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Hello Mike,
I hope your keeping well, helpful as always.
It is that time again, exams are here. I failed my first attemp at P7 with 46 and P6 with 42 so anxious about this sitting.
Regarding P7 I covered most questions on BPP revision kit, mostly with looking at the answers and some on my own, I am currently doing your recommendation of reading the answer and writing a plan.
My problem (worry) is 1. I can’t put plan points to brief paragraphs and end up writing loads or 2. Every time I see the question I am stuck on how to answer it and get a panic mind thinking I am going to fail the exam again.
Any tips? Thank you.
Ok – I know exactly what you mean! Try this. Read a question from the kit and then immediately turn to the answer. If it’s a “typical” answer, it will be 4 or 5 pages long and there’s absolutely no way you could produce anything remotely similar.
However, the answer will have, hopefully, pretty much ALL the valid markable points for that question. Read the first 5 or 6 lines of the suggested solution and try to identify ONE markable point. Then read the next 5 or 6 lines and identify another point. And so on through the whole answer.
When I used to mark “written” papers, the official answers were always excessively long but, by applying that technique, I was able to reduce the answer to 20 / 25 important points ( summarised in the margin next to each paragraph )
Now, when you find that this is a viable way of summarising a “full” answer, turn your thinking round 180 degrees and recognise that, if you can find 20 / 25 one word key points, you should then be capable of blowing them up into full sentences. And don’t even try to aim for the length that the printed solutions suggest / imply.
One more point – before you start the above experiment, time yourself strictly over this next little exercise. Copy, that’s right, just COPY, a passage from the revision kit answers. For 1.3 minutes. See how much you can physically write in 1 minute 18 seconds.
My students average around 5 / 6 lines which consistently equals 2.5 lines of printed type.
That now tells you the MAXIMUM length of your sentences / paragraphs. Remember, one point per paragraph, one paragraph per point. And leave a line between your paragraphs.
Finally, read the two exam technique articles in the Student Accountant ACCA P3 Technical articles written by two different members of the P3 marking team. With only one tiny difference, they repeat almost verbatim my own thoughts about how to approach exam questions. But these guys are bang up to date – it’s been 14 years since I marked any ACCA exams
And good luck this time
i failed p5 this june 2013attempt.i got 43. this was my first attempt.i did with some past paper practice but a night before exam i was serious problems with suggesting myself,,, solutions to numerical part of questions..
your above advice is so practical that i am thinking to take p7 instead of p5…please advise should i do this?i am comfortable with your lectures as i listened those respective ones for f7 and p2…
should i try once more or turn to p7…the attraction to turning to p7 is also the feeling of ease of understanding from u as i remember u make my life easy for Question 1 of p2 side by side singing that song H’s own + H’s share…and the Christmas dinner example!!!!!!!If it were me, I’d do P7 – but that’s very much a personal choice. You may not like it – you may not be as full of BS as I am.
But try and see what you think
and good luck
Hi mike
I have this four left to do. P2,p3,p5 and p7.
I have decided to do p7 with p3 thus december But I overhead someone say u need to have knowledge f8 (done) and p2 ( not done yet) before attempting p7 and passing it first sitting . Just wondering if that’s true?yes in order to sit P7, you will also have to register for P2. When I had P2, P3, P6 and P7 left, I wanted to do P2 and P7, but I was required to also pay for P3. In the end I sat the three papers and passed them.
hi mike i am giving 3 papers in this session p3, p6 but for the last one iam confused whther to go for p7 or p5. i hav given p5 once but got failed but hav never given p7 and also wants to know that how much p2 is required for p7 and in terms of approach and marking scheme which paper is easy to give p5 or p7? thanks.
If you think logically about it, they must be pretty similar in terms of difficulty. If one were markedly easier than the other, no one would do the hard one! P2 standards are really a MUST for P7. On the other hand, I hear lecturers saying that P5 is just a (relatively) small step up from F5. But I also know of at least two very bright students who continue repeatedly to struggle with P5.
Personally, I would go for P7 – it seems that I have the required inherent level of BS to be able to make the most of whatever ability I have. But that’s not everyone’s strength.
I’m going to leave it to you – it has to be a matter of personal choice. Sorry 🙁
Like the shades in your pic!
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