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how to self study A2 OCR MEI Mathematics

I'm currently studying the BTEC Level 3 IT 90 Credit Diploma and will progress into the extended dipoma this september. In the past, I have achieved grade B in AS Maths MEI, i am considering to self study the whole A2 Maths syllabus which will consist of C3, C4 and M1. I am looking for any tips for students who are or have been in my situation where they decided to self study OCR MEI A2 Maths and managed to achieve around A/A* grade overall. I have bought the C3 C4 text book and I believe spending at least an hour per day for the modules and following a similar timetable as school which studies around the same number of hours for A Level Maths. Bare in mind that I am currently in college and will need to complete my units coursework to get as many distinctions as possible which shouldn't pose much of a problem. I have contacted my previous sixth form and they gladly said that i'm allowed to take the A Level Maths exams in June 2015, what would you guys/girls recommend? thanks for reading ps I am planning to apply for university after I complete my BTEC course
Reply 1
I don't know how different the boards are, but I've been self-studying all of Edexcel AS and A2 Maths and AS Further Maths for less than a year purely off the internet. That said, my focus has entirely been on learning and understanding the maths, even if I have to go outside the syllabus in order to do so (which I've often had to do for calculus).

I started from a much weaker position than you are, too: I'd gotten a grade C in GCSE and hadn't touched the subject for 8 years since, so I was basically starting from scratch. Despite that, I've managed to become numerate enough to currently be able to study FP2 and FP3, so you most definitely have enough time to learn the maths if it's just A2. However, if you can, you'll want to increase your hours of study to more than what the school timetable follows. I don't know what they teach there, but frankly, I have no idea how they can learn it at such a slow pace as to require an entire year for just C3 and C4, when you can learn the entire A Level Maths syllabus in less than a year.

Try and see if you can learn it in 6 months. That way, you'll have tons of time left in the rest of the year to spend on honing your maths, and if you wish, you can even go on to start learning Further Maths, which will only make your performance in A2 Maths better.

I posted the list of resources I made use of in this thread: http://www.thestudentroom.co.uk/showthread.php?t=2547431&page=3&p=47211032#post47211032
Reply 2
Since it's been almost 2 years of non-maths, I'll take a look at the topics from the maths professor and start building my skills to the point where I can feel comfortable to tackle the A2 syllabus, I have over a year to prepare for the exam, I believe I can pull it off, thanks for the resources :smile:
Reply 3
No problem. Do watch out for calculus, though. If you want any hope of understanding it, you'll need to go outside the syllabus. Especially for definite integration. A Levels teach definite integration as a method of finding the area under a curve, but tells you nothing about how we arrived at this process. For that, you'll need to know differentiation from first principles, Riemann sums, the squeeze theorem, the mean value theorem, and the fundamental theorem of calculus, respectively.

Without this understanding, definite integration will just seem like some sort of magic formula to find the area under a curve.

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