Algebra I in MS ... standard reqs?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:DD was the only kid in her teacher's Algebra I class to get a hundred on the finals, and several of her friends missed one question (she thinks she knows which one). The finals were all multiple choice. She said that it was really hard, because there were no outlier answers that you could eliminate off the bat. The answers were all very close to each other, or what you would get if you made silly mistakes (for instance, she initially did a problem with square roots, and the answer was one of the choices, but on review she caught that it was cube roots), so you actually had to work out the whole problem. Since the test is timed, that added some pressure as well.

Sounds like a well-designed final exam. Who should we give credit for creating it? The teacher?

I think it’s a team effort. All the Algebra IH kids got the same test (DD has friends that have other teachers). Until this thread, I had assumed that the questions came from Gatehouse, or was otherwise the same across schools. Which, I should have known better.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:DD was the only kid in her teacher's Algebra I class to get a hundred on the finals, and several of her friends missed one question (she thinks she knows which one). The finals were all multiple choice. She said that it was really hard, because there were no outlier answers that you could eliminate off the bat. The answers were all very close to each other, or what you would get if you made silly mistakes (for instance, she initially did a problem with square roots, and the answer was one of the choices, but on review she caught that it was cube roots), so you actually had to work out the whole problem. Since the test is timed, that added some pressure as well.

Sounds like a well-designed final exam. Who should we give credit for creating it? The teacher?

I think it’s a team effort. All the Algebra IH kids got the same test (DD has friends that have other teachers). Until this thread, I had assumed that the questions came from Gatehouse, or was otherwise the same across schools. Which, I should have known better.

Perhaps you should have known better. I certainly thought this data point was very interesting, just like the comment by the teacher who earlier in the thread pointed out that they give final exams in Algebra I without Desmos. (Which presumably implies that the kids don't get to constantly use Desmos during practice and tests/quizzes.)

In my child's MS Algebra IH class (in VA but outside FCPS), it was Desmos all the way after Unit I because, according to the teacher, "that's what the SOLs allow." (And then the SOL replaced the final exam.) It is great to hear that this is not a law that everyone follows and some teachers still stand up for their students and enforce high standards.

[Anonymous]

YuppersLocal wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't know about other schools but my Longfellow kid had a final and got a C ... after getting an A- so far in the course and doing all review packs from teacher. Also got pass advanced on SOL. Doesn't seem like the final matched the prep. WTH.

Another Longfellow parent here. My kid studied hard for the Algebra 1 Honors final (with a tutor!). Had a B+ in the class and got a passed advanced on the SOL -- got an F on the crazy hard final. An F! A total mismatch between the course, the SOL, and the final. That seems like the teachers fault and not the kids'.

That's ridiculous and I agree, shows poor teaching or poor course design - there's some kind of mismatch there. What's the teacher's take on how your child could get an F after clearly doing well on what the course and state had expected up to that point?

[Anonymous]

From the original post...what does an Algebra I final project (instead of an exam) look like? Interested to know how that could be considered comparable to the final exam experience that most FCPS schools seem to require for the class based on this thread.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:DD was the only kid in her teacher's Algebra I class to get a hundred on the finals, and several of her friends missed one question (she thinks she knows which one). The finals were all multiple choice. She said that it was really hard, because there were no outlier answers that you could eliminate off the bat. The answers were all very close to each other, or what you would get if you made silly mistakes (for instance, she initially did a problem with square roots, and the answer was one of the choices, but on review she caught that it was cube roots), so you actually had to work out the whole problem. Since the test is timed, that added some pressure as well.

Sounds like a well-designed final exam. Who should we give credit for creating it? The teacher?

I think it’s a team effort. All the Algebra IH kids got the same test (DD has friends that have other teachers). Until this thread, I had assumed that the questions came from Gatehouse, or was otherwise the same across schools. Which, I should have known better.

Perhaps you should have known better. I certainly thought this data point was very interesting, just like the comment by the teacher who earlier in the thread pointed out that they give final exams in Algebra I without Desmos. (Which presumably implies that the kids don't get to constantly use Desmos during practice and tests/quizzes.)

In my child's MS Algebra IH class (in VA but outside FCPS), it was Desmos all the way after Unit I because, according to the teacher, "that's what the SOLs allow." (And then the SOL replaced the final exam.) It is great to hear that this is not a law that everyone follows and some teachers still stand up for their students and enforce high standards.

DD would have loved Desmos for her tests. She was complaining about how they were expected to factor polynomials with large numbers in them by hand (the horrors!).