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hi my name's Debbie and I work for BPP professional education
I here to talk to you about the new format computer-based exams that are
going to come in
February 2014, specifically I'm going to talk to you about
the knowledge modules or the foundations in accountancy diploma
and ACCA F1 accountant in business, we're going to look
at the exam format, what has and hasn't changed, we're going to look at the skills that
you need in order to maximize your chances of
passing the exam and we're going to look in detail at the question types that
you're likely to encounter as you go through the paper. So firstly, let's look at what
hasn't changed
well the exam is two hours long, you have no reading time
and there are 100 marks available
what has changed is that now those 100 marks are available across
two sections, previously the exam was one big lump of a
section, now it's split up into section A and section B
so let's have a look in a little bit more detail then
at those two sections. So section A is 30 questions worth two marks for a total of
sixty marks and 16 questions worth one mark each
for total 16 marks, these questions are
likely to have a short scenario to which you're going to need to apply your
knowledge
in order to correctly answer the question, but you could just have a
question that's a pure knowledge test as well so
a question with no scenario. Section B is going to have six questions
worth four marks, these are likely to have a slightly longer scenario
and multiple tasks associated with them. All the questions are compulsory and the pass mark
is 50%. Okay, so let's have a look at those
exam skills then, so we've got four things to work our way through
the first exam skill is really a
given, it's learning and understanding the syllabus, so there are two
approaches here, we've got learning, which is about the
theoretical knowledge, so filing that away
and then understanding the syllabus which is about the practical application of
your knowledge
to a scenario, so we can't just learn and churn here we've got to make sure we
understand the context of
the knowledge that we've acquired so we've got to make sure that we're doing lots of
practice questions to check that we can
apply our knowledge to the scenarios. Second skill that we're going to need
is time management so we've got one hundred marks to find and we've got two hours
to do it in
that works out at 1.2 minutes per mark
so of course what we don't want to do is
to be looking at the clock every 1.2 minutes, we don't have time for that
so what we'll do is to divide the exam down into say half hour
sections so after half an hour has passed are you a quarter of the way through the paper?
we need to make sure that we've specifically sectioned off 29 minutes, so round about
half an hour
for section B, so we can devote the full time needed
to section B. Third skill then
is tackling objective test questions, so we're we going to look
in detail at the different question types that you're likely to encounter
in the question paper. So the first of these question types then
is the multiple choice questions, so we can see here that we've got
a short statement and we have to pick the most
appropriate answer, we only want to choose one answer of the
available three and this particular question is just worth
one mark, so we're choosing one answer from three options
if we had four options to choose from this question would be worth
two marks and because this is section A we get
no partial credit so the question is either correct
or incorrect, and we'll talk about that a little bit more later on
the other thing to notice with this question is we're asked for the most appropriate answer
what that means is that there's more than one answer here that is
technically correct
so what you'll have to do is demonstrate the strength of your knowledge by
picking the most appropriate answer, the best possible answer
out of those three. Next question type then is multiple response
so here we've got pick two of the
the four statements that we've got pick from so
we've got to make sure that we follow the instructions and pick two
answers, as we said a second ago
so this is section A, we have no partial marking
so if we were to only to pick one answer we wouldn't pick up one mark
so we need to pick two answers and if those answers are correct then we get two marks
if one of them is incorrect then we get no marks unfortunately
third question type is multi response matching
here you can see with this question we've got a reasonably
it's not a big scenario, but it's bigger than what we've seen so far
and we've got four decisions to make, so this particular question's going to take
a little bit more time than the other questions that we've looked at
and the true/false that we're going to look at in a second
but that's absolutely fine, so we know that some of the questions we do are going to be
nice and quick and easy
some of them are going to take a little bit more effort, a more little bit more time
but that's fine, we'll get a balance across the entire paper
so with this one we need to pick more than one answer, so we need an answer for
liquidity, an answer for operating costs etc
so that's a multi response matching question
final question we're going to look at in this section is a true or false
what you can see here is that we don't have a scenario, we've got a simple statement
is it right, is it wrong? All true/false questions will be for one mark
only and you've got to be really, really careful with this question
so if you notice we'd expect the answers to be
true then false, and what we've got is false then true
so there's no switching on the autopilot when you doing this exam
pay attention make sure you pick the correct answer
finally then, let's talk about those multi task questions, so where you've got a bit more
of a scenario,
something to get your teeth into, and a few tasks to answer
so these questions, there will be six of them, four marks each
and you've got to set aside round about half an hour to get this done
so make sure you keep on track with your timing
okay let's have a look at this question then, we've got the background, so we've got a little
bit of a scenario, we've got the information
and then we've got a new question type
so we've got two new question types in these multi task questions, we've got
to pick from a drop-down menu and then we've got hot spots as well
so we're looking at a drop down menu here, so the question says that we've got
four references to the functions of management, and so we've got four statements
and then we've got task one, which is select the correct reference
for each writer, so you click on the little arrow, drop down menu appears and you can click
you click on the correct reference for
each writer, so here what you'll notice is that for Peter Drucker I've selected
reference D, this particular task has two marks
you can see there we've got 0.25 out of two marks, so I've got this question correct
and as I go through, so I select an answer from Elton Mayo, if I get that correct
I'll get another half mark, I select
an answer for Henry Mintzberg, if I get that correct I'll get another
half mark, so in Section B we have partial marking
which is brilliant of course, partial credit for your efforts
so let's move on to task two
task two says from the list below identify two of
Henry Fayol's functions of management
so what you'll notice is that task two is on the same topic as
task one but they don't follow on from each other
so if you've made a little mistake in task one it doesn't matter
you get a clean slate for task two, this is a multi response question exactly like we
saw before
so you need to pick two answers rather than
just one and we've got two marks available
this is section B, so we do you have that partial marking don't forget
so here what you can see is I've selected one answer
and you know that this is the correct answer, but you can see that I've got no credit for that yet
what I need to do to get credit for that answer that's correct
is select another answer, so here if I picked motivating
I know that's incorrect, but if I didn't know the answer and I selected motivating
then I would get one mark, I'd get the one mark for having selected
one correct answer and then put the correct number
of answers into the exam
of course if I wanted the full two marks, I'd have to select two right answers
final thing I'm going to show you then for these multi-task questions
is the collapse function, what we can see on this slide
if that we've got the big orange plus
and then we've got three sections to the question, so we've got the background
then we've got task one and task two
so these questions they can be quite long so it's quite handy to be able to
collapse down
one or more of the tasks so that
you're just looking at the task that you're doing at the moment so we don't
get distracted
by all the stuff that's going on, so here we can see that we've got the background
so we can read
the scenario and then on the next slide if you want to take a look at task one we'll
just click
on the orange cross
or plus sign and expand task one, we can have a go at task one
once we've finished task one we'll click the little minus button
and then move on to task two
just a couple more things I want to remind you of then
just before I say goodbye
things to watch out for
when you're studying what you need to remember
is to do lots and lots of question practice, that's the main thing
you can practice the application of your knowledge to a scenario
then when you actually in the exam you need to remember to read the question
very very carefully they do try to trip you up
but that's something that we're prepared for and we're going to make sure that
we read the questions
and answer them correctly, other things of course
time management, pay attention to how quickly you're getting through those
questions and make sure you keep the pace up
if you need to you and then finally
next steps, so what should you do
after you've booked your CB, while you're preparing
for the exam, well what we would recommend is that you go to the ACCA
website and have a go at the specimen
paper, so fantastic resource there for you
just like sitting the real exam so go and have a look at that, there are two available
there's one that's a full length paper
and it's one that's some extra practice for those
multi-task questions, apart from that make sure you have a go at as many questions
as you can get your hands on so
acquire a practice and revision kit if you can and
do lots and lots and lots of question practice
get hold of your tuition provider
if you need any extra support, they will be more than happy to help you out
and other than that I wish you lots and lots of luck for you future studies