Cambridge vs Fitzpatrick: A Final Vote (1 Viewer)

[beetree1]

Thanks for the offer, that'd be great if I need them . She may not have them becuase we use MIF for year 12, I will ask though

oh i have them, did u need them for 2,3 or 4u? I can email to anyone else who needs pls reply to this message with ur email

 

[dumNerd]

Yep that’s what I meant Math in Focus shouldn’t be the only book one uses

The superannuation questions aren't bad for 2U though. My school did it from that book and I can preety much do all 2U questions for that

 

[jarodphillips_]

later questions of 4U Cambridge are wack

 

[idkkdi]

Hey guys, I'm looking to get ahead and start learning the mathematics courses on my own ahead of time. I plan on studying Ext 2 in year 12.

I'm fortunate enough that one of my relatives is helping me study who is a prize-winning mathematician at UNSW, but completed his HSC in 2010 and said it would be best to ask boredofstudies what textbooks are recommended for the new syllabus as he does not tutor HSC math. He sent me the below though (for reference: he sat 2U HSC in yr 11, 3U + 4U HSC in yr 12).

"- 2U: Fitzpatrick for theory/questions. Just use 1 good textbook, there is no point overworking yourself for 2U.
- 3U: Fitzpatrick for theory/questions. Supplement with Cambridge for the THEORY ONLY lol. It's not that the Cambridge questions are not useful, some of them are super interesting but you'll spend too much time on 3U and you will have 4-6 other subjects to look after as well.
- 4U: Cambridge for theory/questions. Supplement certain topics with Terry Lee, Fitzpatrick and S.K. Patel (for some reason, each of the textbooks covered only 1-2 topics well and sucked at the rest). In general, the textbooks were all pretty bad at explaining the concepts. I used to learn from online university resources for theory, so I'll help you here."

He also said Maths in Focus is probably why students hate math and that the textbook is terrible and should just be used as a doorstopper.

I was wondering which textbooks would you guys recommend for Math Adv, Ext, and Ext 2 for the new syllabus?

The textbooks are quite expensive, so I was also hoping someone might have copies of them in pdf form. Hopefully, you found his advice above also useful!

Cambridge, Cambridge, cambridge

nothing else is needed, maybe terry lee for 4u. i don't think time is an issue for you considering ur in yr 10. also, Cambridge 3 unit includes the 2 unit book in it so no need for a 2u and 3 u book.

tell your tutor to have a look at the new Cambridge book and report his thoughts. personally, I think it is pretty godly. haven't seen any other hsc textbook as good as it in terms of rigour.

also, new syllabus Cambridge is considerably easier than the old syllabus ones (for 3 unit, at least).

 

[yue0]

Can anyone chuck me the Fitzpatrick Yr12 Advanced textbook pdf? If so please PM me. Thanks in advance.

 

[turtle67]

Can anyone chuck me the Fitzpatrick Yr12 Advanced textbook pdf? If so please PM me. Thanks in advance.

If you could also chuck it my way that'd be splendid

 

[yao_jahang]

@beetree1 Hey. i was wondering if your offer for the 2u, 3u, 4u textbooks were still available? my email is yaoj51532@gmail.com

 

[ExtremelyBoredUser]

All you need is cambridge honestly, besides the really bad worked solutions its great.

 

[dasfas]

Cambridge straight up - all the top schools use it for a reason

 

[yao_jahang]

Ye but aren’t worked solutions important to understand how to do the question next time?

 

[yao_jahang]

And do U guys have any tips on how to use the Cambridge textbook effectively? And also is it god for 2u and 3u and 4 u maths?

 

[AKONS]

And do U guys have any tips on how to use the Cambridge textbook effectively? And also is it god for 2u and 3u and 4 u maths?

Don't do every question. Choose the questions that suit your weaknesses. A lot of the questions are just copies of the question before it. Do a few different types and reflect whether you're understanding is strong enough. If it is, move onto the next exercise. If it's not, do some more questions.

 

[ExtremelyBoredUser]

Ye but aren’t worked solutions important to understand how to do the question next time?

Yeah but the worked solutions imo are pretty bad, like 9/10 times you'd be confused by them and do worse off reading them rather than actually understanding the problem. Unironically thats been helpful since it pushed me to think of a way to solve the problem rather than reading off the answer.

 

[yao_jahang]

so would u recommend this textbook out of all the other ones (terry lee, fitzpatrick) to do well in maths advanced? because our school uses maths in focus

 

[ExtremelyBoredUser]

so would u recommend this textbook out of all the other ones (terry lee, fitzpatrick) to do well in maths advanced? because our school uses maths in focus

Yes definitely. Its worth the buy however some people have online copies of it so you could technically ask them for the copies but that would be "illegal" so I "condone" doing that if you get what im saying. We can't share stuff here in this forum but if you know anyone whose school is doing cambridge, you could ask them for an online copy but I'm not encouraging that once again since that would be against the rules.

 

[011235]

My school (top 40) used to use Maths In Focus. Thank goodness they moved to Cambridge, I think they did it with the new syllabus. For some reason my teacher has an absolute fascination with Maths In Focus and suggests it for "extra revision" all the time. I tried using it once, never again, the hardest questions don't progress past the first third of a normal difficulty exam.

 

[yao_jahang]

so is It the Cambridge 3u, 2u, or 4u? which Cambridge is the best? and can I use the Cambridge 3u textbook for 2u stuff.

 

[ExtremelyBoredUser]

so is It the Cambridge 3u, 2u, or 4u? which Cambridge is the best? and can I use the Cambridge 3u textbook for 2u stuff.

Yes the 3U Cambridge textbook has all the 2U Chapters with 3U. Not the same with 4U however.
4U textbook only has 4U content.


The 3U textbook should be your go to textbook in any circumstance, it has a plethora of questions. The reason people praise cambridge is due to the quantity of questions it has combined with its quality; the questions build you up from basic to an exam-level difficulty. The book is very well formatted and is by far better than any other currently.

The 4U textbook is the only textbook I would consider buying, it is pretty good once again and the only one I use for 4U.

 

[yao_jahang]

so how should I use the textbook? should I read the key notes and do the questions I want to do? or should I go colum by column?

 

[ExtremelyBoredUser]

so how should I use the textbook? should I read the key notes and do the questions I want to do? or should I go colum by column?

Honestly up to you. I don't learn off the textbook because their explanations is ehhh, for me. Personally I just use cambridge for the sole purpose of doing the questions. Its advised against doing all questions in a exercise but my rule for doing the textbook is that you should do the maximum questions before you can finish a question at an exam rate. So for polynomial questions, stop doing them until you finish the questions in 30-60s, that would indicate you would be good in an exam scenario. If you're just doing X questions per Y excercise and you're not actually good at doing those questions, you're doing something wrong.