Wednesday 31 August 2016

A basic area ACCA F6 students are neglecting!

Planning your answers may seem like an obvious piece of advice from the ACCA examiner, but it is surprising just how many student launch straight into answering a question without taking time to think about how they are going to approach it. This has resulted in poorly structured answers, making it difficult for the examiner to identify the key points that have been provided and whether therefore the requirements of the question have been met. 

Here are some of the ACCA examiners’ remarks on this issue:
“This is where the 15 minutes of reading time can be well spent in planning out how to approach and layout a slightly more difficult or unusual answer. Although not computationally difficult, the question did require some prior thought.”ACCA F6 Examiner's Report -December 2015

“....workings were often badly laid out, hard to follow, and repeated the same points. It is in such situations that the reading time can be put to good use in planning an appropriate layout.” ACCA F6 Examiner's Report - September 2015

“....although candidates needed to plan their answers carefully in order to deal with the group losses without having to redo calculations.”  - ACCA F6 Examiner's Report - June 2014

It is recommend that you allocate yourself some planning time at the start of each question to think about the issues and identify the points you intend to address. This is even more important for questions that involve carrying out complex calculations. By taking just a few minutes to think about how you are going to tackle the answer, you will avoid muddled workings which the examiner cannot follow.

Sometimes students are reluctant to do this due to the time pressure in an exam situation, but the feedback from the examiners emphasises that typically the best answers are well structured and show signs of a plan.

This is just some of the points addressed in our ACCA F6 Examiners' Guide. See what others issues have been identified by going to - ACCA F6 Examiners' Guides


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