace them, and now that some people have accidentally sat the wrong papers, which I agree is not their fault, are going back and saying "we don't have evidence that they've been leaked", because they ceebs to do anything. So now people feel like they have been unfair disadvantaged.
2) They say that this paper was to the same standard as other papers, which it defintely was not.
3) They have misled me, and other pupils by telling allowing us to practice for this exam with normal papers, and suddenly changing them.

You are saying this because you have found the paper ok, which I believe is because you have understood the concepts more thoroughly but you are also a gifted mathematician probably. Not everyone is as lucky. If the questions were slightly different, it could easily have been you in this position, and getting upset.

EDIT- you are completely missing the point that had we recieved the original paper we wouldn't even be having this discussion. It means it's not even like Edexcel decided to make them harder, because they were not challenging enough, as the original paper was easier, and that is what they intended to give us. It just feels like it's something they've thrown together at the last minute.

Not everyone found the old papers easy. You obviously did, but some people worked incredibly hard for their grades in those papers. I'm glad that you liked the paper this year though. As long as you found it challenging and had a ball doing it.

It doesn't mean that something is wrong with the exam. It means something is wrong with the way people are learning the content, seeing that everyone loses their mind the moment they have to do something slightly different to what they're used to.

Exams are supposed to be about applying the same knowledge to different situations, not applying the same knowledge to the same old situations over and over again.

But due to grade boundaries there will still be around the same percentage of people achieving A*, A etc... so how is it unfair? Remember that your grades are a measure of how you did relative to other candidates, not how well you actually did in the paper.

What good does changing the spec do anyway? Everything in this exam was on the spec. The spec isn't what decides the difficultly of the paper in general, it's the exam questions.

im guessing you did well

You should remove the modulus as they're known constants, first of all... |6|=6, |9|=9, etc.

$-\ln 6 - \ln 9 + \ln 4$

$= \ln 4 - \ln 6 - \ln 9$

Apply your log rules here - $\log_c a - \log_c b = \log_c \dfrac{a}{b}$

$= \ln \dfrac{4}{6} - \ln 9 = \ln \dfrac{2}{3} - \ln 9$

$= \ln \dfrac{\frac{2}{3}}{9} = \ln \dfrac{2}{27}$

Yeah if they significantly lower the grade boundaries then it will work out the same so thats fine. Otherwise, it's not fair. In terms of changing the specification, if edexcel think that their papers are too easy at the moment, they should create a new maths specification with new test papers that are ALL significantly harder, not deciding to have one paper much harder then the rest in our specification. Having said that, if edexcel lower the grade boundaries for this then it will be fine.

I did C3 in Jan.