Mastering Criterion B for eAssessment Success

Start with a structured table so every student can begin; that is the Level 1-2 access the IB expects. Then ask students to state the patterns they notice and verify with a case outside the table. Then open it up: increase the complexity of the pattern or add a second variable, and ask students to find the rule connecting the variables, verify it and justify it, choosing their own method. The guide is explicit that a task which does not let students select a technique is too guided and caps at Level 4 in Year 5. Complexity matters too: a linear pattern, or a quadratic of the form ax² or ax² + c, is a simple pattern; a full quadratic, a cubic, an exponential or a rational expression is complex, and only complex patterns reach 5-8.

The 7-8 descriptor reads "prove, or verify and justify". Proof is one route to the top band, not a requirement. Students who verify with an out-of-range case and justify from the structure can reach 7-8 without a formal proof. That said, an examiner may write a task where proof is the natural route, so it is good practice to do a short algebraic proof once every week or two, for example showing that T(n+1) minus T(n) is constant. If your students find algebraic proof hard, make sure all of them are strong on verification and justification first.

The IB guide gives a non-exhaustive list. Simple patterns are linear, and quadratic in the form ax² or ax² + c. Complex patterns are full quadratics, cubics, quartics, exponentials, and rational expressions of the form f(x) over g(x). The distinction decides the ceiling: Levels 1-4 are written for simple patterns, Levels 5-8 for complex ones. A useful pair to show students is n2 + 9 (simple) against n2 + 6n + 9 (complex), both from the same shaded-squares picture.

They can score 5-6. If the student's process is complete and accurate from the general rule through verification and justification, and the only fault is that the pattern they observed was wrong, award Level 5-6. Level 7-8 requires the findings themselves to be correct. The guide adds one condition: the rule must be of an equivalent level of complexity.

Patterns often are sequences underneath, but do not fix that as the blueprint. A Criterion B task can sit inside any topic: a table of sin, cos, sin2 and cos2 values leads to a trigonometric identity; geometry, coordinates and area all generate investigable patterns. What makes it Criterion B is the process of collecting cases, generalising, verifying and justifying, not the topic.

Separate learning from assessment. During teaching, differentiate freely: vary how data is collected, scaffold the early prompts, run the same investigation at two levels of complexity. In a summative Criterion B assessment, and certainly in the eAssessment, the task is the same for everyone. The differentiation is in the product: the three-part architecture lets every student start, and the open final part lets stronger students show 7-8. On the platform side, Koncepts' student app serves criterion-tagged practice that adapts to the student's level.

Yes to both. In the Handouts section, Standard Handout turns a lesson plan into a topic-specific worksheet, and Mock Exam Practice Papers generates eAssessment-style practice. The Paper Builder generates a full eAssessment-style paper with interactives and images and can be confined to a single topic. On the second part: choosing a value outside the table is the verification step, and at 7-8 verification and justification go together. In the eAssessment the final part is open-ended, so a strong answer verifies with an out-of-range value, states that it matches, and then explains why the rule must hold.

This is a school-level and teacher-level decision. Some schools run MYP alongside a national curriculum and go deeper than the IB requires; the IB itself does not mandate that depth. What you can do at teacher level is build short 7-8 tasks that connect two topics, for example circles with Pythagoras or trigonometry, or a coordinate task that leads to a quadratic. Two or three such tasks across the year prepare students for the cross-topic patterns the eAssessment favours.

Question 7 is typically the long Criterion D real-life problem in Task 2, around 20 marks. It was outside this session's scope. The short version: Criterion D has five strands, and most marks are lost on the last two, justifying the degree of accuracy and justifying whether the solution makes sense in context. Teach students to end every Task 2 answer with two labelled lines, Accuracy and Does it make sense. A follow-up session on Criterion D is planned.