Dr. O's Practice Exams

[jthias]

Lucky you on those last few exams, are they Course 1 problems SOA/CAS problems or problems he made......

I don't know; I haven't made the distinction yet between his problems and past exam problems. I've just been focusing on the problems and his solutions.

[Durh]

Prior to purchasing your manual, I was under the mistaken assumption that doing problems that are more complicated and seemingly less related in general than those appearing on the actual exam would be an inefficient way of preparing for the exam. Passing an actuarial exam is already a battle, and I viewed this more challenging approach as an uphill battle. Although I did very poorly on practice exam six in terms of performace, I was genuinely surprised at how well I adapted to the new level of difficulty after successfully following the solutions to the difficult problems in their entirety. Granted, it took me considerably longer to understand some solutions, but I got a much larger return on knowledge for the amount of time invested. In certain cases the knowledge gained went beyond what is presented in the portion of the manual that deals with understanding concepts by reading text and following/doing related examples. Rather than buckling under the pressure of these harder exams they challanged me to become a better actuarial student and adapt to a higher level of standards, and for that I am sincerely grateful.


jthias

Jthias,

Congratulations! You're on your way to a perfect 10 in the actual exam.:smiloe:

Durh

[sohpmalvin]

Prior to purchasing your manual, I was under the mistaken assumption that doing problems that are more complicated and seemingly less related in general than those appearing on the actual exam would be an inefficient way of preparing for the exam. Passing an actuarial exam is already a battle, and I viewed this more challenging approach as an uphill battle. Although I did very poorly on practice exam six in terms of performace, I was genuinely surprised at how well I adapted to the new level of difficulty after successfully following the solutions to the difficult problems in their entirety. Granted, it took me considerably longer to understand some solutions, but I got a much larger return on knowledge for the amount of time invested. In certain cases the knowledge gained went beyond what is presented in the portion of the manual that deals with understanding concepts by reading text and following/doing related examples. Rather than buckling under the pressure of these harder exams they challanged me to become a better actuarial student and adapt to a higher level of standards, and for that I am sincerely grateful.

I agree with that. It has been my methods of studying mathematic since I was in secondary school, that scoring mathematic is not necessarily a matter of doing many exercises, but doing challenging exercises.

Dr. O's exam 6 to me until now is the hardest one I have ever encountered. Just for your information, jthias, test 9 is another monster test (to me) :laugh: But that really serves the purpose: It helps me to cope with various kind of question, and trains me to deal with questions by using different approaches.

Be encouraged! I have finished the test 11. Going to try out the final one (The one that I have is the second lastest version) in the next few days.

[tini6959]

I got 12/30 on both ASM exams 6 & 9. That being said, I took P unprepared in May and got a 4.

Regardless, those exams are infinitely more difficult than the first 5 (I scored at least 76.66% on all 5 of them) and a bit more difficult than 7 & 8. I can say I've learned more from 6 and 9 than all the others put together so far...

I may not pass again in August, but I'm giving it my best shot. Should of started doing these exams 3 mos. ago.

[jthias]

Jthias,

Congratulations! You're on your way to a perfect 10 in the actual exam.:smiloe:

Durh

Thanks Duhr, but at the pace I'm going my sentiments are like those of tini6959. I've been busy lately and have only been able to do exams 6 through 8 with an overall 50% success rate. I should have done these exams sooner

[jthias]

I agree with that. It has been my methods of studying mathematic since I was in secondary school, that scoring mathematic is not necessarily a matter of doing many exercises, but doing challenging exercises.

Dr. O's exam 6 to me until now is the hardest one I have ever encountered. Just for your information, jthias, test 9 is another monster test (to me) :laugh: But that really serves the purpose: It helps me to cope with various kind of question, and trains me to deal with questions by using different approaches.

Be encouraged! I have finished the test 11. Going to try out the final one (The one that I have is the second lastest version) in the next few days.

Good thing you picked it up at an early age I'm doing the dreaded number 9 tomorrow (which is actually today since I'm typing this early this morning). Once I get through the entire set of harder exams (6 and above) I'll try to complete at least two exams per day on subsequent passes. Time is growing short, got to try to make up for lost time

[Durh]

Thanks Duhr, but at the pace I'm going my sentiments are like those of tini6959. I've been busy lately and have only been able to do exams 6 through 8 with an overall 50% success rate. I should have done these exams sooner

You're welcome. It's too early to get discouraged. Just do what you're doing and be confident when walk into the exam. You have all the time in the world to feel bad afterwards if you fail, which I really doubt.

The practice exams are meant to prepare you better. Every time you run into an obstacle, you're growing stronger. That's why you're studying now. If you're ever gone to gym, you know that you don't see immediate result for every push-up you do. But even when you're not seeing anything, you're building your muscles. By struggling through those exams, you're building your actuarial muscles.

An overall 50% success rate means a lot. Please keep in mind that the primary purpose of doing these exams is not testing but learning. From your previous postings, I can tell that you're indeed learning from them.

You have time. Just study and you'll be fine.

Durh

[jthias]

Finally finished the first 5 practice exams.

The results: 29 27 20 26 26

I found the 3rd and 5th exams to be more difficult than the others. I wonder if anyone else has the same occasional bad habit as I of having the right answer but choosing the wrong letter. I did that twice on this set of practice exams. Going to modify my studying routine a little bit based on the results of the third exam by spending time each day reading problems, and creating a plan of attack without solving them - try to improve my reading comprehension skills, as silly as that sounds. When I get nervous during exams (if they are difficult) my reading comprehension becomes more like reading incomprehension.

Here are the final results for anyone that's curious.
[CODE]
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14
29 27 20 26 26 11 18 16 16 21 17 20 17 21[/CODE]

85.33% 58.15% 67.86%

First % on left is average on first 5 exams, middle % is average on remaining exams, and
last % is overall average. Some days I did better than others. I was tired or exam conditions weren't as good (noise from outside, neighbors,etc). Other days I was more lucky with guesses, more clear-headed, etc.

[rjkst14]

Here are the final results for anyone that's curious.
[CODE]
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14
29 27 20 26 26 11 18 16 16 21 17 20 17 21[/CODE]

85.33% 58.15% 67.86%

First % on left is average on first 5 exams, middle % is average on remaining exams, and
last % is overall average. Some days I did better than others. I was tired or exam conditions weren't as good (noise from outside, neighbors,etc). Other days I was more lucky with guesses, more clear-headed, etc.

are these your final scores with the points you recieved from guessing as well or just the number of problems that you knew how to do from the set.

[jthias]

are these your final scores with the points you recieved from guessing as well or just the number of problems that you knew how to do from the set.

The scores include guessed answers. I treated these exams like real exams and left no answers blank.