Hey DPI - Your Algebra 1 EOC is still (mostly) worthless as a math test.
Submitted by persondem on Sat, 06/07/2008 - 5:48pm
Our Dept. of Public Instruction latest version of the Algebra 1 End of Course Test, much like past versions, involves the reading of over 2500 words just to read the questions. That is the equivalent of reading Poe's Cask of Amontillado. Only about 18-20 of the 80 questions were true math questions; those would be questions that have instructions like solve, evaluate, and factor. The rest of the questions are either a paragraph with numbers and formulas scattered therein or a large matrix that takes up most of a page.
The Algebra 1 EOC is primarily a reading test with students' math ability a secondary concern. The test itself was 37 pages which is a little more than two questions per page. For a "math" test?!
Another problem is that many of the questions start with a problem type the student should be familiar with but adds a needless and irrelevant extension of the question that completely obscures the learning goal being tested. For students that don't read well or have recall problems, that is a pure nightmare. A teacher cannot cover all of those possible variations in a semester (90 min. class) or a school year (45 min. classes) , the concepts yes, but the all the possible extensions, no way.
DPI also plays games with the grading. A student can guess and score a 60; I have seen it. Ninth percentile will get a student a 60, just 10 points away from passing. Oh but here's where another DPI game comes in; a student must now score a 77 or better on the exam to pass the class. A student can have a 90+ average and score a 76 on the exam and be considered a failure. That student would have to retest. I have seen students with learning disabilities score 76's on EOC's after busting their butts doing their work for the whole semester/year only to be denied credit because of a single point on a stinkin' test on one stinkin' day. Oh sure they get to take the test again, but the damage is already done, damage that those students have been fighting to overcome their whole academic lives.
Teachers used to have the final say, but now teachers aren't trusted to decide which ones of their students have mastered the material. How would a doctor feel if every diagnosis had to approved by team of doctors in Raleigh that hadn't seen a patient in 10-20 years?
The bottom line is that our tests don't really measure much of anything. Life isn't a multiple choice bubble fest with answers provided. A 2007 comparison of our tests to NAEP scores show that NC has improved a bit; we now rate a D+ score. So our students are forced to sit through one, two, even three (summer school) versions of this "math" test that really tests reading before it tests math, but the questions are not quite like the ones they've been studying, all with a gun to their heads (the 77 cut off score) that is really a joke because you can get the 77 just by getting about half the questions right. Utterly pointless.
More info on high stakes testing from Alfie Kohn here including a nice quote from Paul Wellstone.
I am a teacher. I have to live with this mess every year, every semester. It needs to change.
Thank you for reading.
Mike
And thank you for writing
It's tempting for me to just chuck the whole damn mess of public school accountability, though I know from Graig that there are some pluses here and there. But it mostly seems like a clusterf*ck. I really don't know how you all do it.
Do good. Be nice. Have fun.
It kind of reminds me of that quote from Churchill(?) about
Democracy.
"It's the single worst form of government on Earth, save for all the others."
It's the only game in town. Teachers can still be a force for good even with a screwed up system. That's what gets us up in the morning.
Person County Democrats
Environmental Defense Fund
Cell phones will be to the 21st century what tobacco was to the 20th.
And Teachers like you are the reasons that children learn
despite the absurdity of the test you describe. Thanks for what you do, PD.
Be the change you wish to see in the world. --Gandhi
Pointing at Naked Emperors
Maybe I am old Skool
But word problems are extremely important for showing a student is capable of using mathematics in the real world.
to a degree
Yes they are, but to a degree. A few sentences? Sure. But a gigantic long paragraph? Not so much. At least not for Alegbra 1.
How many times a day/week/month do you solve
a system of two variables in two equations? Oh, and then just for kicks add the two numbers together? Some of the situations in the problems are realistic; most are silly and contrived.
What you are refering to (I think) is numeracy - the mathematical world's equivalent to literacy. Words do not develop numeracy; numbers, formula, equations and expressions develop numeracy.
The bottom line is what are we testing? Reading is already tested directly on the English 9 EOC and indirectly on every other non-math EOC. Some word problems would be ok, but not 75% of the test.
Also, testing a student on reading and math makes no sense if we are not sure that the student can do just the math.
Person County Democrats
Environmental Defense Fund
Cell phones will be to the 21st century what tobacco was to the 20th.
From a Student's Perspective
I don't see the big deal at all. If you don't like the standardized tests, how do you suppose we pass or fail students? I'd prefer to have more standardized tests rather than less, to make sure that variations in teacher's grading don't play a role in passing or failing.
Just as an example, for the math class i just finished, there are two different teachers in the school. Even though they worked together on the material and had similar assignments at times, the teacher I had was guaranteed for about 7 pts higher a grade than the other teacher. So is the solution that those kids who failed one teacher's class are screwed by her grading system, when they could've possibly gotten a C had they been dealt a different teacher? Wouldn't taking a standardized test here cancel out that effect or at least mitigate it?
I can say more, but I'm a little unsure of what points you are making besides the idea that standardized tests aren't the right idea.
Your teachers need to have "Common Assessments" with
a similar grading rubric. The situation at your school does sound unfair, but taking a meaningless test would not seem to be the answer. The 25% of your grade that the EOC accounts for wouldn't make that much of a difference anyways, and, in fact, hasn't made much of a difference as the 7 point discrepancy exists with the EOC situation as it is.
Did you follow the last two links in my OP?
Person County Democrats
Environmental Defense Fund
Cell phones will be to the 21st century what tobacco was to the 20th.
I only followed the first originally
"Second, do no more test preparation than is absolutely necessary. Some experts have argued that a relatively short period of introducing students to the content and format of the tests is sufficient to produce scores equivalent to those obtained by students who have spent the entire year in test-prep mode."
I'd like to see how this theory was tested. It is my thought that these tests are important because there has to be a way to verify the kind of job the teacher is doing. But i'll go along with you and say they shouln't count as 25% of the grade for the class and by making it worth a little less (10% is as low as i think it should go), then there will be a little less pressure.
Obviously, I can't say for a fact the kind of pressure that a school puts on it's teachers, but hopefully there can be an equilibrium that keeps the teacher honest but somewhat gives them the freedom to teach how they like.
Note: the math class i was in doesnt have an EOC.
I know you didn't mean this to be insulting, but you must
realize that this presumption of dishonesty is really hard to take.
Every profession has it's deadbeats, and teaching is no exception. What this could be a reaction to is the fact that the underpaying of teachers for decades lead to a "you get what you pay for" situation. But I can assert that close to all of the teachers I know and have known are dedicated to doing the best job they can do while operating under the constraints of a rather screwed up system.
The answer to keeping teachers honest is having effective, involved administrators, not a worthless series of contrived tests that do not effectively measure what they purport to measure. That's what the NAEP cmparison link in my OP is about.
Ah. Those two teachers still need to have common assessments to include their final exams. Cooperation and collaboration should eliminate that 7 point tilt.
Thanks for sharing your views.
Person County Democrats
Environmental Defense Fund
Cell phones will be to the 21st century what tobacco was to the 20th.