Reply to 23 Baltimore City Schools Have Zero Students Proficient in Math

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Last one, now that I have learned to post pictures. These are all from the MD state released items/practice test 3rd grade Math test:

[img]https://i.imgur.com/dlNiVGj.png[/img]

I think it is tricky, for a third grader.  Yes, of course, I think it would be wonderful for all third graders to be able to answer a question like this that shows they are truly able to understand the application of math. Instead of just asking a simple question: "What is the area of this rectangle?"

But - the fact that many students aren't able to answer questions like this doesn't mean they are learning nothing in math. Just that these questions are pretty tricky for them to understand.[/quote]

I think it's important to point out that a lot of these word problems were made because of allegations from marxists that math is somehow racist against black people - that they can't understand abstract concepts (which is in itself an extremely racist viewpoint but one pushed by many black civil rights advocates). But of course they will understand things like "tyrone has five mixtapes and lost two" or "uncle jim is painting a garage." It is, however, ironic that the black kids in baltimore schools cannot even answer the contextualized questions that the education marxists have forced into the curriculum[/quote]

[b]This question is somewhat elitist. How many people have garages or paint the floors? I can see why kids can't relate to these problems. They don't make sense.[/b][/quote]

Noce try -- but no. the problem isn't that some kids don't have garages or paint floors.

I'm the teacher who posted the questions and said that they were too word dependent and convoluted.

I tried the above word problem out on my third grade ESOL students today, individually. These students are pretty good students, academically, IMO.

None of them were able to correctly answer the area of the garage floor question. They didn't understand what was being asked.  When I asked "what does the amount of space" mea?  Point to that part of the picture ... they pointed to the sides of the rectangle.

But unfortunately they also didn't know how to calculate the area of the square, even when I explained - I said "The question is asking you - what's the area of the rectangle? can you tell that from the lenth of the sides?"

No they could not.

They could finally do it, when I drew all the squares in as a grid, and showed them how to count them all.

[/quote]
 Just think of all these questions--if you have to process them in another language than your own, remember what things like "garage floors" are if you've never had one, connect that the word "space" should connect to a formula for calculating area, and then calculate it.  And then do question after question on that?  For over an hour at a time.  The tests are often not written the best because it's hard to design tests that serve different age groups/cultural backgrounds, have decent psychometric properties etc.  The level that is considered "proficient" is often arbitrary and has been frequently changed (in VA for instance, the SOL bar was considerably raised in the past decade making people think scores have gone down when actually the measure went up in difficulty).  Students may not be motivated to perform on a test that has absolutely zero impact on them individually--they don't receive a grade for it or any kind of credit--schools are not allowed to do that.   A fundamental analysis of motivation would say--a ton of kids might rather not try at all so then they can say if they got a low score that they just wrote in whatever.  Better than working hard on something that has no credit and then doing poorly on it.  Basic work-saving and face-saving 101.

Yet people blithely assume that the tests are telling something "true"  about proficiency.  I'd rather look at their ongoing classwork and trust teachers' judgment.  But people think somehow they are going to get "objective" data by these testing means.[/quote]

The majority of the students are not foreign. They were born here to parents born here.

And even for those that are, you’re not making a case for easier exams. You’re actually making a case for separating out the immigrant kids until they have adequate language skills, the same as they do in places like Germany.[/quote]

I'm not making the case for anything except for the claim that I don't trust these tests as a measure of proficiency.[/quote]

How many people who were born here have garage floors? I was born here, but I never had one and I wouldn't think you would be painting one if I did.  If I were in 3rd grade, half my brain would be wondering why someone would be painting the floor their car drives on and then forget the question.  And I have a math degree![/quote]

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