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CIE winter variants harder than summer variants?

Is it just me or are the CIE winter variants harder than summer variants?
Whenever I am solving Physics (9702) or Mathematics P1/S1 (9709) past papers, i find the winter variants always harder than summer variants.
I will be appearing for CIE during May and June.

Reply 1

Vanessa Leah

Original post by hassansheikh

CIE is the most difficult exam board because the questions that are set can be very tricky most of the time and also the examiners are very stingy with the marks. If you can do Edexcel then it'll be much easier for you to score higher grades.

Reply 2

hassansheikh

Original post by Vanessa Leah

CIE is the hardest? some people say that CIE is easy.

Reply 3

hassansheikh

Can anyone clarify my statement?

Reply 4

danconway

Original post by hassansheikh

Can anyone clarify my statement?

NO

It's probably just by chance / your own interpretation.

Either way, it doesn't matter if one paper is harder than another because the grade thresholds will account for it.

Reply 5

Vanessa Leah

Original post by hassansheikh

CIE is the hardest? some people say that CIE is easy.

go onto the oxford and cambridge threads on this forum and see how many students got into oxbridge by doing CIE A levels. it will be the odd few for sure. As long as you do not do CIE based papers, you will easily score high marks and get into the top British universities.

In a way some people (those who are sitting for other exams by other exam boards apart from CIE) were thanking their lucky stars when news broke that Michael Gove was removed from his education minister post. I am certain if he had his way, he would have scrapped all the other exam boards and retained the CIE one. He would then go on to standardize and ensure that all students will do CIE subjects at either GCSE or A levels.

Perhaps you don't read the newspapers at all or you have a poor memory? Michael Gove has said on numerous occasions that the current exams are way too easy.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/education/education-news/alevel-student-who-gained-six-a-grades-pens-furious-letter-to-michael-gove-over-offensive-exam-reforms-8784154.html

http://www.channel4.com/news/michael-gove-gcses-edexcel-elizabeth-truss

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/10116007/Michael-Goves-GCSE-exam-reforms-deserve-to-make-the-grade.html

and who could forget the Edexcel Geography chief examiner who was busted on video for saying exactly the same thing but in a different context?

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/secondaryeducation/8943954/Exam-chief-you-dont-have-to-teach-a-lot-for-our-tests.html

[video="youtube;cGOAEV-GBCo"]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cGOAEV-GBCo[/video]

Reply 6

Vanessa Leah

Original post by hassansheikh

Can anyone clarify my statement?

my teacher has been giving us really difficult GCE A level questions papers from other countries to practice and it's really good fun tbh.

https://app.box.com/shared/uue78devfy39cd37yjep

and when the examiners were called before a select committee to explain themselves. this is what they had to say. but shhhhhhhhhhhhh! don't make too much of a meal out of this. the general elections are just around the corner. and don't forget, 'We're all in this together', remember? :biggrin:

[video="youtube;-GpRw0KclR4"]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-GpRw0KclR4[/video]

(edited 9 years ago)

Reply 7

musicobsession

sorry this is late but actually
the winter variants are harder because typically the people who take the winter papers are RE-SITTING a paper
as in, if you get bad grades (touchwood) then you can resit the paper in oct/nov which is why its slightly harder because its a redo and you've had extra months to prepare so it has to be extra harder in order to be fair.
hope this helped! x