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You may have a mental image of a mathematician – enormous forehead, crazy hair, thick glasses, tweed jacket over a tasteless shirt with pens neatly arranged in the breast pocket, gibbering manically away at a blackboard covered in crazy equations. Actually, I do know mathematicians like that – but we're not all so poorly adjusted. Being good at maths doesn't automatically turn you into a socially awkward egghead. That's not the only good news: you're also excused from having to understand all those crazy equations. There's virtually no algebra in the numeracy curriculum (just a few simple formulas). To solve the test series for ias all you need to be able to do is: - ? Add, take away, divide and multiply confidently. If you can do all of these, you're going to rock. If not, you're still going to rock, but you may want to spend some time getting a solid foundation in place. ? Figure out the right sum to do. This can be tricky, but if you can keep a clear head and think through what the question is asking, it will make sense in the end. Promise. ? Make sense of measures. 'Measure' doesn't just mean being able to use a ruler, although that's a good starting point. It's also about weighing, taking temperatures, telling the time and working with shapes. There are a few simple formulas you may need to know for area and volume. ? Read and understand graphs and basic statistics. Once you 'get' graphs, the answers start to jump off the page at you – there are only a handful of types of graph you need to care about, and you just need to figure out where each of them is hiding the information. Until you know that, graphs can be a bit confusing – but don't worry, I take you through them as gently as I can! Numeracy is a proficiency which is developed mainly in mathematics, but also in other subjects. It is more than an ability to do basic arithmetic. It involves developing confidence and competence with numbers and measures. It requires understanding of the number system, a repertoire of mathematical techniques, and an inclination and ability to solve quantitative or spatial problems in a range of contexts. Numeracy also demands understanding of the ways in which data are gathered by counting and measuring, and presented in graphs, diagrams, charts and tables. This definition makes me want to cry. A repertoire of mathematical techniques? You're not a performing seal. Here's my less technical, more useful for ias prelims . Numeracy is the maths the average person needs to stay out of trouble. Unless you're doing something pretty technical, you probably don't have much need for algebra, trigonometry or calculus in your daily life – but you may well need to be able to work out lengths and volumes, percentages, or to interpret graphs. So, numeracy is about useful maths skills that you could conceivably need to use at work, at home or anywhere else, and those skills are usually the ones that numeracy tests cover. What numeracy tests typically cover? Numeracy test questions tend to break down into four broad categories (although sometimes the questions bleed across the boundaries): ? Whole number arithmetic is about being able to deal with adding, taking away, multiplying and dividing. This is really the basis for all of the other categories, so knowing your number facts and methods really pays off. ? Fractions, decimals, percentages and friends are about working with the slightly more awkward but still useful sums. ? Measures, space and shape are used to talk about the world, whether you're describing how long a journey should take or how warm it is. ? Graphs and statistics come up all the time: at work, in the news, in adverts and so on. You only need to know a few basic types of graph and statistic for a numeracy test. ? Understanding numeracy ? Why you'd take a test ? What you need to learn
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Test Series for IAS, IAS Prelims, IAS Test, IAS Exam,
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