Sorry, if the RADII are 1 and 3cm and the point of contact, A, is marked
on the larger circle then why isn't the answer 3? Of course, if A were
only marked on the smaller circle the answer would have been 1.
Jane Galbraith
PS But I'm glad some people know a Poisson can't be negative.
> It was said that in the USA a multiple choice maths question was answered
> by
> over 100,000 examinees of whom only one had the temerity to point out that
> all the answers were wrong. The question was as follows:
> "A circle of radius 1cm rolls round the outside a circle of 3cm. The
> point A is the initial point of contact of the two circles. How many
> revolutions does the smaller circle make before it returns to point A? 2?
> 3? 4.5? 6?"
>
> A Cambridge statistical examiner was criticised for asking candidates to
> prove that both the sum and the difference of two Poisson variables has
> the
> Poisson distribution. This time the bolder entrants did comment that
> Poisson variables cannot be negative.
>
> Gavin Ross
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Ted Harding" <[log in to unmask]>
> To: <[log in to unmask]>
> Sent: Thursday, June 09, 2011 8:22 AM
> Subject: Oh those exam questions!
>
>
>> Greetings All!
>> Perhaps a bit off-topic for us, but I reckon it's a
>> good place to ask the question.
>>
>> I've been repeatedly hearing/seeing teasing news items
>> about the "unanswerable" AS-level exam questions set by
>> different exam boards:
>>
>> A maths question which was impossible to answer
>> because not enough information was given (OCR)
>>
>> A business studies question which did not give enough
>> information (AQA)
>>
>> A multiple-choice biology question which gave several
>> possible answers but not the correct one (Edexcel)
>>
>> (descriptions quoted from the BBC News website).
>>
>> I say "teasing" because I'd love to know the details of
>> these questions, just to see how "goofy" they really are.
>> But nowhere have I come across citations of the actual
>> questions themselves, nor any detail much more specific
>> than the above.
>>
>> So can anyone provide full citations, or pointers to where
>> they can be found?
>>
>> My interest is aroused because I've set (and seen) a good
>> few exam questions in my time, and therefore have an eye
>> for the "warning signs" of a dodgy question. I'd like to
>> be able to see how blatant these were in the above cases!
>>
>> With thanks, and best wishes to all.
>> And apologies if I have set an unanswerable question.
>>
>> Ted.
>>
>> --------------------------------------------------------------------
>> E-Mail: (Ted Harding) <[log in to unmask]>
>> Fax-to-email: +44 (0)870 094 0861
>> Date: 09-Jun-11 Time: 08:21:58
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