[OT] Maths GCE O-Level text books from 70s-80s ?

[Tim Watts]

Can anyone remember the name and/or author of their GCE Maths books?

I'm interested in O level and AO (Additional O) level. Ideally London Board (which was different to the O&C).

I've been looking at the GCSE books for maths and physics in order to help the sprogs - and I'm appalled by the lack of material covered.

I've located some text books I had in the 80s:

A Level maths: Bostock and Chandler series (Some doubt over exactly which book(s) as I did Further Maths too but this looks familiar:

O Level Chemistry: CHEMISTRY: A PRACTICAL APPROACH, A.L. BARKER, K.A. KNAPP (Easy as both were my teachers)

O Level Physics Ordinary Level Physics by Abbott, A.F. Certain about that one

A Level Physics: Advanced Level Physics by M Nelkon, P, Parker (Not sure which edition, either 3rd or 4th)

So it's the O Level and AO Maths I'm missing here - and recollections, no matter how vague, would be welcome :)

[Huge]

Not a scooby. 'O' Level was 47 years ago.

[Michael Chare]

And earlier!

[Martin Brown]

You should be able to find them in a copyright library- though which ones your school actually used might be harder to determine. Old exam papers are usually available too - they make interesting reading.

Spherical trig and great circle navigation was still on the syllabus when I did it as were the basics of integral and differential calculus.

[Brian Gaff]

I never did exams at School I'm completely self taught lets see, three andtd three are 9.... :-)

Brian

[Broadback]

What a Wally, everyone knows it is thirty three

[TimW]

Can't help with specifics, but I always use

to search the catalogues of almost every book dealer in the uk and quite a lot of those in the world. TW

[John Rumm]

Not for O level... The only maths one I recall is the K A Stroud book of Engineering Maths that I had (in fact still have) later.

Keep in mind the syllabus is potentially very different from our day. There also seems to be a trend for each exam board to produce their own revision guide. These are ok and worth having, but tend to be very "busy" with the loud "angry fruit salad" school of page layout and colour selection!

There were a set of books the school had that I recall for their covers decorated with a set of "Heath Robinson" style line drawings of daft machines. I don't recall much else about them though.

I remember those, although did not own copies. I have a pair of books by Tom Duncan ("Fields, waves, & Atoms" and "Materials & Mechanics"), and then a single volume by Roger Muncaster which is quite good but also very concise.

[John Rumm]

I was looking for some old papers the other day - in particular A Level Computer Science from around '86 (A.E.B IIRC). Not found it yet...

[Huge]

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LOL. I was appalled when I saw my best friend's daughter's 'A' Level Maths revision guide. It looked like the Beano!

[Tim Watts]

I've been trying searches like that for 3 days :)

It's how I remembered the Bostock and Chandler (recognised the image) but no joy with my O Level books :(

Although the Alpha and Beta books were in use at my primary school (we got Beta as we were thick)

[Tim Watts]

Indeed they do! I found some from my time - and interestingly, Cambridge still run a GCE O Level syllabus for other countries (Singapore is one IIRC) as our GCSEs are a relative joke.

And yes, O Level physics is decently hard back then (and even now with the Cambridge one) - but the GCSE (pre 9-1 system) is a complete joke. More like "general science".

Markov chains, proper permutation and combination calculations, decent amount of calculus, matices (to be fair, most of those were AO level and A level)

[Tim Watts]

Would Bob have a lead on those?

[Tim Watts]

Interesting resource - thank you.

That allows searching by publication date, so that would help.

[Tim Watts]

Yes indeed. My plan here is to add some extra material where it seems useful and to go into more depth on whatever subject they are learning today.

That might ring a bell...

[Tim Watts]

And A Level maths is less tainted than GCSE Physics. If you looked at that (AQA) you would weep.

When I bought the A Level physics book, I saw comments saying "found this useful for 1st year uni". *sigh*

I've heard it from the other side too - asked a Senior Lecturer in physics at a good uni, what he thought of the British kids.

The reply was essentially: totally behind, compared to many of the foreign students - we have to run a remedial maths course in the 1st year...

[Geoff Clare]

My school used the "School Mathematics Project" books in the 1970's. They were published by Cambridge University Press, but we used them for the London Board O, AO and A levels.

[Huge]

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Aren't some STEM courses going to 4 years now, so the Uni's can teach remedial maths in the first year?

[Dave Plowman (News)]

For O level maths? (No O levels when I were at school in Scotland)

[Tim Watts]

I did not know that...

Presumably the oriental kids will enter straight in at 2nd year?