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New Exampro worksheets: making the most of crossover skills in Maths and Geography

Similar mathematical skills are explored in both A-level Geography and Level 3 Mathematical Studies (L3MS), so we want to make it even easier for teachers of these qualifications to access relevant past exam questions. That’s why AQA Curriculum Managers Carly Hayton (Maths) and Jon Boden-Wright (Geography) have teamed up with Exampro to create two suites of worksheets to aid in the delivery and practice of these skills. The best bit…? There’s a free sample from each suite for you try, so keep on reading! In this blog post, Carly and Jon discuss why these resources are so important, share the work that went into creating the worksheets and suggest how they might be used in your classroom. They also highlight how fantastic Exampro is as a tool in your assessment armoury for AQA qualifications.

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Published

Monday 4 Mar 2024

Author

Carly Hayton and Jon Boden-Wright

New Exampro worksheets: making the most of crossover skills in Maths and Geography

Why is the resource important?


Carly Hayton (Maths)Jon Boden-Wright (Geography)
As Curriculum Manager for maths, I know that Level 3 Mathematical Studies teachers are always keen to find relevant data, samples, and diagrams from authentic contexts to help develop their students’ analysis and promote critical thinking. With a wealth of past exam items from the A-level Geography (7036/7037) qualification, it became clear that getting those questions in the hands of L3MS teachers and students would be really useful. Geography offers a rich lens through which real-world data can be explored. With topics ranging from urbanisation and population change to climate issues and environmental instability, the questions included in these resources emphasise the versatility and relevance of maths for interpreting and understanding our surroundings. As well as items designed by geography assessment specialists, they also contain real data from AS-level Geography fieldwork meaning you can be sure that the contexts covered, and samples used are authentic. Further to the benefit of reminding students that L3MS is supporting their other studies, these resources could also be a catalyst for inter-departmental staff collaboration. Seeing the similarities and slight differences in how the same skills are assessed in each qualification could offer a chance for a unified approach or an opportunity for maths teachers to support their geography colleagues with an area of the specification that they may be less confident in delivering.As a former Head of Department for geography and after teaching the subject for 11 years prior to joining AQA’s curriculum team, I understand just how challenging it can be to teach the required mathematical skills to A-level learners. Many geographical skills are listed in the A-level geography specification, including statistical skills, qualitative data skills and quantitative data skills. It’s best practice to integrate the teaching of geographical skills into subject content, rather than as an add-on. This allows you to revisit skills that your students may find harder than others to give them practice in different contexts. However, it can be difficult to incorporate the required statistical skills into geography teaching due to the small number of past paper examples, content taught in the context of the geography NEA and the challenges of designing your own examples. Having access to examples designed by assessment specialists to support the teaching of these skills not only helps teachers but will boost student confidence.

About the sheets

Carly Hayton (Maths)Jon Boden-Wright (Geography)
Using Exampro, I’ve created three worksheets, each with an accompanying mark scheme and feedback form that can be used to practise certain mathematical skills in the geographical contexts: Analysis of data (only) – download a free sample Critical analysis of given data and models (only) Analysis of data and critical analysis of given data and models All 3 worksheets in the series are now available to existing Exampro Level 3 (Core) Maths subscribers (Log in now!). If you would like to join Exampro, find out how Exampro Maths can support your teaching. It's important to note that the questions in these worksheets do not reflect Level 3 Mathematical Studies questions. Their purpose is to boost confidence and provide additional practice in unfamiliar contexts.Using Exampro, I’ve created six worksheets, each with an accompanying mark scheme and feedback form that can be used to build student confidence in some of the required maths skills: NEA preparation – Sampling – download a free sample Geographical Skills – Data Geographical Skills – Data Analysis 1 Geographical Skills – Data Analysis 2 Geographical Skills – Data Analysis 3 Statistical Skills – Standard Deviation All 6 worksheets in the series are now available to existing Exampro A-level Geography subscribers (Log in now!). If you would like to join Exampro, find out how Exampro Geography can support your teaching. It's important to note that the questions in these worksheets do not reflect A-level Geography exam questions. Their purpose is to boost confidence and assist with mathematical knowledge and understanding.

How the resources were made and how they could be used

Carly Hayton (Maths)Jon Boden-Wright (Geography)
A few years ago, I created this Maths in Other Subjects page that details how certain specification references of maths qualifications align with mathematical content in other A-levels. Using this reference point, it was incredibly quick and easy to filter Exampro by specification reference to narrow down hundreds of A-level Geography (7036/7037) past items to only those which could be applicable to L3MS. When structuring the suitable items into worksheets, I separated questions where students are provided data to analyse and/or perform calculations from those that present the data in a given graph or diagram for critical analysis. The third worksheet includes a mixture of the two. I believe the worksheets would have the most impact if used within lessons as, although the potentially unfamiliar context is a desirable difficulty, you may wish to draw attention to the slight differences in how the mathematical skills are presented and assessed in A-level Geography. For example, the use of scaffolds in ranking questions that are not present in L3MS could be a prompt for discussion with your students. Also, you may wish to hear your students’ thoughts on the reasons for using a different divisor in the standard deviation formula (as n is used in place of n - 1in A-level Geography). What’s more, it’s quite likely that there will be some A-level Geographers in your L3MS class; you may be able to pair these students up with “non-geographers” to allow them to bring their geographical knowledge to the maths classroom!After identifying the commonality between maths and statistical skills found on the A-level Geography (7037) and the Core Maths (1350) and A-level Mathematics (7357) specifications, Exampro’s search tool then made it an easy task to identify past questions featured on Maths examinations that would be applicable for A-level Geography. Having found several sampling questions from A-level Mathematics and data-related questions from Core Maths, it became obvious that these questions could also be used to assist in the teaching of some required fieldwork skills. The use of examples of real-world data, pitched at their required level, will build students’ confidence before they have to collect primary data, select secondary data and analyse these for their own geographical investigation. Finally, standard deviation can be found in A-level Mathematics past questions and also features on past questions for A-level Geography. However, the format of the questions is somewhat different in A-level Geography; the data is presented in a table and the formula and key given.  Students must be familiar with how this would look if it appeared on their own examination papers so this final worksheet includes extracts from A-level Geography past questions at the beginning. At the back of this worksheet, there is a blank table to assist in standard deviation calculations of the A-level Maths examples to build confidence with this skill in a familiar layout. This table may need to be photocopied so students can use it for a number of the mathematics past paper questions.

Full access to the suite of Level 3 (Core) Mathematics – in context worksheets is available now with an Exampro Level 3 (Core) Maths subscription.

Full access to the suite of A-level Geography – Mathematical skills worksheets is available now with either an Exampro A-level Geography or GCSE and A-level Geography Package subscription.

We really hope that you find these resources useful and welcome any feedback.

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