Hey Brits! Study your math!

[Solver]

Saw it today on the BBC website, pretty amazing.

I believe, though, it's somewhat exaggerated. Surely you wouldn't get the "English" task here at Oxford. And I'm also fairly sure that it would be the easiest one in an exam, probably followed by more difficult tasks. I'm unaware of exams consisting of one question.

Still, it's fairly surprising they even put something as simple as that in any university entry test. Every 9th grader (12 school grades over here) should be able to solve it.

 

[-0blivion-]

Im a sixth form student studying maths and going on to University to study a pharmacology degree and geometry is a pretty small part of the C3/C4 syllabus really, only a small section on 3d vectors, finding feet of perpendicular, where lines intersect, etc.

The majority of the C3/C4 course is focused on Integration, Differentiation and Trigonometry, at a pretty advanced level, certainly more than enough for a Science course at a British University. I do think the article has a good point though, Maths should be a compulsory element at A level if you want to do sciences at university, instead of forcing the burden onto the university to provide booster lessons.

 

[Kal'thzar]

I dunno about anyone else but at school I didn't feel held back over maths, and I didn't see others being held back over it either (heck I was suprised about some of the others who took it to Advanced Higher level (equiviliant to the A level Maths for the english students). Everyone passed as I recall.

The only thing to note was that one had to understand the maths rather than do it by rote. In my Prelim I managed to get 94% out of 2 days revision ( I revised for about 5-6 hours a day mind). And I focussed on learning a tool set and on how to apply that tool set, not on how to solve particular problem sets.

Now, the questions that Xenocrates posted, I could do the UK question in my 2nd or 3rd year at Secondry school, and I could definitly do the Chineese Question by 4-5th year at secondary school.

Now the subject choice from 1st-4th year with regards to maths was compulsry (sp...english was too btw). and in 5th year it was heavily advised to take English and Maths....(and I suck at english; I passed with a C).

Now I can't imagine them giving me a question like the pythagoras one for an entrance or beginning of course test at all. Heck my diagnostic tests that I can do if I want too are harder. The Chineese one might be asked, but I think it much more likly for it to be about planes etc.

 

[Eran of Arcadia]

The less resilient ones chicken out to the English Department to be yet another loser majoring in his/her native language.

If majoring in one's own language is being a loser, then wouldn't majoring in one's own species? I mean, they study more than grammar, or do you mock the anatomy majors?

(If so, then it's all good . . .)

 

[JoeM]

I dunno about anyone else but at school I didn't feel held back over maths, and I didn't see others being held back over it either

In primary school I, and and a few others, were allowed to work ahead of the class but only a few books.

In secondary, we were told in no uncertain terms to stop advancing. Our mathematics teacher, also our form tutor, refused to mark any work we did that was beyond the exercises the class were set. I remember the conversation quite vividly from her glaring eyes and red face.

Effectively we were told to sit on our hands for six years.

 

[JoeM]

Dot product

Ah yes or scalar product as we called it.

Sadly as you can see my mathematical skills have deteriorated somewhat since the age of eleven.

 

[aneeshm]

In primary school I, and and a few others, were allowed to work ahead of the class but only a few books.

In secondary, we were told in no uncertain terms to stop advancing. Our mathematics teacher, also our form tutor, refused to mark any work we did that was beyond the exercises the class were set. I remember the conversation quite vividly from her glaring eyes and red face.

Effectively we were told to sit on our hands for six years.

This is one of the saddest, most disgusting, and most infuriating things I have ever heard.

 

[aneeshm]

As far as my experience in the Indian education system goes, both those problems are pathetic.

The British one is so awe-inspiringly dumb that I still can't fully grasp that it's for real.

The Chinese one had me scratching my head for a moment, but then I realised, WTH, they're still doing Euclidean geometry! And quite easy geometry, at that!

Over here in India, we drop the Euclidean stuff in favour of 3-d co-ordinate systems right around 11th class, and the trigonometry we do then is solidly theoretical, and even the applications are far tougher. Even the algebra is much tougher. Our physics syllabus in 11th also includes rudimentary calculus. 12th grade maths is all about matrices, probability, calculus, vectors, and stuff like that. If you're not good at maths, you're pretty much sunk if you take science.

The IIT-JEE test is insanely tougher than both the questions presented here.

 

[JoeM]

IIRC I'm pretty sure that the British example is one of a swathe of questions that you sit in the first year of a science degree to see if you've got enough grasp of mathematics to handle the rest of the course.

I remember sitting some sort of test to see if you needed to take the mathematics 'remedial' module to get you up to speed. It wasn't particularly hard and is designed to see how much theory you know, but as the BBC example shows, it's quite straightforward.

However, if this was part of a straight maths degree I'd sack everyone from the test designer through to the education minister.

In fact, I'd sack the education minister on any given day.

 

[Truronian]

The question I was set in the admissions test for maths were significantly harder than the one in the article... I find it hard to believe that a GCSE level question would be set for any maths course in the country.

 

[mrt144]

This is one of the saddest, most disgusting, and most infuriating things I have ever heard.

so it's worse than richard gere's kiss?

 

[Kal'thzar]

In primary school I, and and a few others, were allowed to work ahead of the class but only a few books.

In secondary, we were told in no uncertain terms to stop advancing. Our mathematics teacher, also our form tutor, refused to mark any work we did that was beyond the exercises the class were set. I remember the conversation quite vividly from her glaring eyes and red face.

Effectively we were told to sit on our hands for six years.

Yes, Primary school certainly let people advance a lot further, but I do distinctly remember taking a test in secondary school in 1st year that tested to make sure what I learned in Primary school was actually where I was at.

Then the grading system changed in standard grade. And I must admit, I think I was lucky with my maths teacher foir standard grade, he was harsh true, but he pushed you hard, he made you learn a dozen things on top of the course requirements, and made you learn things HIS way rather than the textbook way.

Still I was never explicitly held back, and I was in the top classes in standard grade, but I was middle of that pack, I only really pulled to the front in my advanced higher course.

Indeed as I think I stated before; we were explicitly told to do Maths and English to Higher level if able, and if not to take the course a level down in each area. As these topics were seen as important to careers etc.


Sooo, could you describe your school? Is it a comprehensive, was it seen as a rich school etc? What type of people did it draw in and so on?

Just trying to think of trends here

 

[mrt144]

The fault in the premise that kids were actually held back is that the kids had the chance outside of school to pursue tutoring on this level, but didn't, for selfish reasons.

 

[JoeM]

Sooo, could you describe your school? Is it a comprehensive, was it seen as a rich school etc? What type of people did it draw in and so on?

My school was and still is a comprehensive, as far as my world revolved it was the second best choice I had, at least in the area.

Not rich, by any means.

Type? Well, I don't know. There were six 'forms' a,b and c graded for ability or 'streamed'. Of the two 'a' classes I was in one and the other one had all the middle class kids in. Tossers, if I recall correctly.

...Hmm, we never did have a reunion.

 

[nihilistic]

If majoring in one's own language is being a loser, then wouldn't majoring in one's own species? I mean, they study more than grammar, or do you mock the anatomy majors?

(If so, then it's all good . . .)

Well, you don't need to be an English major to communicate but you better need to have studied anatomy if you want to operate on a lung.

And personally, some of the dumbest people I've ever known, are English teachers and people who major in English.

 

[Kal'thzar]

My school was and still is a comprehensive, as far as my world revolved it was the second best choice I had, at least in the area.

Not rich, by any means.

mhmm my school was middle of the pack, in fact I doubt it was made as a "choice" for anyone; *shrug* your school was a mite more intrested in getting good grades however.

 

[DaveShack]

I moved from what I would call a "high math" school system in grade 7 to a "low math" system in grade 8. My 7th grade classes were chemistry and algebra II -- and what they "taught" in grade 8 was fractions and no science at all. I was forced to skate for 3 years, correcting the teachers master grading papers a couple days a week and spending the rest of my time writing computer programs using the math department's account at the University of Minnesota.

The problem from China isn't all that difficult, of course, and the British one is an insult, plain and simple.

In CompSci, we didn't use much math at all. The whole math minor was to get a foundation to be able to understand sets (not the easy stuff from high school, but the really hairy language membership stuff), groups, networks, state machines, and discrete. And practice in doing proofs.

 

[Ansar]

It's probably British humor, so I'll ask:

Whats the difference between Math and Maths?

 

[shortguy]

As far as my experience in the Indian education system goes, both those problems are pathetic.

The British one is so awe-inspiringly dumb that I still can't fully grasp that it's for real.

The Chinese one had me scratching my head for a moment, but then I realised, WTH, they're still doing Euclidean geometry! And quite easy geometry, at that!

Over here in India, we drop the Euclidean stuff in favour of 3-d co-ordinate systems right around 11th class, and the trigonometry we do then is solidly theoretical, and even the applications are far tougher. Even the algebra is much tougher. Our physics syllabus in 11th also includes rudimentary calculus. 12th grade maths is all about matrices, probability, calculus, vectors, and stuff like that. If you're not good at maths, you're pretty much sunk if you take science.

The IIT-JEE test is insanely tougher than both the questions presented here.

What do you mean by "11th class" and "12th class"?

 

[Bill3000]

It's probably British humor, so I'll ask:

Whats the difference between Math and Maths?

More like british language, not british humor...