Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:can someone explain how do your kids get to learn trigonometry in fifth grade? why are they doing it?

Parents who sign their children up for things like aops or RSM. There's a reason a bus takes kids to after school prep from the same ES that offers AIM to 5th graders. Their kids from that same school who are taking honor's geometry in 6th. Some families really value education and push their kids. I'm fine with it personally. In fact, why not let kids go at their own pace?

which elementary is this?

Btw we value education, and we value math, but trigonometry in middle school doesn't make sense for 99.9999% children. I've known several medalists from math olympiads and none of them did trig in elementary school. There are many, many difficult math problems to master before you move on to the next concept.

Cold Spring is the one most often mentioned here. (If you ignore the posts about fictitious schools intended to foster consternation.)

The school's administration apparently has facilitated ongoing family requests for this for years. Other elementaries may have interested students, but families can run into variable opposition from school admin; making this happen can be logistically difficult. Presumably, CSES has a large group of families requesting it to go along with the ingrained pattern. From some of what MCPS has said, I'd think it's more Algebra in 6th than Geometry, but it's possible some outliers among this outlier situation do that, and there are reported to be a handful of students getting that kind of fourth-tier extra acceleration in one-off situations outside of CSES.

All good if:

The pull came from student interest/well identified capability and not just family push, and

Families and students fully understood the downstream effects (e.g., super-advanced classes that would need to be taken in high school), and

The differential cost of providing the class was minimal/didn't interfere significantly with other programming needs of higher priority, and

MCPS acknowledged it openly instead of effectively hiding it, making sure that similar accommodation was available to students anywhere else in the system (as a PP noted, there really are kids who just love Math; I know an ES student who since at least 3rd grade has gravitated to Math texts -- the adult kind -- when they went to the library), and

MCPS didn't use criteria for magnet eligibility or selection that are directly affected by this exposure (less of a concern, of course, if there were to be equivalent awareness/access across the system).

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:can someone explain how do your kids get to learn trigonometry in fifth grade? why are they doing it?

Parents who sign their children up for things like aops or RSM. There's a reason a bus takes kids to after school prep from the same ES that offers AIM to 5th graders. Their kids from that same school who are taking honor's geometry in 6th. Some families really value education and push their kids. I'm fine with it personally. In fact, why not let kids go at their own pace?

which elementary is this?

Btw we value education, and we value math, but trigonometry in middle school doesn't make sense for 99.9999% children. I've known several medalists from math olympiads and none of them did trig in elementary school. There are many, many difficult math problems to master before you move on to the next concept.

The trig required to score 300 plus on the map-m is fairly basic. I believe it is also covered at the end of magnet geometry at TPMS.

Everything on map-m is basic. The concepts are advanced but the problems are trivial.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:can someone explain how do your kids get to learn trigonometry in fifth grade? why are they doing it?

Parents who sign their children up for things like aops or RSM. There's a reason a bus takes kids to after school prep from the same ES that offers AIM to 5th graders. Their kids from that same school who are taking honor's geometry in 6th. Some families really value education and push their kids. I'm fine with it personally. In fact, why not let kids go at their own pace?

which elementary is this?

Btw we value education, and we value math, but trigonometry in middle school doesn't make sense for 99.9999% children. I've known several medalists from math olympiads and none of them did trig in elementary school. There are many, many difficult math problems to master before you move on to the next concept.

The trig required to score 300 plus on the map-m is fairly basic. I believe it is also covered at the end of magnet geometry at TPMS.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:can someone explain how do your kids get to learn trigonometry in fifth grade? why are they doing it?

Parents who sign their children up for things like aops or RSM. There's a reason a bus takes kids to after school prep from the same ES that offers AIM to 5th graders. Their kids from that same school who are taking honor's geometry in 6th. Some families really value education and push their kids. I'm fine with it personally. In fact, why not let kids go at their own pace?

which elementary is this?

Btw we value education, and we value math, but trigonometry in middle school doesn't make sense for 99.9999% children. I've known several medalists from math olympiads and none of them did trig in elementary school. There are many, many difficult math problems to master before you move on to the next concept.

Anonymous wrote:can someone explain how do your kids get to learn trigonometry in fifth grade? why are they doing it?

Parents who sign their children up for things like aops or RSM. There's a reason a bus takes kids to after school prep from the same ES that offers AIM to 5th graders. Their kids from that same school who are taking honor's geometry in 6th. Some families really value education and push their kids. I'm fine with it personally. In fact, why not let kids go at their own pace?

I'm an elementary SDT and we definitely use the MAP data at my school to help teachers address student needs. Our teachers are required to pull MAP reports, analyze the data (with some coaching from us), and then engage in a data meeting with our administration, reading specialist, and myself to ensure we don't have kids slipping through the cracks. We like to celebrate the growth kids make while also encouraging teachers to reflect about what's working for certain kids and where students can grow. We help them plan for intervention groups within their classrooms. Sometimes you have students who score perfectly fine and pass the cut score for a testing window but just aren't growing. In that case, we consider how the teacher could possibly provide enrichment opportunities for the student.
All that being said, it is one data point. However, it's a heck of a lot more useful than MCAP scores that come out six months later. We like to use MAP scores in conjunction with the formative assessments teachers are using day to day in the classrooms.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:MAP _scores_ are not useful, but are unfortunately used for gating access to magnet and pre-algebra or algebra class, instead of a proper aptitude or summative test.

The detailed skill reports that teachers get are partly useful.

No one is gate kept out of pre-Alg or algebra or any further math class by MAP M scores. If you take the preceding class, do well and can show you have met the standards from that class(which includes assessment in that class) you should be ready for the next math class and teachers will recommend you for such. MAP scores are not the only measurement.

Tell that to the central folks running the MS math magnet lottery and recommending placement for 4th & 6th grade.

Anonymous wrote:can someone explain how do your kids get to learn trigonometry in fifth grade? why are they doing it?

WPES, doncha know.

Anonymous wrote:The detailed report lists topics you must master to improve your score. The problem is teachers almost never share this or even look at it themselves. I've only had one teacher ever share it and I've asked almost every year.

+1. You have to ask about this specific report. Each time I’ve asked I’ve had to explain which report I’m talking about and the teacher has had to go figure out how to get the info. It’s sad that they aren’t looking at. The only hope is that some SDT or someone is actually pulling the data to determine where worn is actually needed in any given class.

Anonymous wrote:MAP _scores_ are not useful, but are unfortunately used for gating access to magnet and pre-algebra or algebra class, instead of a proper aptitude or summative test.

The detailed skill reports that teachers get are partly useful.

No one is gate kept out of pre-Alg or algebra or any further math class by MAP M scores. If you take the preceding class, do well and can show you have met the standards from that class(which includes assessment in that class) you should be ready for the next math class and teachers will recommend you for such. MAP scores are not the only measurement.

Anonymous wrote:can someone explain how do your kids get to learn trigonometry in fifth grade? why are they doing it?

Some kids like math.

Some kids like math a lot.

Some kids like math a heck of a lot.

Some kids like math a whole heck of a lot, full beans.

It's all free online at Khan Academy.

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Anonymous wrote:thank you! this is helpful, but only goes to 220 or something. what do difficult questions look like?

There are no difficult questions on the MAP. It is a test of basic grade level math. There are higher grade level questions on the MAP.

Be aware that level 220 material means "if you get half of these questions correct, you'll get a score of 220".

It's the same as main math content through Algebra 2 / Integrated Math 3(including statistics modules)

230+ is prealgrebra
235+ is algebra 1
245+ is high school geometry
~255+ is algebra 2

Your score is the level where you get 50% correct.
So if you know 100% of algebra and 50% of Algebra 2, you'll get a score around 260.


https://www.khanacademy.org/math

Where did you get those numbers from? My kid got 270 at the start of 6th and not only is unfamiliar with algebra 2, but certainly doesn’t know all of algebra 1, or likely, any geometry.

Are the 4 subscores the same or unbalanced?

Are you sure your kid doesn't know any? Basic geometry ramps up through elementary school. Talented kids can work out higher level problems using their intuition, if they have had exposure to the symbols or get word problems. Most of the data&statistics topics can be solved totally intuitively as long as you know arithmetic. The 50% "RIT" standard is 50% of the content of the basic non-honors curriculum, which includes review and respin of earlier year content.

Also, due to the "50%" logic, if your kid knows 100% of something and 0% of something else, the scoring algorithm can get confused trying to give a final rating.

The sub scores are usually relatively balanced when I’ve seen them. The MAP report doesn’t give the sub scores only “extremely high” or something like that.

The teacher/admin can see the subscores and can forward you that report, if desired. There's a brief that just shows the subscores and a full report that contains specific content suggestions/teaching objectives. I'm not sure if they are allowed (by NWEA, which produces MAP) to disseminate the latter, but I've seen it.

I’m the PP and I’ve seen those in the past and they are not helpful as they essentially say “very high” for everything and do not differentiate or identify any weakness (to the extent that there are weaknesses at 99th percentile +)

The detailed report actually does go into that. Unfortunately, teachers rarely if ever share it.

Again, I have received the detailed report in the past. There is not enough difference between high scores in all areas to provide anything meaningful. In fact, if I recall correctly, the sections for “areas to focus on” were blank. Remember this is god a score about 30 points above 99th percentile I believe.

not sure what you expect there. the test doesn't have the resolution to provide you with extra fine grained insight.

I don’t expect anything. I was just telling the PP why it wasn’t helpful.

can someone explain how do your kids get to learn trigonometry in fifth grade? why are they doing it?

Anonymous wrote:The detailed report lists topics you must master to improve your score. The problem is teachers almost never share this or even look at it themselves. I've only had one teacher ever share it and I've asked almost every year.

Could you get it by requesting to review your child’s educational record? (I just don’t know what is in the record.)

The detailed report lists topics you must master to improve your score. The problem is teachers almost never share this or even look at it themselves. I've only had one teacher ever share it and I've asked almost every year.