Cambridge Assessment International Education (CAIE) produces an interactive learner guide for 0580 IGCSE maths  which students will soon be updating. The “traffic-light”  itemised proficiency checklist contained within is an excellent progress tracker. 

Also, as mock exams and finals approach it is natural for maths students to quiz teachers about how examiners think. It is an intelligent response. Still, they sometimes view examiners as judges. Judges who can turn the tables for apparently random reasons. Now their approach it one as a guilty defendant in a courtroom; considering whether they might get off on a technicality!

Such thoughts can fill a disproportionate amount of space in their head, so it’s best to have the appropriate conversations with them and move on. No question is a bad one! Use this time to introduce them to examiners reports and grade thresholds. More on those further down the page,

Here are a few of the most common questions I am asked as students plan in preparation for 0580 IGCSE maths. 

1. My teacher wants me to drop from Extended to Core. Should I?

In case you are unclear what is the difference between IGCSE Core and Extended maths, read this article by CIE. 

Choosing between Core and Extended is a double-edged sword. If you take Core, the highest grade awarded is C. It will be one of either C, D, E, F or G. You could not get an A or B or A*. 

However, if you opt for Extended the lowest grade given is E. Next down from an E is ungraded, denoted by a U. You can’t get a grade F or G if you sit an Extended exam. Don’t let that put you off. If there is a chance you could get higher than a C go for it!

The vast majority of students are capable of passing IGCSE maths. All depends on their level of commitment. Only the student knows how investedthey are in their own future. In case the response to that is 'not much' there is every chance that could change in an instant. It is never too late.

Note that secondary school students are not good at assessing how well they understand maths and how big the gaps are that need to be filled. Only an experienced educator can comment on who has the mathematical ability to shine. Student and educator each offer their own contribution towards making  the decision Once it is made it is all hands to the deck and no looking back.

2. Is it easier to obtain a grade C in Core or Extended?

It is almost impossible to have a definitive answer regarding whether to take Core or Extended because this question weighs heavily on the minds of students who cannot decide which level to go for.

I think it is because students local to me have the idea Core is easier to pass. They think they only need 40% on papers 1 and 3 to pbtain a C when in reality it is approximately 60%.

Back in 2013 Cambridge Assesment.org published a report on this very topic.  relating to GCSE. It is technical, but worth opening just to observe the compexity of the situation. They show for those particular exam sessions an Extended student would need to score 31.7% of available marks, whilst a Core student would need to score 55% of available marks on corresponding papers. On the surface it seems it is easier to obtain a grade C by taking Extended not Core.

The difference is huge, and even CAIE were surprised themselves. Wondering how to interpret these findings lead to lengthy discussions. There were six identical questions common to both papers, and the remaining marks needed to be made up from other questions on the rest of the paper. But how could anyone determine the comparative levels of difficulty in the 'other' questions?

I did a quick check on s23 sitting of IGCSE to get an idea of how this impacts on us. The short-question papers 11 and 21 shared 6 questions in common. The marks totalled 14 and this corresponded to achieving 26/56 = 46% on the Core paper 11 versus 27/70 = 39% on the Extended paper 12. 

Comparison of papers 3 and 4, which are comprised of the longer, structured questions showed no identical questions. It’s only data from one sitting, but it seemed much easier to score higher on Core paper 3 than Extended paper 4. If I had to choose I would probably choose to take the Core paper. More work needs to be done here. You might like to check it out yourselves and comment.

However, I would stay in the Extended class for as long as realistically possible during the course because it is vital students develop your mathematical skill set. Even if they aren’t able to answer all the questions at the end of the course they will have been exposed to skills and concepts that will help them in the future at college or uni.           

What do the students who have already taken their exams say in the student chat rooms? Many will tell you they found the Extended papers were not so hard and they were glad they took them - straight from the horses mouth!

3. Where can I get practice papers for 0580 IGCSE maths preparation?

Best Exam Help is my favourite website by far. It is easy to navigate and does not bombard you with ads. It also holds the most recent past papers. Most of the others, such as  PapaCambridge, Save My Exams, Exam-Mate, can be very visually confusing. If you know how exam papers are named another option is to type the exam paper code directly into Google. We will cover that.

I recommend you download the papers rather than try to access them from the websites each time. During busy periods the websites often hang or even crash and valuable time is lost just because you don’t know. If you are in a tuition lesson will be doubly frustrating.

Let's make sure you don't pick up the wrong papers when you go online. There is a US version of CIE which has a similar syllabus and is coded 0444. Do check which version you are sitting because it is not determined by location, but by personal preference.

All take this format. 0580 is the course number. By the way, anyone studying Additional Maths would look for 0606 in it’s place.

S for summer equates to May/June sittings and w for winter equates to Oct/November. Obviously m equates to only the month of March, and notice that not all time zones have March sittings.

qp and ms pair up question papers and their corresponding mark schemes. Gt is a one page document that lists all of the minimum scores required to achieve each grade for each variant of each paper for that sitting. Finally, er denotes the examiners report. There is a single examiners report for all of the papers.

The last chunk, 13, indicates the paper level and variant number. Paper number is given by the first digit. Core students will sit papers 1 and 3 whilst Extended will sit papers 2 and 4. The variants range from 1 to 3 and exist as a response to global cheating that occurred way back in 2008, I think! 

It is not clear from the naming convention, but each of the 140 participating countries is placed in one of six Admnistration zones. For example, Mauritius is in Zone 4. You can find yours by following the link. After, use it to find the exam dates. It is a lengthy document so use ‘Control + F’ to find each mention of code 0580. It will save you a lot of time.

Important: Each admin zone will set the same variant each time. E.g. Mauritius always sets variant 2. However, anyone who is revising would be well-advised to practice all variants.. They are intended to be very similar.

Examiners Reports and Grade Thresholds provide inside information. Examiners' reports pass comment on how individual questions were answered by the whole body of students that sat that exam. They explain what was good, what was bad and offer recommendations to the teaching profession as to what needs to be taught better going forward.

It is an easy document to read and surprisingly helpful. Students who use past papers as part of the revision process can pit their wits against those who went before and measure their performance directly.

The grade thresholds make your interpretation of the grade you would have received more accurate. For each paper and each grade, the required score for that grade is listed, after the marks have all been scaled. It means you can be more objective about which papers were corkers .

I will be writing more posts to help set students up with successful tried and tested revision skills. If you have any questions either join the IGCSE maths club FB group and post them there, or write directly to me at dawn@mathstutoronlineuk.com.