New York Standardized Tests to Become Harder

It's no secret to public school teachers in New York: The state tests have become a joke. I can't speak to all subjects, but the prior statement is unequivocally true about Math especially at the high school level where some of the tests are laughable. In the mathematics curriculum, the laughable ease of the tests were most obvious in the Math A exams and, now, in the Integrated Algebra (IA) exam--both of which can be passed almost solely by doing OK on the multiple choice exams. The reason that the Math A and now the IA are so easy especially in comparison to other Math Regents exams (Math B /Algebra 2 Trig ) to pass has always been obvious to public school teachers. The easy one has always been the one that students must pass to get a diploma--No Child Left Behind rewards schools and states passed on High School pass rates...and not surprisingly our state responded -- by making it very easy to reach the minimum graduation requirement and proffering a very easy test to the students!

Well apparently, our state went a bit too far in its quest to ease up on the tests. According to a New York Times article, our students were doing better and better on state tests but our students were not doing any better on national tests. In other words, they were doing better in our state but when measured against students in other states...our kids were not showing any improvement.

So...expect the Integrated Algebra I exam to get a harder next year!

Math B: Thank God it's Ending!

Today, I sat down with the rest of the math teachers in our department to grade the January 2009 Math B regents. I found myself thinking "Thank god the Math A and Math B sequence is coming to a close this year" For those of you who are ignorant (blissfully so) of what has been largely seen as a failure: the math A and Math B sequences divide up the traditional Algebra I, Geometry and Algebra II sequence a little differently.  Rather than devoting one year to each of the aforementioned subjects,  Math A covers algebra I and some geometry. Math B covers the rest of geometry and Algebra II.  With few exceptions, schools teach these courses over a year and half. Anyone who has ever prepared a student for an end of the year standardized test like the New York Regents might immediately see the issue. There is a long amount of time and a large amount of material covered by the test.  At the end of June when studetns sit for the test, they must remember things from about a year and a half ago!  The Math B is particularly tough for most students becuase it covers a lot of  'real math' and the curve is much less forgiving than the Math A.  You also invaraibly get some curve ball questions like the logarithmic regression question, question 33.  The thing that was most annoying about this question is that you had to take a natural log regression--and natural logs are not even in the Math B curriculum

Having taught the course for years, I wondered to myself "Did I just not know that natural logs were on the curriculum." In the end, no teacher in our department could find anything about natural logs in the state's published curriculum! All you can wonder is ' what were they thinking when they wrote that question ?'