Briefing session on

2024 HKDSE Mathematics

Extended Part Module 1
Contents

• General marking guidelines

• Candidates’ performances
• Examiners’ general recommendations

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General marking guidelines
• ‘M’ marks
for correct method with substitution
• ‘A’ marks
for correct answer that follows from the steps
• ‘1’
for correctly completing a proof or arriving at a given
answer
• f.t.
stands for ‘follow through’, all related parts should be
correct to be given this mark

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Question 1
Part (b)(i)
✓ Many candidates were able to compare P(C)P(D) and P(CD) to decide
if C and D are independent.
 Some candidates overlooked the range of X for event C , and wrongly
included P(X = 0) in P(C) .

Part (b)(ii)
 A common wrong answer was 0.4 resulting from the mistake of P(C) = 0.6
in (b)(i).

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Question 2
Part (b)
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 Some candidates wrongly took as P(F’W) instead of P(W|F’),
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3
and as P(W’|F) instead of P(FW’) ,
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where F denotes the event that the selected member is a female,

and W denotes the event that the selected member wears glasses.
And F’ and W’ denotes the complementary events of F and W
respectively.

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Question 3
Part (b)
 Some candidates missed the step k ln 0.875 < ln 0.15 (i.e. taking log/ln)
before writing the value of k .

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Question 4
Part (b)
✓ Many candidates were able to find the mean of the weekly revision time
of the girls in the sample but
 failed to proceed to find the standard deviation required.

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Question 5
Part (a)
 Some candidates failed to handle to negative index and gave
2 2
𝑛𝑥 = 𝑛𝑥 2 𝑛𝑥 3
.
𝑒 1+𝑛𝑥+ 2! + 3! +⋯

Part (b)
2
 A few candidates wrongly considered 1 + 4𝑥 𝑚
instead of
𝑒 𝑛𝑥
𝑚 2
1 + 4𝑥 + .
𝑒 𝑛𝑥

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Question 6
Part (a)(i)
 Some candidates used wrong presentation 𝑢 = 2𝑥 + 1 ∙ ln 𝑥 2 + 𝑥 + 𝑒
instead of 𝑢 = 2𝑥 + 1 ln 𝑥 2 + 𝑥 + 𝑒 .

Part (a)(ii)
 Many candidates failed to use the result of (a)(i) and chain rule correctly
to obtain the answer.
 Some candidates wrongly thought that
d 2
𝑥 + 𝑥 + 𝑒 2𝑥+1 = 2𝑥 + 1 𝑥 2 + 𝑥 + 𝑒 2𝑥 .
d𝑥
 Poor presentations, e.g. ln 𝑥 2 + 𝑥 + 𝑒 ∙ 2 , were found.

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Question 6
Part (b)
✓ Many candidates were able to use either slope-intercept form or point-
slope form with the result of (a)(ii) to find the equation of the required
tangent.

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Question 7
 Many candidates failed to set up an equation representing the relation
between the area of the picture and x , thus failed to find the rate of
change of the area required.

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Question 8
Part (b)
 Some candidates did not realise that the required region is below the
x-axis.
 Some candidates failed to evaluate the definite integral
−𝑥2 −𝑥 2 2
0.5 0.5 0.5 −𝑥
− ‫׬‬0 2𝑥 − 1 𝑒 2 d𝑥 by changing it to −2 ‫׬‬0 𝑥𝑒 2 d𝑥 + ‫׬‬0 𝑒 2 d𝑥 .
 Some candidates wrongly thought that
−𝑥2 2
0.5 0.5 0.5 −𝑥
− ‫׬‬0 2𝑥 − 1 𝑒 2 d𝑥 = − ‫׬‬0 2𝑥 − 1 d𝑥 ∙ ‫׬‬0 𝑒 2 d𝑥 or
−𝑥2 2
0.5 0.5 0.5 −𝑥
− ‫׬‬0 2𝑥 − 1 𝑒 2 d𝑥 = − ‫׬‬0 2𝑥 − 1 d𝑥 + ‫׬‬0 𝑒 2 d𝑥 .

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Question 9
Part (b)
𝜎
 Some candidates wrongly used s instead of in the standardisation of
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the normal random variable.
 Some candidates did not change to the standard normal variable Z after
5.4−5.1
standardisation, giving wrong expressions like P 𝑋 ≤ 1.2 .
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Part (c)
X
 Some candidates wrongly found the expected price of 1 pumpkin instead
of the required expected price of the 8 pumpkins in the trolley.

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Question 9
Part (d)
 Some candidates mixed up the probabilities P(Grade A) and P(Grade C) .
 Many candidates did not give correct combination coefficients or did not
consider all the possible cases.

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Question 10
Part (a)
 Some candidates did not show any substitution into the Poisson formula.

Part (b)
 A few candidates did not get the accurate answer because they did not use
enough decimal places from the answer of (a).

Part (c)
 Some candidates did not give correct combination coefficients or did not
consider all the possible cases for the expression in the numerator of the
conditional probability.
 Some candidates did not realise that a conditional probability is required.

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Question 10
Part (d)
The required probability is 7 6
−1.6 1.61 𝑒 −1.6 1.62 𝑒 −1.6 1.60 𝑒 −1.6 1.61 𝑒 −1.6 1.62
3.88𝑒 −1.6 7− 𝑒 + − 𝐶17 +
1! 2! 0! 1! 2!
7 6
𝑒 −1.6 1.60 𝑒 −1.6 1.60 𝑒 −1.6 1.60
1− 1− − 𝐶17 1−
0! 0! 0!

 Common mistakes included:

 using 1 instead of 3.88𝑒 −1.6 7 in the first term in the numerator,
𝑒 −1.6 1.60 𝑒 −1.6 1.61 𝑒 −1.6 1.62
 using 1 − instead of + in the numerator,
0! 1! 2!
 using a wrong denominator.

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Question 11
Part (b)
 A few candidates did not give the exact values as required.
 A few candidates mistook 2.5 as the intercept on the vertical axis instead
of the intercept on the horizontal axis.

Part (c)
 Many candidates wrongly used the interval [7, 11] instead of [0, 4] in
the trapezoidal rule.
 Some candidates used undefined notations like f(0) , f(1) .
 Some candidates made mistakes in defining a function, like
f 𝑥 = 𝑎 −𝑡 2 + 10𝑡 + 8 𝑒 𝑏𝑡 .
X
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Question 11
Part (d)(i)
✓ Many candidates correctly found the required definite integral by using
integration by substitution.
 A few candidates tried the substitution 𝑢 = 𝑒 0.4𝑡 without success.

Part (d)(ii)
d2 𝑃
✓ Many candidates were able to consider 2 to determine the nature of
d𝑡
the estimate found in (c).
 Most of them either got the second derivative wrong or
 did not explain in details why the second derivative is less than zero
for 0  t  4 .

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Question 12
Part (a)
d𝑅 d d𝑅
 Some candidates wrongly considered = 0 instead of =0.
d𝑡 d𝑡 d𝑡
d d𝑅
 Some candidates made mistakes in calculating .
d𝑡 d𝑡
 Some candidates did not show the correct column headers ( t and
d d𝑅
) in the table of the first derivative test. The test would be
d𝑡 d𝑡
considered wrong in this case.

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Question 12
Part (b)(i)
 Many candidates made mistakes in finding the required total profit
12 d𝑅
‫׬‬0 d𝑡 − 10 0.8 2𝑡+3 d𝑡 .
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12 0.82𝑡+3
 Examples include ‫׬‬0 10 0.8 2𝑡+3 d𝑡 = 10 instead of the
ln0 .8 0
12
0.82𝑡+3
correct answer 10 ,
2ln0 .8 0

12 2𝑒 0.5𝑡 −5𝑒 −0.5𝑡 2𝑒 6 +5𝑒 −6 −5 2

 and ‫׬‬0 2𝑒 0.5𝑡+5𝑒 −0.5𝑡−5 + 2 d𝑡 = ‫׬‬2 + 2 d𝑢 instead of the
𝑢

2𝑒 6 +5𝑒 −6 −5 2 12
correct expression ‫׬‬2 d𝑢 + ‫׬‬0 2d𝑡 ,
𝑢

where 𝑢 = 2𝑒 0.5𝑡 + 5𝑒 −0.5𝑡 − 5 .

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Question 12
Part (b)(ii)
 Some candidates failed to formulate the answer with the correct limit
d𝑃
notation lim .
𝑡→∞ d𝑡
 Some candidates missed important intermediate steps in evaluating the
2−5𝑒 −𝑡 2𝑡+3
limit, such as lim −𝑡 −0.5𝑡 + 2 − lim 10 0.8 .
𝑡→∞ 2+5𝑒 −5𝑒 𝑡→∞

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Examiners’ general
recommendations
• Read the question carefully to give the required
answer or exact values as appropriate;
• Grasp the counting of cases in combinations;
• Grasp the integration of exponential functions with
base not equal to e ;
• Grasp the method of testing for maximum or
minimum;
Examiners’ general
recommendations
• Grasp the use of the limit notation and the
evaluation of a limit;
• Grasp the correct method of judging whether a
second derivative is less than or greater than zero
with particular attention paid to the interval being
considered; and
• Pay attention to the accuracy required for the final
answer, and maintain sufficient accuracy in the
intermediate results for this purpose.
END

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