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March 29, 2024, 08:21:29 pm

Author Topic: [Review] VCE Physics 3/4  (Read 54691 times)  Share 

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BasicAcid

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Re: [Review] VCE Physics 3/4
« Reply #60 on: October 10, 2013, 05:29:49 pm »
+1
There is someone who repeated Methods after getting a 43 one year. They didn't go to classes at all, but did the SACs and got a 50 the next year.

*Looks at your signature*

lzxnl

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Re: [Review] VCE Physics 3/4
« Reply #61 on: October 10, 2013, 06:31:41 pm »
0
I've done Methods only once. It's not me.
2012
Mathematical Methods (50) Chinese SL (45~52)

2013
English Language (50) Chemistry (50) Specialist Mathematics (49~54.9) Physics (49) UMEP Physics (96%) ATAR 99.95

2014-2016: University of Melbourne, Bachelor of Science, Diploma in Mathematical Sciences (Applied Maths)

2017-2018: Master of Science (Applied Mathematics)

2019-2024: PhD, MIT (Applied Mathematics)

Accepting students for VCE tutoring in Maths Methods, Specialist Maths and Physics! (and university maths/physics too) PM for more details

Alwin

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Re: [Review] VCE Physics 3/4
« Reply #62 on: October 10, 2013, 06:48:16 pm »
+6
I've done Methods only once. It's not me.

he only needed to do it once ;)


And semi back on track, a lot of people complain how vce physics is easy (looks at no one in particular *cough* *cough* pi` *cough* *cough*) but honestly if you don't get what you're doing / not inclined to look further into physics to why things work they way they do you might find it a bit tough to do well. Mate of mine accelerated with me in year 11, but he got mid 30s trying to tackle physics head on  memorising formulas etc. A few others in my class got high 30s / low-mid 40s because they were always asking questions and wanting to know more about (for example) amplifiers, p-n junctions, different concepts or old reject models for light. Actually, most of the people I know who got 40+ in physics were like that, willing to learn more than the vce physics course.
Just some food for thought :)
« Last Edit: October 10, 2013, 06:56:18 pm by Alwin »
2012:  Methods [48] Physics [49]
2013:  English [40] (oops) Chemistry [46] Spesh [42] Indo SL [34] Uni Maths: Melb UMEP [4.5] Monash MUEP [just for a bit of fun]
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lzxnl

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Re: [Review] VCE Physics 3/4
« Reply #63 on: October 10, 2013, 07:15:54 pm »
+1
he only needed to do it once ;)


And semi back on track, a lot of people complain how vce physics is easy (looks at no one in particular *cough* *cough* pi` *cough* *cough*) but honestly if you don't get what you're doing / not inclined to look further into physics to why things work they way they do you might find it a bit tough to do well. Mate of mine accelerated with me in year 11, but he got mid 30s trying to tackle physics head on  memorising formulas etc. A few others in my class got high 30s / low-mid 40s because they were always asking questions and wanting to know more about (for example) amplifiers, p-n junctions, different concepts or old reject models for light. Actually, most of the people I know who got 40+ in physics were like that, willing to learn more than the vce physics course.
Just some food for thought :)

Just to elaborate on learning more, if you just learn the VCE physics course...a lot of the stuff may not make too much sense. For instance, you're just given this stuff about diffraction, and you're asked to just remember wavelength/slit width. Ever wonder where that comes from? Or...why exactly is the centripetal acceleration v^2/r? Or even why the Rutherford model of the atom fails; why can't an electron orbit an atom the way planets do? If you understand stuff beyond the physics course, you'll be better equipped to learn the physics course as an actual science course where you learn about the mechanics of the universe, and not just randomly remember that R^3/T^2=GM/4pi^2. Remembering formulas by itself won't get you very far unfortunately.
2012
Mathematical Methods (50) Chinese SL (45~52)

2013
English Language (50) Chemistry (50) Specialist Mathematics (49~54.9) Physics (49) UMEP Physics (96%) ATAR 99.95

2014-2016: University of Melbourne, Bachelor of Science, Diploma in Mathematical Sciences (Applied Maths)

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pi

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Re: [Review] VCE Physics 3/4
« Reply #64 on: October 10, 2013, 07:20:52 pm »
+1
I only think it's easy because you get a cheat-sheet and the application is minimal. I honestly think that it's not that hard to get 40+ if you make a good cheat-sheet.

lzxnl

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Re: [Review] VCE Physics 3/4
« Reply #65 on: October 10, 2013, 07:25:58 pm »
0
I only think it's easy because you get a cheat-sheet and the application is minimal. I honestly think that it's not that hard to get 40+ if you make a good cheat-sheet.

I was told that the grades in physics weren't affected by the introduction of the cheat sheet. Although it would have been awesome for this to happen:

1. 3 hour exam
2. Nothing cut out
3. No cheat sheet

Avoids the potential problem that 109 people will get 100% on the exam; probably will happen this year as VCAA isn't likely to write a difficult exam in the first year that the two exams were merged, and add that to the fact that we have 4 sides of A4 for 5 areas of study as opposed to 6...you can put more on these sheets...
2012
Mathematical Methods (50) Chinese SL (45~52)

2013
English Language (50) Chemistry (50) Specialist Mathematics (49~54.9) Physics (49) UMEP Physics (96%) ATAR 99.95

2014-2016: University of Melbourne, Bachelor of Science, Diploma in Mathematical Sciences (Applied Maths)

2017-2018: Master of Science (Applied Mathematics)

2019-2024: PhD, MIT (Applied Mathematics)

Accepting students for VCE tutoring in Maths Methods, Specialist Maths and Physics! (and university maths/physics too) PM for more details

b^3

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Re: [Review] VCE Physics 3/4
« Reply #66 on: October 10, 2013, 07:42:14 pm »
+1
I think relative to the other Asian 5 subjects, it's easy in the sense that you don't have to understand as much to get marks, as you would for say Chemistry or Spesh. With that being said, it doesn't mean that you can do well by not understanding everything, it's just that you can get away with more. In certain situations, you can get away with not understanding where the formula comes from, as long as you can apply it (I'm not saying all, and I'm not encouraging this either). Yes there are questions that ask you to explain why and give proper reasoning, but they're not really the majority, and as pi` has said, people get away with getting these right without having a clue sometimes with the aid of their cheat sheet, (yes in the examiners report they always say that students lose marks for copying explanations off their cheat sheets without interpreting them in the context of the question, but with some understanding you can do this easily, by some I mean what you're supposed to know within the course, not really using too much outside it). Again I'm not encouraging it, I'm just getting at what has happened in the past.

If you want to do well, then learn the material properly, and go outside the course, with that being said, it's not impossible to do well without doing this, unfortunately.

Now for a bit of an anecdote. During year 12, I put a lot of effort into chemistry and spesh (really a lot of effort into chem). I didn't really put that much into physics, probably moreso because of loss of motivation resulting from our teacher marking in a way that contradicted VCAA (some of our sac questions were pulled from past vcaa exams, and giving what vcaa gave in the examiners report was marked wrong).

Anyways, what I'm getting at here is, physics is seen as 'easier' because a lot of those who do it compare it to other Asian 5 subjects, you don't have to put as much effort into physics to get the same score in chem or spesh. You have that cheat sheet to fall back on, to get you out of a pickle. In chem, if you don't know something in the exam, you don't know it and that's it. In physics, there's the off chance you can fall back on your cheat sheet. (Yes there is a bound reference in spesh, but you need more understanding to get through spesh than physics, and you don't have much time to use the bound reference in exam 2 if you need to anyways).

If you had to pick the easier subject/easiest subject to do well in out of the Asian 5 subjects, what would you pick? I'd have to go with physics. I'd also say that the average physics student isn't as great as the average chem or spesh student. Now again, this is only anecdotal but looking back at the demographics of my physics classes compared to say chem, spesh or even methods, on average we didn't have as many that were say aiming high, compared to our chem and spesh classes, if that makes sense. This could have just been my school though.

Now again, I don't encourage this, in an ideal world we'd be learning physics properly. I'm just getting at that with a bit of intelligence some people can get away with a 40+ study score without too much effort (you could even say it's not deserved, I don't think my physics score was deserved). At the same time I saw people put a lot more work into physics, but in the 'wrong way' for vce, and get mid 30's, they worked a lot harder than I did, (I'd call this the right way to learn properly though, which is again unfortunately, and frustrating).

I would argue though that you'd have trouble getting 45+ without knowing and understanding the content properly.

I will say this again, but I don't encourage going about physics this way, it's better to learn everything properly, otherwise you'll have gaps  in your knowledge when you get to uni. It's frustrating that the course and system is this way, really frustrating, but that's the way it is. If you want the top scores, this won't work though.

I've kinda looped a bit, and repeated myself. The post isn't thought out well, I guess since I'm pretty frustrated typing it, as a lot of it goes against what I think is right, and want to be right I guess.
« Last Edit: October 10, 2013, 07:48:40 pm by b^3 »
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Gentoo

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Re: [Review] VCE Physics 3/4
« Reply #67 on: February 14, 2015, 08:27:59 pm »
+1
First thing's first: I am so glad I stumbled across this. Thank you, Pi. Reading your post (and the posts of many others in the thread) was seriously cathartic. A few other points I'd like to add to the hate-train that I haven't seen brought up:

-WHY is gravity near the earth's surface treated as 10 m/s^(-2)?! We have access to a calculator ALL THE TIME so why don't we use the ACTUAL g value (or at least not round it to the nearest 1)?! Even in Spesh, which is partly non-calc, we still use 9.8. Hey, while we're at it, why don't we make pi equal to 3?! That should make things easier right?!

-The optional areas of study are even more stupid than the core study design, and that's saying something. They're ALL multiple choice, and I know for Sound at least, required you to either rote learn a ton of information about bloody microphones and speakers or waste 1/3 of your cheat sheet on it (the cheat sheet being a stupid idea in the first place, as others have expounded upon already) and not use a shred of critical thinking. Some of the questions were so easy it was just criminal (phonic curves and questions that use the v=f*landa formula - I remember one MC question one year that 98% of the state got right, and that's with around 1% not even answering). To make matters even worse, errors have been made for certain questions in particular areas of study (more frequently than other subjects it seems), which results in the question being nullified and students studying that AoS being given full marks for it, which gives them a free 2 marks compared to the rest of the people doing other AoS (with whom they are competing on the bell curve).

-I'm not sure if this is a compulsory point of the study design, but at our school they made us write an experimental report for our first SAC. This would be okay except incredibly vague advice was given from the teacher about what to write in it, some people were getting more help from the teacher than others, people were helping each other, some people were presumably getting their tutor to write it for them, etc. etc. so basically its ability to accurately measure people's knowledge of the subject was well and truly thrown out the window (not to mention its incredibly time consuming nature, and the fact that nothing valuable was really learned anyway). Also it took like 3 weeks.

End rant.
(sorry if this is considered a bump, it's just that this is a stickied thread anyway)

zsteve

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Re: [Review] VCE Physics 3/4
« Reply #68 on: November 19, 2015, 07:00:17 pm »
0
They should have two Physics subjects for VCE:
- Current physics course for people who don't do Spesh
- Different Physics course for people who do Spesh - you need vectors for this kind of thing :P

Does anyone know if the IB course is any better? I know IB Maths is more advanced in some ways than Specialist
~~ rarely checking these forums these days ~~

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lzxnl

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Re: [Review] VCE Physics 3/4
« Reply #69 on: November 19, 2015, 07:33:38 pm »
0
They should have two Physics subjects for VCE:
- Current physics course for people who don't do Spesh
- Different Physics course for people who do Spesh - you need vectors for this kind of thing :P

Does anyone know if the IB course is any better? I know IB Maths is more advanced in some ways than Specialist

In theory, this is an awesome idea. In practice, there are a few issues.

1. How are you going to design it? Who will teach it?
2. Cynically, you'll always have people unhappy at implementing an advanced course in one area and not others
3. There's an argument that disadvantaged schools may well be affected more by their inability to provide for teachers that can teach this sort of physics.
4. This puts our current uni physics courses in a bit of a weird spot. Are they going to be too easy? Are they going to have to make more physics streams? I know UoM has physics streams but I'm not sure about others.

The above holds true for any VCE extension subject (that's not a uni extension subject).
2012
Mathematical Methods (50) Chinese SL (45~52)

2013
English Language (50) Chemistry (50) Specialist Mathematics (49~54.9) Physics (49) UMEP Physics (96%) ATAR 99.95

2014-2016: University of Melbourne, Bachelor of Science, Diploma in Mathematical Sciences (Applied Maths)

2017-2018: Master of Science (Applied Mathematics)

2019-2024: PhD, MIT (Applied Mathematics)

Accepting students for VCE tutoring in Maths Methods, Specialist Maths and Physics! (and university maths/physics too) PM for more details

zsteve

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Re: [Review] VCE Physics 3/4
« Reply #70 on: November 19, 2015, 08:00:56 pm »
0
Right then, make Methods prereq for Physics, then introduce calculus and linear algebra properly into Methods :P
jk, just forget about VCE entirely
~~ rarely checking these forums these days ~~

2015: Specialist [47] | Methods [48] | Chemistry [50] | Physics [48] | English Language [46] | UMEP Mathematics [5.0] | ATAR - 99.95
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lzxnl

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Re: [Review] VCE Physics 3/4
« Reply #71 on: November 20, 2015, 03:12:31 pm »
0
Right then, make Methods prereq for Physics, then introduce calculus and linear algebra properly into Methods :P
jk, just forget about VCE entirely

Then you have people complaining about how hard the course is.
People complain about the current courses. Put that into perspective first.
2012
Mathematical Methods (50) Chinese SL (45~52)

2013
English Language (50) Chemistry (50) Specialist Mathematics (49~54.9) Physics (49) UMEP Physics (96%) ATAR 99.95

2014-2016: University of Melbourne, Bachelor of Science, Diploma in Mathematical Sciences (Applied Maths)

2017-2018: Master of Science (Applied Mathematics)

2019-2024: PhD, MIT (Applied Mathematics)

Accepting students for VCE tutoring in Maths Methods, Specialist Maths and Physics! (and university maths/physics too) PM for more details

odeaa

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Re: [Review] VCE Physics 3/4
« Reply #72 on: November 20, 2015, 03:42:53 pm »
0
Right then, make Methods prereq for Physics, then introduce calculus and linear algebra properly into Methods
jk, just forget about VCE entirely
I think they have always wanted to do this (make methods prereq for physics) but the numbers for physics were decreasing until they got rid of calculus (pretty sure that pre-1997 vce physics had calculus)
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