Question and Answer Bank Questions...

Right now I am trudging through the question and answer bank questions - I'm at the end of chapter 2. However I'm finding that the questions that are worth around 6-14 marks I have no clue on how to start. However once having skimmed through the solution for a bit I realize how to do the question (most of the time). The questions worth around 1-5 marks I can do relatively comfortably but at times I still may make a slight fundamental mistake. My question is: am I making horrible progress? At this point should I be breezing through these questions?

How similar are the question and answer bank questions to the actual exam paper ones? I, without a doubt know I am making progress as I'm now getting used to the pattern of questions and I know what to focus on. However I don't know if I'm making enough progress. Also I have read that I'll need generally around 60/100 to pass That doesn't help matters lol.

Any advice or tips?

*edit* Also if say we make a simple mistake in a question e.g. forget to discount something or discount it with the wrong factor how will the examiner see this? I know the answer wouldbe wrong but surely they won't mark it all wrong. How do they mark the exam?

 

Check out the past exam papers here.

http://www.actuaries.org.uk/students/exams/preparing/exam_papers


Sorry can't help with more specific advice re: CT1, it's been a while since I've sat it. Good luck to you though!

 

If you’re getting the 1-5 mark questions it appears to me that you understand the concepts, but you do have not practiced the “Tricks” you need to be able to answer the longer questions. I am rather sceptical of Acted’s questions, some of them (Especially a few Mock exams I’ve done) seem to go a bit off track and the marking scheme doesn’t seem to be very representative (on a marks to time basis) of past exam papers. They are good for developing/consolidating understanding of the material, but this close to the exam; if you are only up to section2 I would probably abandon the Q&A bank and practice on past exam papers. As for your other question i'm pretty sure you get marks for consequential errors using a correct method, but conceptual errors don't earn any marks (unless you use a "resonable" approach which is fully justified, you may pick up some marks). For example if i discount somthing at the wrong interest rate i will lose 1 mark, but if i accumulate somthing when i'm supposed to be discounting i get 0.

 

To pick up method marks leave a good audit trail....

Eg say discounting at 4% etc or write the equation and say where i=4%.

You can only lose marks once for any slip. If you then carry on and make no other mistakes you'll have most marks.

the advice to do actual papers is very sound.

 

Oh no, does this mean I'm quite far behind? I felt that I was behind but thought I'd still manage to finish the Q and A and do past papers by 27th April.

I'm actually finding the sections in the Q&A quite useful at the moment as they are topic-specific. If I abandon the remaining sections there will be certain areas that I will be much weaker at. So I am thinking of finishing the sections but possibly abandoning the assignments. And then doing past papers for around 3 weeks.

Does this seem effective?

 

Only you can decide what's best for you as you know your strengths etc and different people learn differently.

But as a suggestion, try one or two past papers to see how it goes. If you identify any weak points, you can tackle the Q&A for those questions. As you go along you should consolidate your strengths and lessen your weaknesses efficiently.

 

You mention assignments. Have you got marking - vouchers? The assignments also follow course sections so if you know you are weak in one area, getting the assignments back could give valuable incite on your difficulty.

Or just do a mock with marking which will do the same thing and show what you know and what you don't. You then must concentrate on the gaps and not just keep revisting bits you can do. That is comforting but you cannot afford to go into the exam with significant gaps.

As someone else said, it has to be your call