The Larmor Society

IA Maths B

This is officially the option for people who have done Further Maths at A-level, but this doesn't stop you from taking it if you haven't. It will be a bit more work though, as you won't have met complex numbers, matrices or second order differential equations before (amongst other things) and they'll go through them relatively quickly.

Speaking from personal experience (I only did AS Further Maths) it's definitely possible to do Maths B, it's just quite demoralising when everyone around you understands what's going on and you don't!

The advantage of taking Maths B comes when you reach the exams, as you'll get a wider choice of questions. The disadvantage is that during the course the lecturers will move through the material more quickly as they'll assume you're familiar with some of it. There's also a sizeable proportion of material in the B course which is not in the A course but this generally tends to be quite easy to get to grips with. There are no practicals in Maths, although there is a computing assessed exercise in Lent term which you'll have six computing lectures to prepare you for. This is absolutely nothing to worry about, honestly, it's self-explanatory and you get nine weeks to do it (Maths A people also have to do it as well I'm afraid).

Subjects that go with Maths B:

It's usual to do Maths B if you're also doing Physics B in the first year. If you're thinking of doing Physics in the second year, Maths B will be a good investment (although not essential). You'll need to do Maths B if you want to do Maths in Part IB. For all other subjects it doesn't matter which you do.

Which textbooks?

You'll find that the lecture notes are pretty bad for Maths. They've got the stuff you need to know in them, but no examples at all. There are examples classes, normally three or four a term in which the lecturer will go through some questions, but these will often clash with your timetable. Your most useful resource in Maths will probably be your supervisions.

A book that everyone tends to get is Riley, Hobson and Bence's 'Mathematical Methods for Physics and Engineering,' which follows the course really well (you'll even find questions from it reproduced on your question sheets). The only problem is that whilst it's very detailed and comprehensive, it doesn't have enough example problems. It's definitely worth getting if you're planning to do Maths in Part IB (and you'll get 20% off in the Cambridge University Bookshop with your student card).

A good book to buy for examples of how to do questions is Stroud's 'Engineering Mathematics' and 'Advanced Engineering Mathematics.' It just throws hundreds of examples at you and can be a real help. The only problem is that you would need to get both books to cover the syllabus as some topics are split between them. It's probably best to get these out from the library as and when you need them.