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2015 Exam Review
#1
The Review of Oct 2015 exam was held yesterday;  I hope to get some notes of this available here in about a week.  The IRSE have promised to make the video recording and Powerpoint slides considerably quicker than was achieved last year.

In summary, the most important items-

1. It was confirmed that the Reading List is to be amalgamated into the Study packs for each of the modules and that the latest revisions will gradually be placed on the IRSE website member's area over next month or so.


2. It was stated that there will be some changes regarding eligibility to enter for a module in the 2016 exam and that the details of this will be published in the next IRSE News.

3.  Syllabus not changing this year; a reminder though that it did change for 2015, so when looking at any earlier past paper need to beware that since that date there has been some shifting of topics between modules, some new topics, some emphasis changes.

4. Another warning to candidates was that they should certainly not rely on any topic appearing in 2016 and if it does it may not be in the same form as previous years- this is particularly true of track calculations, aspect sequence diagrams and stopping headway calculations.

and then the usual pleas

repeated YEAR

after YEAR

after YEAR ...............

Read the question and read the entire question before you start answering any of it and then answer what was asked.  The answer to last year's question (or any previous year's question) is not going to be correct for answering the question set- these may have some relevance of course, but do not learn last year's answer and reproduce it!

Here are some screenshots of the results-
[attachment=1986]
[attachment=1988]


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As the last talk in the YM seminar prior to the exam review, I did a session about Preparing for the IRSE Exam.
Several people asked me for slides but the file size is large (some 25MB) , so I have placed on this Dropbox link

https://www.dropbox.com/s/a1bjx670fn7ka8....pptx?dl=0
PJW
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#2
(18-03-2016, 09:11 AM)PJW Wrote: The Review of Oct 2015 exam was held yesterday;  I hope to get some notes of this available here in about a week.  The IRSE have promised to make the video recording and powerpoint slides considerably quicker than was achieved last year.

Hi Peter

I logged onto the live stream- yes very sad i know- the sound quality was very bad i gave up after about 10 mins
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#3
(18-03-2016, 03:56 PM)StrongLifts5x5 Wrote:
(18-03-2016, 09:11 AM)PJW Wrote: The Review of Oct 2015 exam was held yesterday;  I hope to get some notes of this available here in about a week.  The IRSE have promised to make the video recording and powerpoint slides considerably quicker than was achieved last year.

Hi Peter

I logged onto the live stream- yes very sad i know- the sound quality was very bad i gave up after about 10 mins

A great pity because I do think it was a worthwhile innovation, although the timing of the IRSE Exam event (which cannot realistically be changed as early evening is the only time going to be able to get examiners to be able to attend) does mean it is late at night for India and stupid o'clock for places further east.

I'll make sure the IRSE know that it was unsatisfactory audio.
PJW
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#4
(18-03-2016, 03:56 PM)StrongLifts5x5 Wrote:
(18-03-2016, 09:11 AM)PJW Wrote: The Review of Oct 2015 exam was held yesterday;  I hope to get some notes of this available here in about a week.  The IRSE have promised to make the video recording and powerpoint slides considerably quicker than was achieved last year.

Hi Peter

I logged onto the live stream- yes very sad i know- the sound quality was very bad i gave up after about 10 mins

A great pity because I do think it was a worthwhile innovation, although the timing of the IRSE Exam event (which cannot realistically be changed as early evening is the only time going to be able to get examiners to be able to attend) does mean it is late at night for India and stupid o'clock for places further east.

I'll make sure the IRSE know that it was unsatisfactory audio.
PJW
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#5
(18-03-2016, 07:56 PM)PJW Wrote:
(18-03-2016, 03:56 PM)StrongLifts5x5 Wrote:
(18-03-2016, 09:11 AM)PJW Wrote: The Review of Oct 2015 exam was held yesterday;  I hope to get some notes of this available here in about a week.  The IRSE have promised to make the video recording and powerpoint slides considerably quicker than was achieved last year.

Hi Peter

I logged onto the live stream- yes very sad i know- the sound quality was very bad i gave up after about 10 mins

A great pity because I do think it was a worthwhile innovation, although the timing of the IRSE Exam event (which cannot realistically be changed as early evening is the only time going to be able to get examiners to be able to attend) does mean it is late at night for India and stupid o'clock for places further east.

I'll make sure the IRSE know that it was unsatisfactory audio.

I still have not yet managed to complete writing up my notes and my various other commitments for the next week makes it very unlikely that I'll make any more progress any time soon.  
Therefore I will put on a "how it is at present"; it is basically complete for the first few pages but then gets rather more scrappy as it progresses into a few odd notes, interspersed with bits I have tidied up a bit.  So more or less complete as far as module 4, but not so good after that.  
When it rises to the top of my priority list again, I'll complete it and then supersede this version, but better than nothing.
PJW
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#6
I have noticed that the IRSE have now published the video webcast (and the associated Powerpoint slides from the examiners) on
http://www.irse.org/knowledge/public/tec...casts.aspx

Do note that it is currently at the very top and so if you just look at the list of webcasts you may miss it and only see those of previous years - it is only then that I noticed the heading said "other webcasts" and the 2015 Exam Review was the "latest just added".

Mind you the generic messages from the examiner about
READING THE QUESTION,
READING ALL AS A WHOLE BEFORE STARTING and
TIME MANAGEMENT
haven't altered very much from year to year!
PJW
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#7
Just to add PJW, READING THE QUESTION actually means UNDERSTAND WHAT THE EXAMINER IS ASKING FOR. It is very easy under the pressure of exam questions to misread, misinterpret or assume what the question is asking for. Maybe we should consider a mini-session in July to aid peoples' technique

Jerry
Le coureur
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#8
(17-05-2016, 08:18 AM)Jerry1237 Wrote: Just to add PJW, READING THE QUESTION actually means UNDERSTAND WHAT THE EXAMINER IS ASKING FOR. It is very easy under the pressure of exam questions to misread, misinterpret or assume what the question is asking for. Maybe we should consider a mini-session in July to aid peoples' technique

Jerry

I do agree that it is not actually purely READING; one of the problems which people face is that many lack a sufficiently wide experience to be able to pick up on all the nuances of the question and therefore fail to respond to all the elements within it.  Some of it is actually not reading carefully enough; for the Atkins event Dhanya reported over a third of the participants didn't complete the registration form correctly and in many cases sent it to email addresses other than that specified on the form (and that does not require any detailed signaling knowledge!).

It looks like we have a good number of tutors available on the Saturday, so the re is certainly the option to offer quite a range of stuff for participants to choose between.  One of the tasks I need to do as soon as I can find the time is put forward a proposal for timetable and I'll certainly bear that in mind.  I did give such a presentation on the morning of the mod1/7 event;  to ring the changes would you like to lead on such at the Signet event?

The bulk of the mod1/7 event was taken up by David (mod1) and me (mod 7) leading group discussions of various questions and we did try to emphasise  throughout; some of the same students will be at Derby but in general the participants will be different and yes it is well worth repeating and demonstrating almost ad nausiam.  The mod 5 coverage at Signet has generally been more focused on demonstrating of equipment mainly for people who are not intending to sit the exam in the following October; hopefully this year we will be able to split into enough small groups that we can offer more in the way of written question attempts at mod 5 as well as mod 3; however as you imply there is quite a lot of "common mode" in the failures for the different modules.
PJW
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#9
(11-05-2016, 12:38 PM)PJW Wrote: I have noticed that the IRSE have now published the video webcast (and the associated Powerpoint slides from the examiners) on
http://www.irse.org/knowledge/public/tec...casts.aspx

Do note that it is currently at the very top and so if you just look at the list of webcasts you may miss it and only see those of previous years - it is only then that I noticed the heading said "other webcasts" and the 2015 Exam Review was the "latest just added".

Mind you the generic messages from the examiner about
READING THE QUESTION,
READING ALL AS A WHOLE BEFORE STARTING and
TIME MANAGEMENT
haven't altered very much from year to year!

As far as I can see this is the 2015 exam review, I.e. the review of the 2014 exam paper. I cannot find the slides & podcast for the 2015 exam paper (i.e. 2016 review.)
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#10
(20-05-2016, 10:02 AM)TheRailwaySignaller Wrote:
(11-05-2016, 12:38 PM)PJW Wrote: I have noticed that the IRSE have now published the video webcast (and the associated Powerpoint slides from the examiners) on
http://www.irse.org/knowledge/public/tec...casts.aspx

Do note that it is currently at the very top and so if you just look at the list of webcasts you may miss it and only see those of previous years - it is only then that I noticed the heading said "other webcasts" and the 2015 Exam Review was the "latest just added".

Mind you the generic messages from the examiner about
READING THE QUESTION,
READING ALL AS A WHOLE BEFORE STARTING and
TIME MANAGEMENT
haven't altered very much from year to year!

As far as I can see this is the 2015 exam review, I.e. the review of the 2014 exam paper. I cannot find the slides & podcast for the 2015 exam paper (i.e. 2016 review.)


You are right!
I fell for it- clearly I did not read the answer!
PJW
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