Re: [math-fun] NY State math exam flap
I haven't had time to look at the test itself, so I will rely on your thoughts. Word problems are _always_ somewhat ambiguous; I think that that is the point of them. They test the student's ability to use common sense and abstract the important elements. That's why the easiest way to confuse student in word problems is to give them extraneous information. They keep trying to incorporate all the information, and all of the information isn't necessary. Are you telling me that in this era where _everyone_ practises for tests, using Kaplan, internet, whatever, that students aren't prepared for these kinds of tests? I keep hearing stories about teachers teaching _only_ for the tests. One would expect that under these conditions, the students would do well on the tests, but still not know any math. But we have an even worse situation -- they don't do well on the tests, and they don't know math, either. Perhaps students did better (as when we were in high school) when they didn't actually "study" for the tests. At 08:22 AM 7/3/03 -0400, William Thurston wrote:
On Thursday, July 3, 2003, at 12:35 AM, Henry Baker wrote:
I looked at the exam on the web. There were many questions that to me seemed poorly designed. This particular question as you paraphrased it may be something that you think most people *should* be able to do, but in reality I think few high school graduates actually master it, since, in particular, solid geometry is generally not taught. The actual question was about a juice container something like 2" x 4" x 5", and it asked how long a straw would fit diagonally, to the nearest tenth of an inch. A straw is not the same as a line, and the thickness of the straw (not specified, of course, and *intended* to be disregarded) would actually be likely to change the answer. People who've been taught a particular mechanical formula for this particular question can do it, but otherwise, it's likely to be a time-consuming and futile exercise, compounded by trying to calculate square roots presumably without a calculator.
So NY state responded to the high failure rate by canceling the test. So what about the students who passed? Do they have to take the exam over again? The nature of the public school system is that the curriculum is dumbed down to the level of the stupidest students. The liberal news media is always concerned that the system fails the students of lesser ability, but for some strange reason they just couldn't care less about the more gifted students achieving their own potential. A while back the New York Times had a flaming liberal named Richard Rothstein who wrote a column on education. This Rothstein fellow presented as a reason to oppose vouchers that gifted students would be able to leave the worst schools, and thus no longer be available to serve as role models for poorer students. I expect that Mr. Rothstein was told to shut up and put his red flag back in the closet until the time is right to wave it. Perhaps the fundamental cause of the educational crisis is not the details of the curriculum, or the details of the test, but rather the monopolistic nature of state controlled public education. __________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? SBC Yahoo! DSL - Now only $29.95 per month! http://sbc.yahoo.com
does any of you know of the level of mathematics teaching in the former soviet union (or Hungary) during versus after the communist periond? I suppose state control over education can be both effective or ineffective, dependent on the quality of those controls. I for one had good and inspiring teachers, but the mathematics studies were scary (so I took chemistry). A continuing education, after joining the workforce, would be a plus. As my dad used to say, (pun ..) mathematics and religion share the property that they are inward focussed, not observing the outward world, like the sciences. (end pun) Wouter. ----- Original Message ----- From: "Eugene Salamin" <gene_salamin@yahoo.com> To: "math-fun" <math-fun@mailman.xmission.com> Sent: Thursday, July 03, 2003 7:24 PM Subject: Re: [math-fun] NY State math exam flap
So NY state responded to the high failure rate by canceling the test. So what about the students who passed? Do they have to take the exam over again? The nature of the public school system is that the curriculum is dumbed down to the level of the stupidest students.
The liberal news media is always concerned that the system fails the students of lesser ability, but for some strange reason they just couldn't care less about the more gifted students achieving their own potential. A while back the New York Times had a flaming liberal named Richard Rothstein who wrote a column on education. This Rothstein fellow presented as a reason to oppose vouchers that gifted students would be able to leave the worst schools, and thus no longer be available to serve as role models for poorer students. I expect that Mr. Rothstein was told to shut up and put his red flag back in the closet until the time is right to wave it.
Perhaps the fundamental cause of the educational crisis is not the details of the curriculum, or the details of the test, but rather the monopolistic nature of state controlled public education.
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participants (3)
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Eugene Salamin -
Henry Baker -
wouter meeussen