The nth term

[Daogroupie]

I was astonished to see nth term questions in the Maths First Past the Post Papers. Is this now part of KS2 Maths? None of my student had any clue what it was. Any guidance on how to explain this simply? DG

[laretta]

The Wallington Girls test had the last few questions on nth term two years ago. No idea how to get a 10 year old to complete it. Personally I think it's ridiculous especially as 11+ should be testing to level 5.

[mystery]

I suppose if you have done number series and explaining the rules of the series, and some basic algebra, it all comes together.

Who sets the Wellington test - gl or cem?

[laretta]

It's Wallington in Surrey - the maths test is designed by the school.

[mystery]

Sorry that was my iPad that changed the spelling. How does a school set its own assessment test without any reference to the experts? I could devise a load of maths papers. But I would not like to say that placing the children in score order would really be saying anything very much about their relative mathematical aptitude. Does wallington produce any great mathematicians?

[Daogroupie]

First Past the Post papers have been newly created and sold by this website. They must have had a reason for including nth term questions? DG

[Tinkers]

My DD did a bit about nth term in year 6 at school.

[Tagore]

DG,
I have learnt an immense amount about the 11+ process from your informative posts. I hope this will help your students.

Nth term questions appear in various forms in Independent School Papers. With practice I find that students grasp onto the equation easily. However, recognising of when the Nth term equation should be used to find an answer is the difficult part.

Example :-
In a series of 3, 7, 11, 15, 19 you will note that each increment remains the same, 4. Thus the start of the
Nth term equation becomes 4n. Now, one has to ask oneself the question, how do you arrive at the first number of 3 when n is 1 (the first number)? 4n -1 would give you 3. Now try this on the 4th number say (i.e. n =4). 4n-1 = 16-1 = 15. It works.

The advanced stage of this deals with differing differentials and involves indices.

I hope this helps. Be rest assured that questions based on nth term appear quite regularly. See St. Pauls Sample Mathematics paper, Section C Q1 and Consortium Paper 1 2012, Q34.

Tagore
Incredibly grateful for all your help

[DC17C]

My DD did a bit about nth term in year 6 at school.

I think my son did as well but he did the level 6 maths SAT paper

[Daogroupie]

Tagore, I am really glad to hear you found my posts helpful. Thank you for telling me. I hope your dd is getting excited about joining Year 7 and she is getting used to the blazer! I am grateful for your help. I shall do some trial runs on nth term questions with your strategy and see how I get on. I am a great believer that I can learn anything if I can find somebody who can explain it to me clearly enough. DG