A Level Maths Past Papers

Skipton Tutors is the leading local tuition agency for all maths, English and Science related subjects. Each week we look to write about a resource that will help our students and others learn and revise. This week we are looking at A Level maths past papers. Most people know the value of past exam papers and how these can aid in effective revision but sometimes the papers are not used in the most appropriate way. Too often schools and 6th forms use up the exam paper questions in homework and topic tests throughout the year, leaving very few if any unseen exam paper questions by the time it comes to the exam period.

Where possible, we advise students to avoid using the A level maths past exam papers until the end of the year so that they can be used to test understanding and identify gaps in knowledge in the critical weeks leading up to the final exams. Ideally students work through an unseen exam paper, having not done any of the questions in that paper before. The paper is then marked using the official mark scheme or model solutions that are provided by a number of different websites. The final mark at this stage isn’t too important, the value extracted from the paper is in the mistakes and marks lost. This should highlight the topic areas a student needs to work on before attempting another paper. Therefore there should be a period of intensive revision between exam papers, plugging the gaps in knowledge before moving onto paper 2. Paper 2 is then completed in the same way, under exam conditions and marked after. Paper 2 may present a number of different topics so it isn’t unusual to see little progress in the first couple of papers, but repeating this process over 4 or 5 exam papers should result in an upward trend in the mark with fewer and fewer gaps in knowledge being identified.

At Skipton Tutors we aim to offer an all round approach to our A level maths tuition. This includes delivering high quality 1-2-1 tutorials but involves giving students effective study tips and revision advice on things like how to best use the A level maths past papers.