The Student Room Group
Uni students - Complete our survey >>
Uni students - Complete our survey >>
Uni students - Complete our survey >>

AQA Physics PHYA4 - Thursday 11th June 2015 [Exam Discussion Thread]

Scroll to see replies

Reply 380
Avatar for CD223
CD223
OP
10
Original post by Disney0702
Ah yes that's true, the content isn't too difficult.

I haven't seen any past papers yet but I do know that there is only half as many past paper material for Unit 5 compared to Unit 4.


I prefer unit 5 content purely due to interest but it's probably hard given the lack of a range of past exam questions.


Posted from TSR Mobile
Reply 381
Avatar for CD223
CD223
OP
10
Original post by Lau14
I kind of enjoy doing the multiple choice section but they still go with a mark a minute so there isn't enough time to do both halves properly in the exam sometimes :/ and the multiple choice makes up a big enough part of the marks that you need to do it properly to do really well because you're unlikely to get full marks on the written, there's always some stupid mistakes.


Stupid mistakes are inevitable on the MC. I seem to get around 19/25 at the minute :/


Posted from TSR Mobile
Reply 382
Avatar for wmavfc
wmavfc
2
Original post by CD223
It's not impossible but then I wouldn't call any of physics "easy". I find the very early further mechanics topics - momentum and circular motion the easiest. Radioactivity is nice. Thermal physics can be hard. Astro so far is okay but I've not done much or enough to pass judgement on that.

How much have you got left?


Posted from TSR Mobile


Well we started Astro at the end of Year 12 for some stupid reason. So I've forgotten most of that even though my teacher insists we know it all.. Apart from that I've just started the first section so Rutherfords experiment and radioactivity.
Reply 383
Avatar for wmavfc
wmavfc
2
Original post by Disney0702
From what I have learnt so far I do not think that Unit 5 is that hard but the UMS grade boundaries suggests that it is


That sounds good to me haha..!
Reply 384
Avatar for CD223
CD223
OP
10
Original post by wmavfc
Well we started Astro at the end of Year 12 for some stupid reason. So I've forgotten most of that even though my teacher insists we know it all.. Apart from that I've just started the first section so Rutherfords experiment and radioactivity.


Oh wow! Sounds an interesting way of doing things...I have the rest of Astro after lenses to go. Then the EMPA :/


Posted from TSR Mobile
Reply 385
Avatar for Lau14
Lau14
11
Original post by CD223
Stupid mistakes are inevitable on the MC. I seem to get around 19/25 at the minute :/


Posted from TSR Mobile


Yeah I've had 18, 19, 19 on all the ones I've done so far... Pretty much the only tip I've picked up for dealing with them is to think of things in terms of proportionality (basically ignoring constants etc to speed things up!)
Reply 386
Avatar for wmavfc
wmavfc
2
Original post by CD223
Oh wow! Sounds an interesting way of doing things...I have the rest of Astro after lenses to go. Then the EMPA :/


Posted from TSR Mobile


He's an... interesting teacher. We only have 2 people in the class, and the other doesn't do maths or chemistry or anything scientific, so we spend a lot of time going through bits of maths to help them.
I've just not thought about that - was just gonna wing it... lol
Reply 387
Avatar for Lau14
Lau14
11
Original post by wmavfc
Well we started Astro at the end of Year 12 for some stupid reason. So I've forgotten most of that even though my teacher insists we know it all.. Apart from that I've just started the first section so Rutherfords experiment and radioactivity.


We were taught capacitors at the end of last year (after exams) so everyone's pretty much forgotten all that! Fortunately capacitors is a much shorter topic though
Reply 388
Avatar for wmavfc
wmavfc
2
Original post by Lau14
We were taught capacitors at the end of last year (after exams) so everyone's pretty much forgotten all that! Fortunately capacitors is a much shorter topic though


Love capacitors. They never seem to throw anything too complicated at you
Reply 389
Avatar for Lau14
Lau14
11
Original post by wmavfc
Love capacitors. They never seem to throw anything too complicated at you


I'll probably like them a lot better once I've relearnt them. We had the added complication of our college using our class to interview possible new physics teachers by having them teach us what a capacitor was for twenty minutes each... so we had the same explanation three times but in a different way and all the teachers were trying to show off which isn't actually very helpful for us and then our actual teacher never went through it with us. So all the equations and stuff? Fine, great. But what a capacitor actually is... Well, we recently found out properly. After a six mark question on it on the June 14 mock!
What do you guys think needs more time when revising/is more difficult PHYA4 or PHYA5 ?
Reply 391
Avatar for wmavfc
wmavfc
2
Original post by Lau14
I'll probably like them a lot better once I've relearnt them. We had the added complication of our college using our class to interview possible new physics teachers by having them teach us what a capacitor was for twenty minutes each... so we had the same explanation three times but in a different way and all the teachers were trying to show off which isn't actually very helpful for us and then our actual teacher never went through it with us. So all the equations and stuff? Fine, great. But what a capacitor actually is... Well, we recently found out properly. After a six mark question on it on the June 14 mock!


I taught them to myself as my teacher really didn't fancy it as a priority before our mock haha.
Haha yeah we did that as our mock - it was the first timed unit 4 paper i'd done so had about 2 minutes for the 6 marker and was on about entirely the wrong thing anyway. got 1/6 marks lol
Reply 392
Avatar for Lau14
Lau14
11
Original post by wmavfc
I taught them to myself as my teacher really didn't fancy it as a priority before our mock haha.
Haha yeah we did that as our mock - it was the first timed unit 4 paper i'd done so had about 2 minutes for the 6 marker and was on about entirely the wrong thing anyway. got 1/6 marks lol


It was theoretically our second timed paper but I missed the one before Christmas and I didn't have a chance to do it properly because our teacher doesn't seem to believe in checking when we are free :| everyone was short on time for it though it wasn't nice :/
Reply 393
Avatar for CD223
CD223
OP
10
Original post by Lau14
Yeah I've had 18, 19, 19 on all the ones I've done so far... Pretty much the only tip I've picked up for dealing with them is to think of things in terms of proportionality (basically ignoring constants etc to speed things up!)


Yeah good idea!


Posted from TSR Mobile
Reply 394
Avatar for CD223
CD223
OP
10
Original post by wmavfc
He's an... interesting teacher. We only have 2 people in the class, and the other doesn't do maths or chemistry or anything scientific, so we spend a lot of time going through bits of maths to help them.
I've just not thought about that - was just gonna wing it... lol


Woah! There's 18 people in my class! And there's 6 classes in the year!

Aha me too!


Posted from TSR Mobile
Reply 395
Avatar for CD223
CD223
OP
10
Original post by Master Sam
What do you guys think needs more time when revising/is more difficult PHYA4 or PHYA5 ?


Id say PHYA4 given the boundaries are usually higher so it's harder to get good UMS? Just my thinking though. Play to your strengths and weaknesses.


Posted from TSR Mobile
Reply 396
Avatar for wmavfc
wmavfc
2
Original post by Lau14
It was theoretically our second timed paper but I missed the one before Christmas and I didn't have a chance to do it properly because our teacher doesn't seem to believe in checking when we are free :| everyone was short on time for it though it wasn't nice :/


I left it with a solid 2 hour long headache haha. Gonna do the long questions before the MC next one I do see how that goes.
Original post by CD223
Woah! There's 18 people in my class! And there's 6 classes in the year!

Aha me too!


Posted from TSR Mobile


You'll enjoy this then: 4 in my Chemistry, 3 in my Maths and 2 in Physics haha. Not one person in my sixth form year applied to Oxbridge & I had the second highest results in the year last year with AABB at AS. Kind of a small sixth form haha...
Original post by CD223
Id say PHYA4 given the boundaries are usually higher so it's harder to get good UMS? Just my thinking though. Play to your strengths and weaknesses.


Posted from TSR Mobile


That seems fair, do you know what the boundaries were last year for PHYA4 and PHYA5?
Reply 398
Avatar for CD223
CD223
OP
10
Original post by wmavfc
You'll enjoy this then: 4 in my Chemistry, 3 in my Maths and 2 in Physics haha. Not one person in my sixth form year applied to Oxbridge & I had the second highest results in the year last year with AABB at AS. Kind of a small sixth form haha...


That's crazy. 4,000 people go to my sixth form.


Posted from TSR Mobile
Reply 399
Avatar for CD223
CD223
OP
10
Original post by Master Sam
That seems fair, do you know what the boundaries were last year for PHYA4 and PHYA5?


PHYA4
Attachment not found


PHYA5
ImageUploadedByStudent Room1425254644.897748.jpg


Posted from TSR Mobile

Quick Reply

Related discussions

Latest

Trending

Trending

Articles for you