Curriculum: Frequently Asked Questions

If you have a query about teaching any aspect of the MEI specifications you can contact us with it. Some of the queries we have answered recently are dealt with below.

GCSE

What are the certification rules for GCSE?

The modular paper will be reported as a UMS score (see the specification for further details). This score will be added to the scores gained in the terminal paper (and for J518 also the coursework) and will determine the grade awarded to the student. Please note that it is not necessary for candidates to sit the two papers from the same tier; the terminal paper will determine the grades available. Thus a candidate who is intending to sit Foundation and how does exceptionally well in the modular paper may then sit the terminal paper from the Higher tier. Likewise, a candidate who is intending to sit the Higher tier but who does very badly can be transferred to the Foundation tier and use the score already awarded in the modular paper. This represents an increase in the flexibility of the scheme, to the advantage of the student, compared to previous specifications.

Is there any information about grade boundaries for the two-tier GCSE (specification J518)?

This specification will first be certificated in June 2008 and so it will be helpful for teachers to have an idea of possible grade boundaries when doing mock and practice papers with their students.  However, please note that the practice papers available from MEI have not gone through the same standardisation process as real GCSE papers. 

Grade boundaries for real papers are decided, by an Awarding Committee, after students have sat the exam and they vary from year to year.  Boundaries are first set for grades A, C and F; the grades for which grade descriptors exist.  The other grade boundaries are decided arithmetically from these. 

For Higher Tier, the design threshold for A grade is approximately between 75% and 80% and for C grade approximately between 35% and 40%.   For Foundation Tier, the design threshold for C grade is approximately between 75%.and 80% and for F grade approximately between 35% and 40%.   We must emphasise that these are design thresholds only which may or may not be achieved.

As can be seen from the specification, the question matter in the modular papers is generally easier than in the terminal papers. When developing the June 2008 terminal papers the same design thresholds have been used.

The actual grade boundaries for the June 2007 modular papers are available in the examiners’ report on the OCR website and are reproduced below.

A level

When will there be a new A level Mathematics specification?

New specifications for A Level Mathematics are currently planned for first teaching from September 2011. The current specifications, with 6 modules at A Level, will continue until then. You can find more information about forthcoming changes to the mathematics curriculum at Curriculum.

C4: Are volumes of revolution about the y-axis included in the C4 specification?

In the C3C4 MEI textbook, the section about volumes of revolution about the y-axis, on page 257 and 259-60, has a dotted line by the side of it; this usually indicates extension material and it is an error in the book, as can be seen by reference to page 70 of the MEI specification.  Volumes of revolution about the y-axis are included in the C4 specification. 

Although the text books have been written specifically to support the MEI units, examiners work from the specification and so teachers should also ensure that they check the specification.  

Where do asymptotes feature in the MEI A Level?

The word “asymptote” is not included in the national Subject Core for AS and A Level Mathematics and testing of asymptotes is excluded from C1. However, students are likely to have seen asymptotes already, for example, through sketching the curve  in GCSE.

In C2 students meet asymptotes when they draw graph of y = tanθ. This curve, together with transformations of it, is explicitly in the syllabus. So it is likely that, by now, students will have met the word “asymptote”, at least in the context of vertical asymptotes, since teachers will have used the word when describing these curves.

When doing C3 coursework, students are expected to know that failure of a change of sign method can occur for solving f(x) = 0  when f(x)  has a vertical asymptote, as stated in Note C3e2 on page 61 of the specification. 

In examination questions in C3 and C4, for example June 2007 C3 question 7, the correct technical term “asymptote” is used to avoid a lengthy explanation.  Teachers are advised to look carefully at the style used in previous questions on these papers and to treat them as establishing precedent.  Considerable care was taken when setting such questions to make sure that the meaning was clear from the accompanying text and/or diagrams and this will always be the case when the word “asymptote” is used on the C3 and C4 papers. 

In FP1 vertical and horizontal asymptotes are explicitly in the syllabus (Note FP1C2 on page 75 of the specification) and are routinely tested in examination questions. Oblique asymptotes are first met in FP2 (Note FP2C4 on page 91).

S4: What is included in the S4 specification for confidence intervals?

While working on the online resources for S4, we realised that some clarification of competence statement S4 I5 might be helpful.  This covers confidence intervals for the difference between two population means in the unpaired situation.  It should be read in conjunction with competence statement S4 I2 which covers the corresponding significance tests.  Both the case of an interval based on the Normal distribution and the case of an interval based on the t distribution are included in S4 I5, as they are for the corresponding tests in S4 I2.  The Normal case is, of course, for situations where the population variances are known or the samples are large.  The t case is for situations where the samples are small and the population variances are unknown (but the populations are assumed Normally distributed).

There is no specific reference to one-sided confidence intervals in the specification.  These are touched on in the S4 textbook on page 129 but one-sided confidence intervals should be regarded as extension material; only two-sided confidence intervals will be tested in examinations.