F5 Resit Approach

@tanya18 said:
I need to resit paper F5 in June and am unsure whether I should watch all the lectures again and then do exam kit questions; or just focus on doing the exam kit questions along with checking the solutions for a breakdown of the answers and just trying to revise the material that way, any advice?

Hi Tanya,
Practice as much as you can and if you go wrong note down the ones you have got wrong and read the solutions and then try then again, this will allow you to understand them.
First question are you scoring 40+? If you are then it is clearly more likely to be based on your exam technique than a lack of understanding of your material.
Do you finish the F5 paper when you sit it? If not try to follow the 1.8 minutes per mark approach as it is easier to get the first few marks on each question then spend a lot of time getting a couple of marks on a question and then struggle to finish the exam.
From my time in F5, I remember that a lot of people concentrate solely on the numerical side of F5, i.e. How to perform the various costing methods, etc… However, if you can try to understand the technical details, i.e How it works and try to explain it to someone simply as if you can do so this shows you understand the concept, not just the numbers and therefore can apply it to any question.
Another thing I recommend id reading technical articles, which for F5 are found here : (https://www.accaglobal.com/uk/en/student/exam-support-resources/fundamentals-exams-study-resources/f5/technical-articles.html)
They often can simplify difficult areas and help you to support your understanding. Also, occasionally more recent articles can appear in your exam too.

These are the key tips examiners are offering with regards to F5:
1. Understanding the reasoning behind calculations and how these calculations will be useful to management:

Questions which are testing a management accounting technique will usually try to make the link between the technique and its use as a performance management tool.
You must make sure that you have revised the syllabus thoroughly and have the knowledge required of these tools as exam changes mean that the syllabus can be examined in a lot of breadth.
You must make sure that you are applying your knowledge to the information in the question and using evidence from the scenario in your answer.
You must practise the written elements of CR questions in full, as this is where the examiner will test your understanding of the scenario and performance management implications of the question.

2. Managing your time effectively and identifying easy marks available:

There will be easy marks available in all sections of the exam and students who answer these questions usually perform well.
Students who do not manage their time and miss easy marks make it much harder for themselves to pass the exam.
You must make sure that you are using your exam time effectively to identify any OT questions in Section A or parts of questions in Section C that you can easily tackle and plan the order in which you will answer questions in the exam.
Make sure that you try to answer all the OTs in an exam.

3. Reading the question and understanding the requirement:

For OTs:

Read the question carefully and if it is a narrative OT read all the distractors carefully. Ensure you follow the instructions in the question on how to answer the question as different question types will require different interactions.

For CRs:

You must read the question very carefully and identify the instructional verbs used, remember there may be more than one thing to answer within each requirement. You must use the mark allocation to work out how much depth you need to go into in your answer.
Make sure that you are answering the question set not the one that you would like to answer.

Common pitfalls pointed out by the Performance Management examining team include:

Student’s failure to make the step up to Performance Management from the Fundamentals of Management Accounting exam – this is due to a lack of ability to interpret the calculations performed with reference to the scenario given.
Poor interpretation of data – this would be due to lack of planning and understanding the requirements of the question.
Poor technical knowledge and failure to closely read the question.
Not enough practice of the new question types shown in the specimen exams and past published exams from September and December 2016 to ensure familiarity with the new exam format.

Make sure that you are always thinking about these key skills during your revision and that each time you practice a question you are thoroughly reviewing your answer afterwards to identify if you need to work on any of these areas.

I hope that helps and if you have further questions, please ask.
Many Regards,
Samir

@tanya18 said:
Thanks for responding. I will do more practice questions and hope it all sticks. I feel like i covered everything and spend a lot of time trying to understand it all but can get quite confusing sometimes depending on the topic. I may do a question from kit and go through the answer. But just when i think i understand it and move onto another question from same topic it throws me off again.
Im scoring less than 40% in exam so for me I think it’s a mixture of technique and also remembering the individual techniques when it comes to carrying out the questions, as when practicing I can sometimes forget parts of topic by the time I need to start understanding another topic. It’s like my brain gets over loaded.
Do you have tips for remembering the extensive chapters and techniques or does it just boil down to simply practicing, understanding it all and hoping it sticks?

The key for remembering techniques for me is to try to explain it to yourself or someone else in the simplest way possible, if you can verbally explain a definition or approach then you are more likely to understand and able to apply those steps to any questions.
Is there any areas that you are particularly weak at? Often, people dislike variances and there are videos here and on YouTube that Acca have produced that can help in certain areas. The use of technical articles can help as they do try to simplify the more technical areas.
Do you know what type of learner you are? Some people prefer mind maps, other like videos and for me I like making my notes, reading it a few times and then spending rest of the time practising and practising. I think that you should know what you find difficult and that you should get the syllabus and note down areas that you dislike and then ensure you concentrate and understand that area well and then practise questions until you are getting them correct and that should help.
Unfortunately, practice is the best way to pass in my opinion, however reading the solutions given by the examiner can be very useful to understand why the approach used by the gave the correct answer. I would buy an exam kit from an approved partner of ACCA.