how to study for hl math
Here's a little something I posted for another reddit user a while back, which I believe is the key to passing HL Math:
Understand: With the right teacher, understanding the content of Math HL shouldn't be that difficult. Unfortunately, I took Math HL on Pamoja which was outright useless for me, cause the course can't teach. Luckily there are a ton of really good Math teachers online. If you can't understand any of the topics, one of these guys will have at least 1 video on it. Eddie Woo was really good at teaching 2. Functions and Equations, 3. Trigonometry and 6. Calculus and his videos aren't that long either. On the other hand, Professor Leonard teaches 6. Calculus and the Calculus Option perfectly, although his videos are usually more than an hour or two, so if you don't have enough time you may want to resort back to Eddie Woo. I haven't found a perfect teacher for teaching 5. Probability or 4. Vectors, but ExamSolutions does a pretty good job. However, also note ExamSolutions.net has videos that covers the whole IB Math Syllabus, while the other two aren't aimed at the IB, so if you can't find a video regarding a specific skill from Eddie Woo or Professor Leonard, then you should definitely see if he has a video. After each math class, ensure that you do understand the topic from your teacher. If you don't make sure you dedicate time to watching these teachers.
Practice: I found the best textbook to practice for me was the Cambridge HL Math textbook. They usually start off with some practice questions with commentary so you can understand the steps better. The questions then will start off with some basic repetition in order to get the skills built into you, then will progress to become more difficult, to the point where you can test how you really understand the topic. Find the chapter with the skill you learnt in class or online, then do ALL of the questions from the chapter (except the red ones cause those are hella hard). Also the cambridge textbook also has a solutions book which shows all the solutions together.
Test: This stage really shouldn't be done until you've finished the whole Topic, per say like finishing all of Topic 2 Functions and Equations. One you do that, a really good way of getting test questions is through the question banks (who knows, maybe your teacher may even repeat some of the question bank questions as they are past IB questions). I would recommend question bank v3 because even though those questions are from the old syllabus they still apply and are challenging enough. Question Bank v4 contains more recent questions, which personally I would recommend keeping off those until the May exams in DP2, because then you can attempt questions you haven't seen before.
I also wouldn't recommend making notes, but instead just making cheat sheets as I did above, with all the helpful things you used so by looking back you don't need to rediscover all the helpful things
Understand: With the right teacher, understanding the content of Math HL shouldn't be that difficult. Unfortunately, I took Math HL on Pamoja which was outright useless for me, cause the course can't teach. Luckily there are a ton of really good Math teachers online. If you can't understand any of the topics, one of these guys will have at least 1 video on it. Eddie Woo was really good at teaching 2. Functions and Equations, 3. Trigonometry and 6. Calculus and his videos aren't that long either. On the other hand, Professor Leonard teaches 6. Calculus and the Calculus Option perfectly, although his videos are usually more than an hour or two, so if you don't have enough time you may want to resort back to Eddie Woo. I haven't found a perfect teacher for teaching 5. Probability or 4. Vectors, but ExamSolutions does a pretty good job. However, also note ExamSolutions.net has videos that covers the whole IB Math Syllabus, while the other two aren't aimed at the IB, so if you can't find a video regarding a specific skill from Eddie Woo or Professor Leonard, then you should definitely see if he has a video. After each math class, ensure that you do understand the topic from your teacher. If you don't make sure you dedicate time to watching these teachers.
Practice: I found the best textbook to practice for me was the Cambridge HL Math textbook. They usually start off with some practice questions with commentary so you can understand the steps better. The questions then will start off with some basic repetition in order to get the skills built into you, then will progress to become more difficult, to the point where you can test how you really understand the topic. Find the chapter with the skill you learnt in class or online, then do ALL of the questions from the chapter (except the red ones cause those are hella hard). Also the cambridge textbook also has a solutions book which shows all the solutions together.
Test: This stage really shouldn't be done until you've finished the whole Topic, per say like finishing all of Topic 2 Functions and Equations. One you do that, a really good way of getting test questions is through the question banks (who knows, maybe your teacher may even repeat some of the question bank questions as they are past IB questions). I would recommend question bank v3 because even though those questions are from the old syllabus they still apply and are challenging enough. Question Bank v4 contains more recent questions, which personally I would recommend keeping off those until the May exams in DP2, because then you can attempt questions you haven't seen before.
I also wouldn't recommend making notes, but instead just making cheat sheets as I did above, with all the helpful things you used so by looking back you don't need to rediscover all the helpful things
HELPFUL MATH RESOURCES
- ExamSolutions: IB Math Tutorials
- Cristos Nikolaidis: IB Math Worksheets/Tests
- Professor Leonard: Online Teacher (Not IB, but freaking amazing for Core Calculus and Calculus Option, look under Calculus 2 and 3 playlists)
- PatrickJMT: Online Teacher (Not IB, but explains advanced concepts pretty well)
- Eddie Woo: Online Teacher(Not IB, but explains things really well in a short and concise time)
- Andrew Chambers: IB Past Paper Revision (Look for IB related playlists)
- Cambridge Calculus Option Worked Solutions
- MathBFF/NancyPi: Online Teacher (Different channels, same person. Idk there was some weird BTS drama or something)
- PassCalculusDotCom: Online Teacher (Not IB, but has pretty decent Calculus Videos)
- Kristin IB Math: IB Notes