why can't i do a maths paper but can do maths?

3

i had my maths mock today, and as per usual i feel like i ****ed it. everyone else came out saying they found it super fine and were confident in their answers but i found it really difficult.

for reference, last year after my first maths mock i moved down from the highest set to the second set, and then after summer mocks i moved back up again i am sat on a "low seven" according to my teacher (a seven nonetheless) and i always seem to be stuck on a six.

my problem is that if you gave me a sheet of questions and said these are on so and so i could do them straight away but the moment you hide the maths within a question and just say solve for whatever i can't do it. i really struggle to pick the maths out from the question and i find formulating things really hard. i just feel like i used to be really good at maths and now i just suck, i feel like i'm the dumbest person in first set and the smartest person in second set and there's no in-between..

i need any advice that you'd give me on how to help this, my parents are suggesting a tutor but i am apprehensive about it. i am not aiming for grade 9s, an 8 would be my perfect grade but i am aiming for a seven overall, if it helps at all i do edexcel higher :-)

Reply 1

Harinezumi

2

Based on your description, it sounds like you've fallen victim to rote learning, and it's not something easy to deal with.

They taught you how to do maths, but not understand maths. There are two routes you can go in order to fix this, depending on how much effort you're willing to put, and more importantly, how much time you have.

1.

(Short term) Do a lot
You can try doing a lot of maths, exercises, past papers, etc. The goal is not to be better at maths, but to be able to quickly associate a type of question with its respective topic. If you are relatively short on time, this method is more effective, but it also means you're more likely to forget and need refreshers. Don't refrain from looking at the marking scheme at first - if you spend a long time not knowing how to even start a question, look at the marking scheme and see how it's done, then do it again yourself. You don't have to follow exactly what's on the marking scheme - having you're own "style" of solving maths is more beneficial in my opinion.

2.

(Long term) Dig deeper
Try asking more questions, even very basic questions - I've seen too many people who can't even explain what "division" is beyond "it's an operation like... uh... 10 ÷ 5 = 2". Try to figure out what these maths actually mean. If you understand maths, it's like being fluent in a language, and it becomes natural to formulate the methods for a question. For starters, you can learn about proofs. For more in depth learning, I'd suggest khanacademy.org, which is an American website so you would have to search for the individual topics.

That said, doing both to a certain extent is probably a good idea. Given that you're at your mock stage already, I'd say repeating doing maths is more important because it would increase the chance of recognising the question type/topic. Feel free to ask if you have any further questions.

Reply 2

BCU Student Rep

Official Rep

18

Original post

by llilypads

i had my maths mock today, and as per usual i feel like i ****ed it. everyone else came out saying they found it super fine and were confident in their answers but i found it really difficult.
for reference, last year after my first maths mock i moved down from the highest set to the second set, and then after summer mocks i moved back up again i am sat on a "low seven" according to my teacher (a seven nonetheless) and i always seem to be stuck on a six.
my problem is that if you gave me a sheet of questions and said these are on so and so i could do them straight away but the moment you hide the maths within a question and just say solve for whatever i can't do it. i really struggle to pick the maths out from the question and i find formulating things really hard. i just feel like i used to be really good at maths and now i just suck, i feel like i'm the dumbest person in first set and the smartest person in second set and there's no in-between..
i need any advice that you'd give me on how to help this, my parents are suggesting a tutor but i am apprehensive about it. i am not aiming for grade 9s, an 8 would be my perfect grade but i am aiming for a seven overall, if it helps at all i do edexcel higher :-)

Hi @llilypads

I would recommend that you spend time going through exam papers and just writing down what the question is asking you to do - think about you what you need to find out and what skills you need to use to do this. It might help to highlight or underline key words in the question to help you to understand what you are being asked to do.

Another thing that you can do is make sure that you are answering exam style questions even when you are doing topic specific questions. This should help you to become more familiar with the type of questions that are asked for each topic which will hopefully help you to pick out what the question is asking you when you are in an exam.

Hope that helps!

Sophie.
BCU Student Rep.

Reply 3

llilypads

OP

3

Original post

by Harinezumi

Based on your description, it sounds like you've fallen victim to rote learning, and it's not something easy to deal with.
They taught you how to do maths, but not understand maths. There are two routes you can go in order to fix this, depending on how much effort you're willing to put, and more importantly, how much time you have.

1.

(Short term) Do a lot
You can try doing a lot of maths, exercises, past papers, etc. The goal is not to be better at maths, but to be able to quickly associate a type of question with its respective topic. If you are relatively short on time, this method is more effective, but it also means you're more likely to forget and need refreshers. Don't refrain from looking at the marking scheme at first - if you spend a long time not knowing how to even start a question, look at the marking scheme and see how it's done, then do it again yourself. You don't have to follow exactly what's on the marking scheme - having you're own "style" of solving maths is more beneficial in my opinion.

2.

(Long term) Dig deeper
Try asking more questions, even very basic questions - I've seen too many people who can't even explain what "division" is beyond "it's an operation like... uh... 10 ÷ 5 = 2". Try to figure out what these maths actually mean. If you understand maths, it's like being fluent in a language, and it becomes natural to formulate the methods for a question. For starters, you can learn about proofs. For more in depth learning, I'd suggest khanacademy.org, which is an American website so you would have to search for the individual topics.

That said, doing both to a certain extent is probably a good idea. Given that you're at your mock stage already, I'd say repeating doing maths is more important because it would increase the chance of recognising the question type/topic. Feel free to ask if you have any further questions.

i have 2 months till my final set of mocks and then 8-9 till the real things, is there any rough things i should be doing in between each of these gaps? thank you so so much btw!!

Reply 4

Harinezumi

2

Sorry for the late reply.

Since it is quite urgent, I'd suggest you start doing past papers, but if you ever find yourself not knowing how to start a question, look at the marking scheme - don't have to look at the final answer, just the first step. It might give you an idea what this question is about and how to approach it. Of course, if you need to, look at the whole answer. Then, do it again without looking. Feel free to revisit the paper later, perhaps a few days after. Also, AIs like ChatGPT could be quite useful, because you can use it to approach a question in a perspective that you understand. Ask why, not how.

Another method that might help is explaining the questions. Whether just talking to yourself or explaining to ChatGPT - I'd assume it is quite awkward to find a real person and randomly explain how to answer a question. Talk about why you did a certain step, and not just "do this".

Also, if you don't know how to start a question, you can sometimes approach it with a "stupid method" - repeating, trial and error, drawing graphs etc - tedious sometimes, but it could help a lot in linking the underlying math logic with the polished procedures they teach you.

Wish you all the best in your test!!

why can't i do a maths paper but can do maths?

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