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Heya! I personally got a 17/20 (just hit that 7 benchmark!) for my math exploration (though a 6 in math HL as paper 1 pulled all my marks down pwhahaha so you might want to find someone who actually got a 7 in Math HL to help you out). I still remember I had a difficult time thinking of a topic to research about for my math exploration but then I went on google (it's your 2nd bestfriend) and just typed 'cool/interesting/fun math topics' and some of the topics gave me inspiration :smile:

Check out these:
https://www.dpmms.cam.ac.uk/~wtg10/mathsindex.html
https://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20071120135852AAAldBE (sometimes yahoo-answers provide you with some good ideas as well you might want to research more in depth in regards to the research area provided)
http://math.stackexchange.com/questions/490344/interesting-math-facts-that-are-visually-attractive

Etc.

Just go on google or yahoo or any search bars and just find something interesting that you're genuinely interested in (and know that you won't struggle in doing the maths in when you're writing up your IA) and just go for it :smile:

Good luck with everything!
Reply 2
Original post by anniechan514
Heya! I personally got a 17/20 (just hit that 7 benchmark!) for my math exploration (though a 6 in math HL as paper 1 pulled all my marks down pwhahaha so you might want to find someone who actually got a 7 in Math HL to help you out). I still remember I had a difficult time thinking of a topic to research about for my math exploration but then I went on google (it's your 2nd bestfriend) and just typed 'cool/interesting/fun math topics' and some of the topics gave me inspiration :smile:

Check out these:
https://www.dpmms.cam.ac.uk/~wtg10/mathsindex.html
https://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20071120135852AAAldBE (sometimes yahoo-answers provide you with some good ideas as well you might want to research more in depth in regards to the research area provided)
http://math.stackexchange.com/questions/490344/interesting-math-facts-that-are-visually-attractive

Etc.

Just go on google or yahoo or any search bars and just find something interesting that you're genuinely interested in (and know that you won't struggle in doing the maths in when you're writing up your IA) and just go for it :smile:

Good luck with everything!

haha thanks and i would be more than happy if i got a 6! What was your IA actually on though?
Original post by IntBac
haha thanks and i would be more than happy if i got a 6! What was your IA actually on though?


Mine was about the toroidal universe, the different shapes of it + exploring the rates of change of it :smile:
Reply 4
Original post by anniechan514
Mine was about the toroidal universe, the different shapes of it + exploring the rates of change of it :smile:

oh cool, so it was really calc based? :P how much of it was in the syllabus? or you had to learn a lot of new stuff..?
Nahh most of it was syllabus based, but do use some equations that are 'out of the syllabus' :smile:
Reply 6
Original post by anniechan514
Nahh most of it was syllabus based, but do use some equations that are 'out of the syllabus' :smile:

Urgh i still don't know where to start...I'm looking at fractals atm, but i just don't know where the math will come from or how to approach it..
Reply 7
Hello! I started working on my maths IA as well. I was very interested by ur topic (Toroidal Universe) could you please email me ur IA? I was thinking on working on Lotka Volterra Equations for Population Model. Any suggestions? Ideas? Advices? Please Help!
Reply 8
Original post by chiragh
Hello! I started working on my maths IA as well. I was very interested by ur topic (Toroidal Universe) could you please email me ur IA? I was thinking on working on Lotka Volterra Equations for Population Model. Any suggestions? Ideas? Advices? Please Help!


Hey no need to worry, its just an exploration not a full on research paper. As long as you put work into it you can get a good grade. After all, anything you can think of probably has been done 10 thousand times.
Reply 9
No need to stress, its an exploration not a full on research paper so as long as you put work into it they don't care too much about your topic choice. After all anything you can think of probably has been done 5 thousand times.
Original post by IntBac
Hey guys can anyone feed me any ideas for my IB math exploration? It needs to be quite a high level mathematical research project, all ideas are welcome! Also something quite interesting...because i don't have the best attention span.


I got 20/20 on mine. It was about how to calculate the length of a road. It turned out to be an application of polynomial regression and arc length.
To score highly, find a problem and find the most mathematical way to solve a problem. Connecting concepts from different topics is also appreciated.
Thats a really clever idea :smile: How did you go through the process?
Find a curved road on google earth, copy it
Then scale it on geogebra and take note of the coordinates.
Now you find the function of best fit. And then calculate the length of the function from point a to b.

In order to find a function of best fit, look for polynomial regression. You use partial differentiation, matrices, and some statistics

Then to find the length of a function, use arc length. This requires basic calculus knowledge.
That was pretty much it. Hope it helps
Original post by tenorblizzard
Find a curved road on google earth, copy it
Then scale it on geogebra and take note of the coordinates.
Now you find the function of best fit. And then calculate the length of the function from point a to b.

In order to find a function of best fit, look for polynomial regression. You use partial differentiation, matrices, and some statistics

Then to find the length of a function, use arc length. This requires basic calculus knowledge.
That was pretty much it. Hope it helps


Is there anyway you could post your paper online or email it to me? I haven't been able to find a perfect math exploration online and I think seeing one would really help me get an idea of what the IB is looking for.
Original post by inacolombo
Is there anyway you could post your paper online or email it to me? I haven't been able to find a perfect math exploration online and I think seeing one would really help me get an idea of what the IB is looking for.

Yeah I'd also love to see that. My teacher has some ones that have scored like 15/16 but nowhere near as good.
I did my EE in maths actually, and apparantly it cant be in a similiar area so calculus is off the table
Original post by KenjouHitokage
Yeah I'd also love to see that. My teacher has some ones that have scored like 15/16 but nowhere near as good.
I did my EE in maths actually, and apparantly it cant be in a similiar area so calculus is off the table

Original post by inacolombo
Is there anyway you could post your paper online or email it to me? I haven't been able to find a perfect math exploration online and I think seeing one would really help me get an idea of what the IB is looking for.


Sorry but until I get my results in January, I would wanna keep it personal. I can definitely help you with your IA, tho! just send me your facebook link or whatever through personal messages and we can talk on facebook.

Still, I think that polynomial curve fitting is really easy to understand and it is just at the level of a math ia. there are many different applications of it and I think you should try to find one!
This is the only source that taught me polynomial curve fitting, but im sure that your high school library has some books on statistics.
http://web.iitd.ac.in/~pmvs/courses/mel705/curvefitting.pdf
So fractals seems to be where im heading, have you guys got any suggestions as to what I should be exploring and any paticular ideas. Either the maths is too complicated or not to my level hmm
can you explain the step of using geogebra after copying the curved road in google map. I am not doing it for IA but I would like to know what you have to click in order to get the graph in geogegra
hi i am doing something similar to finding the length of a road in that i am finding the arc length of a function. where i am stuck is finding the integral of something like sqrt(p(x)) where p(x) is a polynomial of degree 2+. did you have to do this too?
hi i am doing something similar to yours in that I am finding the arc length of a function. The place where i am stuck is using the arc length formula, which you probably know for a polynomial function. When use the formula i have to integrate a polynomial of degree 2+ which i do not know how to do.