WASSCE Candidates’ Weaknesses In Elective Mathematics And Remedies | Extract From Chief Examiners Report Towards WASSCE 2023
Teachers preparing students for any examination are always worried about the potential weaknesses in answers that their students will provide during the examination. Fortunately, the main examining body, the West Africa Examination Council always provide WASSCE candidates’ weaknesses in Elective Mathematics during the last held examination.
WAEC Summary of 2021 WASSCE Elective Mathematics Paper Two (2)
A. SUMMARY OF CANDIDATES’ STRENGTHS
Candidates showed strength in the following areas:
(a) calculation of rank correlation coefficient;
(b) calculating terms in series and sequences;
(c) finding the equation of a circle passing through three points;
(d) construction of the cumulative frequency tables and drawing the cumulative frequency
curve (ogive).
B. SUMMARY OF CANDIDATES’ WEAKNESSES
The weaknesses of candidates were evident in their inability to:
(a) find the volume of a solid generated using integration;
(b) read correctly the median and the quartiles from the cumulative frequency curve;
(c) find the right technique to handle problems in permutation/combination;
(d) draw correct diagrams as an aid to answering questions involving moments.
C. SUGGESTED REMEDIES FOR THE WEAKNESSES
(a) Teachers should give equal attention to the whole topics in the syllabus.
(b) Candidates should be exposed to a lot of questions as exercises. Teachers should lay emphasis on reading values from ogive.
(c) Candidates should be encouraged to show all steps in their workings when solving a problem and not use calculator to jump steps.
(d) learn how to translate word-problems on moment into diagrams to aid in solving them
WAEC Summary of 2020 WASSCE Elective Mathematics Paper Two (2)
A. SUMMARY OF CANDIDATES’ STRENGTHS
The Chief Examiner for Mathematics (Elective) listed the strengths of candidates as follows; ability to:
(1) find identity element and inverse of a binary operation;
(2) find composite functions;
(3) resolve forces into components;
(4) find the magnitude of the resultant of various forces;
(5) resolve functions into partial fractions;
(6) solve problems in probability;
(7) identify nature of roots of a quadratic function.
B. SUMMARY OF CANDIDATES’ WEAKNESSES
The Chief Examiner for Mathematics (Elective) listed some of the weakness of candidates as difficulty in:
(1) drawing a Histogram;
(2) calculating of Spearman’s Rank Correlation Coefficient;
(3) solving problems involving both Arithmetic/Geometric Progression;
(4) using properties of the scalar (Dot) Product to solve problems;
(5) drawing accurate tree-body diagrams to represent problems in mathematics;
(6) using of cosine/sine ranks appropriately in a triangle.
C. SUGGESTED REMEDIES FOR THE WEAKNESSES
(1) Teachers should give equal attention to all topics in the syllabus rather than specializing on some topics.
(2) Candidates should be given more exercises for them to have good command of the topics in the syllabus.
(3) Candidates should be encouraged to show all steps used in solving a problem clearly without jumping the steps in arriving at the solution.
(4) In general, teachers should pay attention to the weaknesses outlined above.
WAEC Summary of 2019 WASSCE Elective Mathematics Paper Two (2)
A. CANDIDATES’ STRENGTHS
The Chief Examiner for Mathematics (Elective) listed the strengths of the candidates as ability to:
(i) rationalize a given surd;
(ii) find the mean and standard deviation from a given data;
(iii) find the resultant and magnitude of given vectors;
(iv) resolve given forces into component form;
(v) find the determinant and inverse of a given matrix.
B. CANDIDATES’ WEAKNESSES
The Chief Examiner for Mathematics (Elective) listed some of the weaknesses of candidates as difficulty in:
(i) finding the coordinates of a point using internal division of a line in a given ratio;
(ii) solving problems on mechanics;
(iii) solving quadratic and linear equations simultaneously;
(iv) using trigonometric identities to solve trigonometry question.
C. SUGGESTED REMEDIES
The Chief Examiner for Mathematics (Elective) suggested that teachers should:
(i) give equal attention to the whole syllabus rather than specializing in few areas in the syllabus;
(ii) expose candidates to a lot of questions as exercises for them to have a good command on the topics in the syllabus;
(iii) encourage students to show all steps used in solving a question clearly without jumping steps by using calculator;
(iv) coach students on the importance of accuracy so that they would work with at least
four decimal places and round off answers after the whole calculation;
(v) Stress on the need to read and understand the demand of the question before answering
WAEC Summary of 2018 WASSCE Elective Mathematics Paper Two (2)
A. SUMMARY OF CANDIDATES’ STRENGTHS
The Chief Examiner for Mathematics (Elective) listed some of the strengths of candidates as ability to:
(a) compute the Spearman’s Rank correlation coefficient from a given data;
(b) use moment equation to solve related questions;
(c) find acute angle between two given vectors;
(d) apply laws of logarithm to solve related question.
A. SUMMARY OF CANDIDATES WEAKNESSES
The Chief Examiner for Mathematics (Elective) listed some of the weaknesses of candidates as difficulty in:
(a) expressing rational function into partial fraction;
(b) finding equation of a circle passing through three points;
(c) finding the nth term from the sum of the n terms of a sequence;
(d) solving probability related problems.
B. SUGGESTED REMEDIES
The Chief Examiner for Mathematics (Elective) suggested that teachers should give students
sufficient exercises for the various topics treated with the students. He also recommended that
teachers should give in-depth tuition in areas of students’ weaknesses by explaining thoroughly
the relevant concepts.
It is the hope of our team that candidates will perform better when teachers and candidates go through this summary of strengths, WASSCE candidates’ weaknesses in Elective Mathematics and remedies and apply same
Source: waecgh.org
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