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Edinburgh Live
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Jacob Rawley & Iona Young

The 'impossible' maths exam question that both kids and parents struggle with

While there is a lot to miss about the high school years, it's unlikely that exams will be near the top of anyone's list.

For young people, exams can feel like the most important thing in the world at the time. That's why it can feel so horrible when you aren't able to get the results that you were hoping for report the Record.

READ MORE - First picture of 'kind and respectful' West Lothian man killed in crash with police car

However, it may not be all your fault. The experts at Save My Exams found a GCSE-level maths question so tough even parents couldn't get it right.

In Scotland, most schools do not sit GCSE exams with the exceptions of some private schools. Instead, Scottish students will sit a National 5 exam, to give you an idea of the age and level of students answering this question.

The maths question shows a shape with all its measurements in centimetres, where the area of the shape is A cm².

Respondents are asked to show that A = 2x² + 24x + 46.

Shockingly, not a single parent was able to correctly answer this question - which would suggest that the struggle with this maths problem was justified for their children.

Of the 1,000 parents quizzed, 92 percent were unable to answer the question and eight percent failed to get the correct answer.

Save My Exams' maths lead Lucy Kirkham has worked out the answer and shared advice for anyone left stuck by the question.


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She said: "Seeing questions with loads of Algebra can be scary but breaking them down into smaller chunks will help you work through them more easily.

"Our maths experts at Save My Exams create colour-coded model answers which break down each question into easier steps to carefully guide users to the correct answer.

"This question gives you the answer you're working towards, which can sometimes be off-putting as you wonder 'How am I ever going to get there?'. Don’t let it worry you, just try to start with the first step and you'll surprise yourself with how far you can get!

"Even if you don’t get all the way through, marks are awarded for different stages of your working so you can always try to pick up some marks and use our model answers to see how you’d pick up the rest."

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