SACE General Mathematics: statistics, finance and networks in the Stage 2 exam

Six topics, three of them in the exam

The outline requires non-examined topics to be assessed through at least one of the school assessment types, so you still need all six, but the exam is built from the key questions and key concepts in Topics 3, 4 and 5 only. Practise those thoroughly.

How the subject is assessed

Seventy percent is school assessed: Skills and Applications Tasks 40% (four or five tasks) and a Mathematical Investigation 30% (one investigation). The exam is 30%. Students sit one 130-minute external exam, and the outline describes a range of problems, some on knowledge and routine skills, others on analysis and interpretation, where you give explanations and arguments with correct notation. You can bring one unfolded A4 sheet of handwritten notes (two sides) and use approved electronic technology, though the outline asks you to be discerning about how you use it.

Worked examples

A compound interest model (Topic 4)

$8000 is invested at 6% per year, compounded monthly, for two years. The monthly rate is 0.5% and there are 24 periods:

The interest earned is $9017.28 − $8000 = $1017.28. If the question gives a finance solver on your calculator, still set the problem up with the number of periods and the rate per period, because marks go to the setup.

A least-squares line (Topic 3)

A line of best fit for study hours (x) and score (y) is y = 2.4x + 5. At x = 10 hours the prediction is 2.4 × 10 + 5 = 29. If your data only cover 1 to 8 hours, 10 hours is extrapolation, so the prediction is less reliable, and a sentence saying so earns the interpretation mark.

A minimum spanning tree (Topic 5)

Take the shortest edge that does not make a cycle, repeatedly. CD (3), AB (4), BC (5) connect all four vertices, and the next shortest edge AC (6) would close a cycle, so the tree has total weight 3 + 4 + 5 = 12.

The probability and statistics ideas behind Topic 3 are in our Probability course. Try a question there, then press Mark:

Grades, SATAC and the ATAR

The final subject grade runs from A+ to E−. For SATAC's ATAR, your school and exam results make a raw score out of 15, split 10.5 for the 70% and 4.5 for the 30%, which is then scaled. Scaling treats subjects differently, so General Maths does not have the same scaled score range as Mathematical Methods for the same grade. SATAC's scaling page explains how a grade maps to a range, not a single number.

Dates

Use the daily paper as a practice paper

Schools in South Australia usually call their own exams trials. The free daily paper on the Year 12 Statistics track is a short timed practice paper of 8 questions worth 25 to 35 marks, marked as you go, and it is not a 130-minute SACE exam.

• It fits: sampling, measures of location and spread, correlation and regression, and data presentation belong to Topic 3.
• It does not fit: hypothesis testing, the normal and binomial distributions and conditional probability are in its rotation but are not part of the Stage 2 General Maths exam topics, and there are no daily papers on finance or networks. Use your notes for those.

Exam answers

The answers and worked mark scheme come with each daily paper once it is marked. They are Uni-Sine's own, not official SACE Board answers.

Mistakes in General Maths

• Using the annual rate with monthly periods in a compound interest model.
• Writing a prediction with no comment on whether it is interpolation or extrapolation.
• Stopping a minimum spanning tree before all vertices are joined.
• Using the notes sheet to copy worked examples instead of formulas and definitions.

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