Applied or Pure Maths?

[melanie]

Hi,

I have the choice to do either Pure or Applied Maths (Advanced higher) next year (providing Wednesday goes ok!!) but I don't know which to do??!!

I've heard that Applied maths has more statistics than pure maths, but i don't know which would be more useful for medicine. However, I don't particularly like doing statistics , so...

Do uni's mind what "kind" of maths it is?

Any suggestions on whether to go for pure or applied??

Thanks

melx :dance:

[relliott]

statistics - you'll need it for the research papers - and that's just to read em and do critical appraisals

[mutazamin]

I've been doing AH pure maths, we did maths1,2 and 3. most of it is calculus which I'm pretty sure isn't gonna be used in medicine. Unit 3 in pure AH maths is optional, it can be maths 3(or caclulus 3), statistics (which I wish i'd done) and numerical analysis and I think there's somthing else which i can't remember.
I herd that applied maths is very similar to mechanics and dynamics in higher physics, so i wouldn't advice you to do applied maths if you're gonna do AH physics.

[Pud]

Mutaz - the other possible third unit in AH Maths is Mechanics 1.

Applied Maths (I think) is a choice of units as well, so whether it'll be useful for Medicince will depend on what units you or your school chooses to study: Mechanics 1 and 2 probably won't be very handy!

[Jenny]

From someone who gave up Maths after Higher trust me - at some point you're gonna need the statistics. And yes, the reason I gave it up was because I hated it, especially statistics (this is purely a personal view though - I wouldn't want to put you off).:lol

[melanie]

Hey guys,

Thanks for all your advice,

And yes, the reason I gave it up was because I hated it, especially statistics

Jenny, I hate statistics too!! So I don't know whether it would be a good idea. However, if its going to help me in medicine (if iget there) then I probably should do applied.

Thanks for all the help!!

Mel:coolman: :dance:

[Stephen]

I'm doing advanced maths just now, our school doesn't give you a choice - we had to do maths 1, 2 and 3. it's mostly caluclus and matrices (fascinating stuff...:down: ) I have to say that i've not really enjoyed the course at all. It all just seems to have been thrown together, especially the vectors topic (which is in unit 3) which is just stuck on the end of the unit... i think just to annoy you more than anything. I think you'd be better off with the statistics, since you're far mor likely to use it than vectors and matrix algebra.

[Pud]

i'm really fed up with advanced maths, two hours' cramming tomorrow is the only attention it's getting from me :D

[melanie]

Hi,

Is it worth taking maths at all? Does Applied maths help a lot for medicine, or would it be better to do another Advanced Higher?

I think I'm taking AH Biology and Chemistry, and I don't think AH Physics would be all that fun!! :rolleyes:

Mel:D :confused:

[Jenny]

If you're already doing AH Chem and Bio then, if u want to, do something different. I did AH English and SG Russian just for the hell of it!

Do whatever you want, it won't make a huge amount of difference in the long run, as long as you don't mind ploughing ur way thru the statistics at SOME point in the future!:bawling:

[relliott]

I did SYS Chem (found little use for it), Paper IV Maths (prolly pure maths now, mostly useless) Higher biology (useful) and 4 modules in music and music recording (lots of fun)

do things that you want to do. I did apply for the photography module but there were too many doing it so i had to drop it. If there's a subject you havent done before but would like to give it a shot.

[elliottsimpson]

Originally posted by relliott
I did apply for the photography module I read that as model first time!

[mutazamin]

so the exam is over,
the paper wasn't too hard me thinks! it was much easier than last year's paper my teacher sed.
But anyway, some of the questions were really really challenging! but overall the paper was ok!
as for Melanie, I don't wanna put u off maths but personally I feel really regret to have done maths and not done something more useful(a higher in a foriegn language woulda been much more useful) but the reason why I did AH maths because I like maths but now, I feel that I
ve learnt anything that'd help me in the future (i.e medicine). AH chemistry and Biology are interesting and I'm sure they'll help later on.

[Pud]

Originally posted by mutazamin
so the exam is over,
the paper wasn't too hard me thinks! it was much easier than last year's paper my teacher sed.

my teacher thought it was murder...

[ria]

i did ah maths and a foreign language - was fun lol
:banghead:

in response to the original q, i'd go with applied maths of you want to do ah . :)

unit 3 of ah is weird. go with stats

Marie xxx

[melanie]

Hey,

Thanks for all the advice, its given me a lot to think about!!:D

If there's a subject you havent done before but would like to give it a shot.

There's so many subjects I wish I'd taken that I had to drop for Standard Grade and Higher that I wish I could have taken on.

I'd really like to do Higher PE, but I don't think uni's would call that an "academic" subject!! I think its something that I'd really enjoy, but if I don't do 3 AH it limits me to staying in Scotland, cos I'm not sure where I want to go.

There is also the possibility of me doing A-level Polish (I'm half Polish btw) which is probably quite unusual!!
:D

However, maybe AH maths is not such a good idea considering that the higher exam was hard!:cry: :cry: especially paper 2!!

Anyone else find it hard??

Melxx:D

[Stephen]

you should read the post about the advanced higher exam and see what everyone thought of it. Personally, i thought it was ok. I despise maths, and i'm so happy that it's finally over! Advanced higher has been a very long course.

[Dexter]

Melanie,

I chose AH Maths myself for 6th year and have really enjoyed it (because i like maths! :lol) If you like maths too, then pick it, if not.... don't pick it.

Choosing this subject won't have any bearing on your medical application since it's got little or no application to medicine, it's just learning equations etc. (which i happen to find fun... sad really! :D)

As far as the pure/applied decision goes... i'd say definitely pure maths (i.e: 1,2 and 3)... As far as Uni's are concerned, pure maths is viewed more highly than applied due to complexity of the course.

Nevertheless, it's your choice, the advice i was given when making my choices for six year was to broaden my knowledge base... learn something new (uni's like that)... that's why i crashed higher physics (for fun!)...

So long as the uni's see that u've picked a good selection of subjects for your last year (usually including AH chemistry and/or AH biology), u'll be fine! :D

[tom champagne]

My advice is that if you don't really like maths, and you don't need it, then don't pick it. If you just do it for the sake of doing it you'll quickly get bored of having to learn loads of stuff that you don't like, isn't going to get you anywhere and, lets face it, you're probably never going to use again. Also you get frustrated when you've spent 2 hours writing 3 pages of working finding out your answer's A) wrong and B) your first answer (which you disgarded) was correct! Then once it's hammered into your skull it doesn't even turn up in the exam!!!







do i sound bitter?

[Julia]

I found the higher maths exam hard too, but I thought that both papers were of a pretty similar standard.:( . Anyway, 2 down, 3 to go! Good luck everyone else with their exams!:clown:

Julia xxxx

[relliott]

Originally posted by melanie

I'd really like to do Higher PE, but I don't think uni's would call that an "academic" subject!!


well, they let me in with one of my highers being music and they were more than happy for me to do art and music modules.

Glasgow basically said "we dont care what you do so long as you do something"

the medical course is long and hard. Get those things in now that you want to do before you are locked into a prescribed course for 5 or 6 years

[DScollon]

If they really want to know why you did PE, just say you have an interest in sports medicine. From what I understand, you're taught a fair amount about the musculoskeletal system during the Higher PE course.

[Dehydrated Water]

This year I did pure maths units 1 + 2 and numerical analysis.

From what my maths teacher has told my class, the SQA are planning on phasing out the optional units and just having Unit 3 maths.

Don't trust me with that though!

[Stephen]

Yeak, you're right, my maths teacher was talking to me about that too. They're apparently not giving such a big option next year and are just making the 5 options for unit 3 into one unit.

[Stephen]

I meant Yeah there, not yeak

[Dehydrated Water]

lol

[kylegibson_2000]

Pure Maths definitely. It makes you go crazy - finding negative roots and asymptotes. Fascinating stuff!

BTW, no more options from this year, so if you want to do statistics etc, you have to take Applied Maths. Apparently, there wasn't enough people doing the extra sections in the exam, so now it's just Maths 1, 2 and 3.

Kyle