For Students

Study method and revision strategy, and the specific mechanics of IB assessment that no syllabus guide explains on its own.

A grade in IB Mathematics or Physics is not just a function of how well you understand the material — it is a function of how well your work matches what a mark scheme is actually looking for. This section exists to make those mechanics explicit: specific, checkable guidance on where marks are genuinely won and lost, not general study advice.

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The marks that go for reasons other than not knowing the maths.

Mathematics · IB

Where IB Mathematics Students Actually Lose Marks — And Why Knowing the Maths Isn't Enough

The Internal Assessment, exam communication, command terms, and GDC habits — the specific, recurring ways IB Mathematics students lose marks that have nothing to do with not knowing the material.

5 min read

Where marks are won and lost

How IB Mathematics and Physics work is marked, and how to revise against it.

Mathematics · IB

Where IB Mathematics Students Actually Lose Marks — And Why Knowing the Maths Isn't Enough

The Internal Assessment, exam communication, command terms, and GDC habits — the specific, recurring ways IB Mathematics students lose marks that have nothing to do with not knowing the material.

5 min read

Mathematics · IB

Why Your IB Maths Grade Is Stuck Despite More Practice

A diagnostic worksheet for students who recognise solutions but can't reliably reproduce the reasoning in unfamiliar questions — the gap most "more practice" advice misses.

3 min read

Mathematics and Physics · IB

IB Maths and Physics Exam Revision: Diagnose, Practise, Retest

A practical revision loop that connects past-paper errors to targeted practice and independent transfer, instead of a generic calendar and invented percentages.

4 min read

Where to Find IB Past Papers Legally, and How to Use Them Well

Official sample papers, school access, current syllabuses, and a way to turn a past paper into an actual diagnostic instead of just more practice.

3 min read

Internal assessment

The Mathematics exploration and the Physics investigation: criteria, weight and planning.

Physics · IB

IB Physics IA Criteria: Designing an Investigation You Can Defend

The Physics scientific investigation's real weighting, mark scheme and word limit — and the IB's actual guidance on how much data is enough, not an invented formula.

6 min read

Mathematics · IB

IB Maths IA Criteria: Which Rubric Applies to Your Exam Year?

The current five-criterion exploration rubric, the revised four-criterion model for May 2029 onward, and how to confirm which one applies to your own cohort.

3 min read

Physics · IB

Uncertainties in IB Physics: Absolute, Percentage and Propagation

The three forms of an uncertainty, the data booklet's three propagation rules, gradients from uncertainty bars, and where it all earns marks.

4 min read

Physics · IB

IB Physics IA Ideas: 15 Research Questions by Theme, With How to Measure Each

Three research questions for each theme of the 2025 course, each with what to vary and measure, the straight-line graph that answers it and the uncertainty that dominates.

14 min read

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