Thinking of taking up Applied Maths - Suggestions?

Monsieur Folie

It's probably madness to even consider it this late in the year, but I'm aiming for high enough points and I'm not sure if my current lot of subjects will secure me that. I do honours maths and honours physics, and I'd be aiming for at least a B1 (but hopefully an A1 to be honest) in each.

If I were to do it, are there any resources online or a good book I could buy that would help me? Or should I just concentrate on the subjects I'm already doing, instead of adding a new one into the mix?

Is there much overlap in the course between maths and physics or would it all be a bit alien to me? Also, I know you've only to do 6 of 10 questions, so which 6 (or 7, maybe, to be safe) would be the most doable given my situation?

Hopefully there'll be an applied maths guru around to help me out here. =P

Brendan1234

If you are decent at self teaching I would say go for it. To be honest, maths and physics don't help you that much, but applied maths helps with mechanics section of physics, in fact it makes the mathematical mechanics questions look retardedly easy.

In terms of resources, thephysicsteacher.ie is pretty helpful, and the applied maths section of studentxpress.ie is useful for some of the questions. The book I use is Fundamental Applied Maths by Oliver Murphy, in fact I'm pretty sure that is the only one available :P (or at least the only good one)

The classic questions that most people do are 1,2,3,4,5 and 10, but personally I think that question 6 is very manageable as well.

Monsieur Folie

Thanks for the info!

I've just gotten in touch with a friend from a nearby school who does applied maths in school, and he said he'd help me out if I decided to take it on, so I think I might!

Apocladagr0

Im guessing you're in 5th year too? If you're in 6th year I'm really not sure how wise the choice to pick it up now is. Your profile says 18 so I'm not sure.

Anyway, assuming you are a 5th year, I think it would be very doable. Firstly you should know that it's definitely not the easy subject it's made out to be, be aware of that. Our class has covered four and a half chapters since the start of the year and we have five periods a week, so even though you would have a fair bit of catch up to do, I think that if you were willing to sacrifice some weekends/summer holidays you'd be fine and still get the A. Just don't underestimate it. A good teacher helps immensely... I've had two teachers, and lets just say that I feel sorry for the other app maths student in the country who do not have the privilege of having at least one proper teacher now that I realise how bad it is to have a relatively bad one. Fundamental Applied Mathematics, second edition is a good textbook, but don't be fooled by its thinness (its like a large magazine:P) - the questions can take a long time. Since the examples in it are pretty good you probably would be able to learn most of it individually, but not as fast as you would be able to with a good teacher.

I think we're on schedule to have finished the minimum required amount of material to technically be able to answer a LC exam by the end of this year, but of course we wouldn't be able to choose our best questions etc.

Also, for what it's worth, it's a satisfying, rewarding subject which makes you happy when you solve a tough question. I usually do it as my first homework because it's the most enjoyable and I think most other people in my class also like going to it.

spurious

If you are talking about 2013 and if it is not already taken as a subject in your school, please tell your Examinations Secretary as soon as possible so that they can inform the SEC, as there will be supervision implications.

If you happen to be sitting Religious Education too, you will have to be sequestered to sit the second exam.

Monsieur Folie

Apocladagr0 wrote: »

Im guessing you're in 5th year too? If you're in 6th year I'm really not sure how wise the choice to pick it up now is. Your profile says 18 so I'm not sure.

Anyway, assuming you are a 5th year, I think it would be very doable. Firstly you should know that it's definitely not the easy subject it's made out to be, be aware of that. Our class has covered four and a half chapters since the start of the year and we have five periods a week, so even though you would have a fair bit of catch up to do, I think that if you were willing to sacrifice some weekends/summer holidays you'd be fine and still get the A. Just don't underestimate it. A good teacher helps immensely... I've had two teachers, and lets just say that I feel sorry for the other app maths student in the country who do not have the privilege of having at least one proper teacher now that I realise how bad it is to have a relatively bad one. Fundamental Applied Mathematics, second edition is a good textbook, but don't be fooled by its thinness (its like a large magazine:P) - the questions can take a long time. Since the examples in it are pretty good you probably would be able to learn most of it individually, but not as fast as you would be able to with a good teacher.

I think we're on schedule to have finished the minimum required amount of material to technically be able to answer a LC exam by the end of this year, but of course we wouldn't be able to choose our best questions etc.

Also, for what it's worth, it's a satisfying, rewarding subject which makes you happy when you solve a tough question. I usually do it as my first homework because it's the most enjoyable and I think most other people in my class also like going to it.

I'm in sixth year, so yeah, by the sounds of things it'd be quite a mountain to climb.

spurious wrote: »

If you are talking about 2013 and if it is not already taken as a subject in your school, please tell your Examinations Secretary as soon as possible so that they can inform the SEC, as there will be supervision implications.

If you happen to be sitting Religious Education too, you will have to be sequestered to sit the second exam.

I was speaking to her this morning, she said as long as I let her know within the next week there won't be a problem!

Apocladagr0

Monsieur Folie wrote: »

I'm in sixth year, so yeah, by the sounds of things it'd be quite a mountain to climb.

There's another thing I forgot to mention that might speed things up considerably: get the solutions to the textbook questions. This is vital. The answers alone are pretty useless. Once you've learnt off the method that was used you'll recognize it in the future, and although it's not the ideal approach (stops you thinking:pac:) you'll be able to cover a huge percentage of the minimum amount required in a very short space of time.

Monsieur Folie

Apocladagr0 wrote: »

Monsieur Folie wrote: »

I'm in sixth year, so yeah, by the sounds of things it'd be quite a mountain to climb.

There's another thing I forgot to mention that might speed things up considerably: get the solutions to the textbook questions. This is vital. The answers alone are pretty useless. Once you've learnt off the method that was used you'll recognize it in the future, and although it's not the ideal approach (stops you thinking:pac:) you'll be able to cover a huge percentage of the minimum amount required in a very short space of time.

Thanks for that.. Due to the fact I have but a few months to do it, anything that might cut down on the workload will be helpful!

Monsieur Folie

Another question, where are the solutions to Fundamental Applied Maths available? I see that they're on the Folens website but you need to be a teacher to register there!

Brendan1234

Well the answers are in the back of the book (but you probably already knew that :P). To get a full set of worked solutions you have to send €10 (I think) to Oliver Murphy and he'll send them to you. To my knowledge he gives the money to charity. However I may be thinking of exam paper solutions, so don't rely on this information, but I am almost certain you get one of the two.

I realise this is of little help to you but I figured I'd tell you what I know :P

YoursSincerely

Monsieur Folie wrote: »

Another question, where are the solutions to Fundamental Applied Maths available? I see that they're on the Folens website but you need to be a teacher to register there!

if you have the old version of fundamental applied maths ( big brown ugly book ) the full solutions can be found on thephysicsteacher.ie just go into the applied maths and look for text book solutions If you have the new version i dont know sorry

Monsieur Folie

Brendan1234 wrote: »

Well the answers are in the back of the book (but you probably already knew that :P). To get a full set of worked solutions you have to send €10 (I think) to Oliver Murphy and he'll send them to you. To my knowledge he gives the money to charity. However I may be thinking of exam paper solutions, so don't rely on this information, but I am almost certain you get one of the two.

I realise this is of little help to you but I figured I'd tell you what I know :P

I'll look into it, thank you! =P

YoursSincerely wrote: »

if you have the old version of fundamental applied maths ( big brown ugly book ) the full solutions can be found on thephysicsteacher.ie just go into the applied maths and look for text book solutions If you have the new version i dont know sorry

I actually haven't ordered the book yet, but I reckon I'll get the second edition as it's only a few euro more and I'm assuming since it's more up to date it'll be of better help. The lack of available worked solutions is worrying though. I'm going to talk to my maths teacher tomorrow and see if she knows anything about applied maths, since if I'm going to go for it I'll want to be getting stuck into it as soon as my mocks are over!

En

Contrary to what a poster previous to me stated, applied maths requires both a firm grasp on algebra and above average manipulation skills. Unless you are comfortable with logs, exponentials, surds, differentiation and integration, I wouldn't take the subject.

If you are good at these, it makes it a HELL of a lot easier. You'll find yourself scoring very highly on the mechanics section of the physics paper as applied maths is pretty much that with a mathematical approach.

It's not for the faint of heart though, I am self taught and some aspects of the course required a LOT of persistence, especially the jump from simple concepts to whole exam questions.

It is a very short course though, but you must dedicate time to it. I practice twice a week for 3 hours each.

There is plenty of choice on the exam so a minimalistic approach can be taken. You are only required to answer 6 out of 10 questions, but it has happened that they mix two concepts together in one question to throw people off. My advice would be to practice 6 questions frequently and read through the other 4.

Tweej

Monsieur Folie wrote: »

I'll look into it, thank you! =P



I actually haven't ordered the book yet, but I reckon I'll get the second edition as it's only a few euro more and I'm assuming since it's more up to date it'll be of better help. !

The course hasn't changed since pre 1986, and the second edition is just the first edition in a shiny new binding.

Honestly makes no difference.

If you're taking it up in 6th year, good luck. You're going to have to dedicate a serious amount of time to it, to an exam which may all go wrong for you.

Don't get me wrong, I loved it, but I studied it from 5th year.

1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 10 are the generic questions for someone taking it up.

Linear accelerated motion is a question which can be solved in 10 minutes, or takes hours.

Projectiles is the same thing each time, sub in equations, make sure you don't do anything silly. etc

Relative velocity just requires a formal approach to the question

Newton's laws is remembering to draw the diagram and to include everything

Collisions is write the 2 equations for every collision.

Differential equations requires more thought, but with project maths being brought in, has been made easier.

The final one I'd suggest is Rigid body rotation, 3 theorems to learn, 1 comes up every year, worth 20 marks. That's 6.67% in a theorem which you will have learnt off by heart,

Brendan1234

Tweej wrote: »

The course hasn't changed since pre 1986, and the second edition is just the first edition in a shiny new binding.

Honestly makes no difference.

Although the course hasn't technically changed in a very long time (I'll take your word on the year :P), the emphasis of the exam has changed. On one of the first pages of the second edition book it says that the book was released specifically to reflect these changes, so I take it there is a fairly significant change. I have also heard that the worked examples in the second edition are far better than in the first edition. Having said all that, I never used the first edition so I'm only going on what I've heard, but I will say that the worked examples in the second edition are excellent, and usually cover all the types of questions that can be asked, or at least give you an idea of the method of solving them.

ManMade

Brendan1234 wrote: »

Well the answers are in the back of the book (but you probably already knew that :P). To get a full set of worked solutions you have to send €10 (I think) to Oliver Murphy and he'll send them to you. To my knowledge he gives the money to charity. However I may be thinking of exam paper solutions, so don't rely on this information, but I am almost certain you get one of the two.

I realise this is of little help to you but I figured I'd tell you what I know :P

Oliver murphys book are out of print now I think.

Monsieur Folie

Hmm. Some of the comments are making me have second thoughts, but I still think I want to give it a go. =/

I don't think any of my other exams will suffer for it, as I'm fairly on top of things with them, so the worst case scenario is that I fail Applied Maths which, though it would look bad on my cert, wouldn't have any impact on the overall cert or my points or college requirements, would it?

I'm intending to spend a couple of hours on a Friday evening with a friend whose being studying Applied Maths since fifth year, and then to practice by myself as well - is it possible that I could get it up to a standard that would mean I can confidentially go into the exam without worrying I'm going to fail?

I don't want to delude myself; if it isn't possible I'll just drop the idea and focus on my other subjects. I have until Monday to decide for sure.

AGillessen

Tweej wrote: »

The course hasn't changed since pre 1986, and the second edition is just the first edition in a shiny new binding.

Honestly makes no difference.

If you're taking it up in 6th year, good luck. You're going to have to dedicate a serious amount of time to it, to an exam which may all go wrong for you.

Don't get me wrong, I loved it, but I studied it from 5th year.

1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 10 are the generic questions for someone taking it up.

Linear accelerated motion is a question which can be solved in 10 minutes, or takes hours.

Projectiles is the same thing each time, sub in equations, make sure you don't do anything silly. etc

Relative velocity just requires a formal approach to the question

Newton's laws is remembering to draw the diagram and to include everything

Collisions is write the 2 equations for every collision.

Differential equations requires more thought, but with project maths being brought in, has been made easier.

The final one I'd suggest is Rigid body rotation, 3 theorems to learn, 1 comes up every year, worth 20 marks. That's 6.67% in a theorem which you will have learnt off by heart,

How does project maths make Q10 easier? I haven't covered it yet in school. Would i be able to do it based on what i learned from HL maths?

What do you mean when you say that relative velocity requires a formal approach each time?

And what is the rest of rigid body rotation like?