Hi,
I just wanted to know which companies make the best exams (the ones that are the most similar to the VCAA ones). Also which practice exams are utterly rubbish and are not worth my time?
Thank you
I only got a 37 but I've been through all the company exams back until 2010 and while some do reach the difficulty of VCAA exams (or bypass it), the style can never quite be matched.
In order of difficulty/quality:
Without a doubt, the iTute exams are the absolute hardest out there. The questions are crazy difficult and the VCAA will never ask you something that hard. Don't do it unless you want to challenge yourself, though in saying that I did learn quite a few things from the answers to their exams, that ended up being useful in the actual exam.
Next would be Kilbaha. The questions are pretty difficult and the VCAA exams can and will match this level of difficulty, but their trial exams are the same thing each year. They definitely don't expose you to a wide range of problems, which won't prepare you for curveballs that they will throw you on the actual exam. And they will throw many, many curveballs.
NHT papers get overlooked by some students, however, they match the style and difficulty of VCAA questions and are extremely helpful. They also change it up each year; they are unique. Shame there aren't more of them available.
The MAV and Heffernan exams are pretty much the same style and difficulty of questions. They are pretty close to VCAA and definitely worth doing.
TWM has very few practice papers available, but the questions can be very difficult. The style of questions aren't quite the same; TWM will test your theoretical and conceptual knowledge thus their Methods questions can be a lot more complex, and stuff you don't see quite often. Some of their multiple-choice questions were an incredible help to me on exam 2.
Neap exams are pretty standard, good and complex questions so definitely worth doing for the extra practice.
TSSM was worse than Neap. Their questions are very boring and standard, definitely not matching VCAA by any means. The complexity was alright, but not one of the top papers. Go for it if you really want to get that extra practice in.
Then there are other companies such as Insight, Access and Engage Education. Their exams are very sub-par in my opinion, they just look like no effort was put into them and I found several spelling mistakes in their papers, especially Engage. Insight can be good sometimes, but otherwise don't bother.
My best advice when it comes to practice exams is to work on your weak areas, and don't think that quantity supersedes quality. For example, the last question of Methods exam 2 papers is usually the most difficult on the entire paper. I practised those questions in depth for weeks before the exam, making sure I got it right every time. Those questions were a breeze for me when everyone said they were extremely difficult. On the other hand, I completely ignored mistakes on exam 1 papers and brushed over it, and I really struggled in the methods 1 exam, when everyone said it was fairly easy. Take it from someone who did almost 100 practice papers and got 20/40 on exam 1 (was a very bad day) and 70/80 on exam 2, only getting a 37
an extreme amount of practice papers will not mean you are prepared!Hope I could help