What is maths (Grade 9 entry)?

Maths (Grade 9 entry) is our name for a competitive mathematics test for Year 9 entry (i.e. you sit the exam in either Year 5 or 6 to apply for Year 7 entry) for scholarships, selective school tests and other competitive entry exams.

Competitive tests are different from the standard maths test at school as competitive maths tests often test two main things being:

• Mathematical knowledge that would be at Year 9 level in the curriculum (and sometimes higher).
  
• Mathematical reasoning and application for problem solving (very common in ACER exams). The calculations are often not too difficult but deciding what calculations to complete (formulation) is sometimes challenging.

Quite simply, maths (Grade 9 entry) examines how well you know your maths concepts and most importantly, how well you can use mathematics to solve problems.

How to ACE your maths (Grade 9 entry) test

You may sit a maths (Grade 9 entry) with other tests as part of a larger exam or sit the test as an individual stand-alone one. Whichever way, there are some things you'll need to do to ACE it.

1. Curriculum knowledge—remember, in competitive tests, they’re not going to test you on what you have learnt at school. They’re wanting to select students who excel academically so your knowledge of mathematics should be at a Year 9 level (at a minimum) or above. While in lower year levels, this is not as important as problem solving, for Year 9 entry, it is, as mathematical concepts become more important and difficult as you approach higher grade levels.
2. Read and formulate—many mathematics questions are in worded form and require you to formulate the calculation from the written words.
3. Problem solving—the harder questions often involve problem solving and what you’ll find is that there is often a ‘missing link’ or ‘bridge’ that you need to identify and connect before you can complete the calculations.

For every maths question there are 2 overarching steps you need to take:

1. Read the question clearly and understand what you need to do.
2. Set up your formula or calculation.
3. Solve.

In many maths exams, you only need to do step 3 (and that’s quite easy) as it tests your knowledge. However, in competitive exams you need to do step 1 & 2 and that’s the hard bit because it requires critical thinking and setting up of the formula.

This is a process I encourage you to take:

• Prepare before the exam.
• Read the question and decide whether you can do it within your set time or skip.
• Find crucial information to answer the question.
• Formulate.
• Solve.
• Select the answer.

The key thing to remember with maths (Grade 9 entry) is that it there is a definite correct answer. And you can check your answers by:

• Working backwards.
• Using different operators to get to the answer. For example, to check if 7 – 3 = 4; you can also do 3 + 4 = 7.

The time limit

In many exams, you'll need to race through and answer question after question. Many people worry about this but the key thing to remember is not how many you complete. It's how many you get right.

Here's your time strategy:

1. Read the question quickly and decide whether it is a question you can complete quickly.
2. If yes, then complete. If no, then move on and come back to it later.
3. For any remaining questions at the end (30 seconds left), complete it if you can, or guess - Option B or C is often the most likely correct answer because there could be a chance that you could select the correct option.

Note: Some students have been advised that they should leave the question blank rather than guessing. Unless you lose marks for incorrect answers or are penalised for getting the wrong answer, our advice is to guess as there is no downside and we believe that the reason for this request (to leave blank if you don’t know the answer) is so that the exam setters can eliminate the ‘luck’ in assessment.

It's important to note that you should not spend more than your planned time per question. Every second that you spend on figuring out that question could have been spent getting another 2-4 correct.

Common mistakes

What are the pitfalls when it comes to maths (Grade 9 entry) exams with a time limit?

• Taking too long to answer a question.
• Reading the question incorrectly.
• Not having a strategy or an approach.
• Not being able to solve because of lack of mathematical concept knowledge – this can be addressed in preparation by learning all the key concepts you need for Year 9 mathematics (and a bit more).

What you'll learn in this course

In this course, we’ll help you establish how to read and formulate questions for different types of maths (Grade 9 entry) questions so that you can answer questions more confidently (and quickly) in your exam.

There are many areas that maths (Grade 9 entry) can test. Such areas are:

• Maths Shortcuts & Tips PLUS Important Mathematical Concepts You Need to Know
• The Basics - Operators, Fractions, Geometry, Units, Worded Questions
• Number Patterns
• Shapes and Angles
• Pythagoras' Theorem
• Exponents
• Surds
• Basic Algebra - Simplifying
• Expansion and Factorisation
• Linear Equations
• Basic Quadratic Equations
• Rearranging Equations
• Functions
• Basic Trigonometry
• Trigonometric Ratios
• The Unit Circle (Basic)

This may seem like a lot but we'll work through these slowly and you can always go back to different areas and review checkpoints as many times as you want.

Practice time!

Now, it's your turn to practice.

The questions in this checkpoint are provided to give you an introduction to possible questions you may see in your exam. Don't worry too much as you'll continue to build your skills throughout the course.

Click on the button below and start your practice questions. We recommend doing untimed mode first, and then, when you're ready, do timed mode.

Every question has two solutions videos after you complete the question. The first is a quick 60 second video that shows you how our expert answers the question quickly. The second video is a more in-depth 5-steps or less explainer video that shows you the steps to take to answer the question. It's really important that you review the second video because that's where you'll learn additional tips and tricks.

Once you're done with the practice questions, move on to the next checkpoint.

Now, let’s get started on your practice questions.

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