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Rebecca Patterson

California students show moderate gains in English and math - latimes.com - 0 views

  • 50% scored proficient or better in math, compared with 48% last year. The scores are the highest since the standards-based testing began in 2003.
  • Students who were considered at grade level — or proficient — in English-language arts increased from 41% to 44%. In math, from 39% to 43%.
  • Over the last four years, the total of Reseda students who score at grade level or better in English rose from 39% to 47%; the percentage actually dipped slightly this year. In math over that period, the figure rose from 18% to 22%.
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  • About two-thirds of the school's students are low income and 18% are learning English.
  • Test score gains are highest in elementary schools and drop off precipitously in middle and high school.
  • Across L.A. Unified, fewer than 20% of high school students scored proficient or better in general mathematics, algebra 1 and 2 and geometry. In fourth grade, by contrast, 67% of students tested as proficient or better in math.
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      Oh, my!!!! Here is the connection to the elementary article about losing connection with students!
  • In math, the numbers are 76% for Asians, 61% for whites, 41% for Latinos and 34% for African Americans.
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      Proficient or better scores.
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    New California Stats.
Rebecca Patterson

Why Schools Don't Value Spatial Reasoning - Forbes - 0 views

  • I suspect that testing spatial reasoning, especially in a standardized way, is more difficult than standardizing the testing of math and verbal skills. Again, this has to do with the limitation of resources and the limitation of trying to test 3-dimensional reasoning on a 2-dimensional surface.
  • Which means that such skills are either seen as being “beneath” or unattainably advanced to most people.
  • Until that cultural change happens, though, I suspect that those kids and their parents interested in the world of spatial intelligence will still have to find avenues outside of school to hone their skills
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    Opinion piece regarding math process education versus spatial reasoning skills. Interesting!
Rebecca Patterson

Math Disability Tied To Bad Number Sense - Science News - 0 views

  • Mazzocco and her colleagues previously found that the ability to estimate approximate quantities without counting generally improves during childhood and is related to math achievement
  • Mazzocco’s group studied 71 ninth-graders whose math abilities had been tested annually since kindergarten. Students completed two quantity estimation tasks. In one series of trials, participants saw an array of blue and yellow dots flash for a fraction of a second on a computer screen and indicated whether more blue or yellow dots had appeared. In other trials, students saw nine to 15 yellow dots flash on a screen and estimated how many dots were shown.
  • Mazzocco’s group studied 71 ninth-graders whose math abilities had been tested annually since kindergarten. Students completed two quantity estimation tasks. In one series of trials, participants saw an array of blue and yellow dots flash for a fraction of a second on a computer screen and indicated whether more blue or yellow dots had appeared. In other trials, students saw nine to 15 yellow dots flash on a screen and estimated how many dots were shown.
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  • Mazzocco’s group studied 71 ninth-graders whose math abilities had been tested annually since kindergarten. Students completed two quantity estimation tasks. In one series of trials, participants saw an array of blue and yellow dots flash for a fraction of a second on a computer screen and indicated whether more blue or yellow dots had appeared. In other trials, students saw nine to 15 yellow dots flash on a screen and estimated how many dots were shown.
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    I wasn't able to highlight this one in diigo for some reason. Please take a quick read as it is pretty short.
Rebecca Patterson

States Fail to Raise Bar in Reading, Math Tests - WSJ.com - 0 views

  • The report shows huge disparities among the standards states set when their tests are converted to the NAEP's 500-point scale. In eighth-grade reading, for example, there is a 60-point difference between Texas, which has the lowest passing bar, and Missouri, which has the highest, according to the data. In eighth-grade math, there is a 71-point spread between the low, Tennessee, and the high, Massachusetts.
  • South Carolina was the only state to drop standards on every math and reading exam during the study period.
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    National comparisons.
Rebecca Patterson

In turnabout, teachers give students Apples, hope iPads boost test scores - Wednesday, ... - 0 views

  • The $49 Fuse application allows users to learn at their own pace, Blumenfeld said. If students miss a class, they can tap into about 400 video tutorials led by textbook author Edward Burger, a math professor at Williams College in Massachusetts. “Videos allow for anywhere, anytime instruction,” Blumenfeld said. “For students who might have missed class or didn’t understand the lesson, you can push a button and have it explained again and again. You have a teacher available anytime, anywhere.”
  • Test scores in Riverside, Calif., jumped 30 percentage points, from 60 percent to 90 percent proficiency in math, he said. A smaller iPad program in some of Chicago’s elementary schools also resulted in improvement, Ebert said.
  • Indeed, Algebra 1 is one of the most-failed courses in the School District, Ebert said. All Nevada 10th graders are tested on the freshman-level math subject before they can graduate. Only half of the students in Clark County passed the math section of the High School Proficiency Exam on their first try last year. A quarter of students won’t pass the math section by their senior year and, as a result, will fail to graduate. This year, the district has identified about 9,000 seniors who haven’t passed the proficiency exam. They are at risk of dropping out, Ebert said.
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  • At the time, the technology we used (in math class) was a graphing calculator,” he said. “Today, these kids have the privilege to learn math in a new, innovative way
  • Only the Fuse algebra application and a few key tools are loaded onto the devices. At school, students are blocked from inappropriate sites via firewalls. The App Store, where iPad users can purchase games and other applications, is locked on the device, but school officials are looking at opening the online store in the future. Freshman Catherine Rodriguez, 14, flashed a big smile as she received her new iPad. Math isn’t her strongest subject; she hopes the new technology will help her, she said. Passing math is a big concern for Rodriguez’s mother, who took three years to pass pre-algebra, she said.
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    Interesting place to funnel school district money. There should be some good research coming out on this application in the next few years.
Rebecca Patterson

Va. Community Colleges Dive Headfirst Into Remedial-Math Redesign - Students - The Chro... - 0 views

  • Mr. DuBois wanted the system to become smarter in how it invested in people, talent, and technology, as well as do a better job of taking advantage of its size and resources.
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      Glenn DuBois, the chancellor
  • One study by the college system found that only 16.4 percent of students sent to developmental-math classes ever managed to pass a college-level math course.
  • Recent high-school graduates are among the most vulnerable. They become frustrated when they learn they can't immediately enroll in credit-bearing classes, and they sometimes leave college even before taking a single course.
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  • Institutions are equally affected. A recent report by the Community College Research Center put the annual cost of remediation at $1.9-billion to $2.3-billion at community colleges and $500-million more at four-year colleges.
  • There is growing recognition that the traditional semester-long course sequence used by many community colleges doesn't work, says Michael Lawrence Collins, associate vice president for postsecondary state policy at Jobs for the Future, a Boston-based nonprofit that studies education and work-force issues. It's inefficient to have students take up to a year and a half in remediation when many need just pieces of what they're being taught.
  • The Virginia system is betting on that promise. Its colleges will soon replace their semester-long developmental-math courses with nine units, which can be taken as one-credit classes or Web-based lessons with variable credit hours that allow students to complete more than one unit in a self-paced computer lab and classroom. The number of units that students are required to complete will depend on their placement-test scores and intended program of study. Students focused on the liberal arts will have to show competence in only five units, for example, mastering basic algebra concepts such as linear equations. Students who plan to pursue careers in science, technology, engineering, math, or business administration must complete all nine units.
  • Although he has help from a tutor in the class, it's a lot to juggle, he says. Mr. Wyrick does like how the Web-based class allows him to peek at students' quizzes in real time and track their progress a lot faster than by sorting through homework and test papers himself. "It allows me to intervene even before they ask for help," he says.
  • There is one certainty. The Virginia Community College system is not the only one anticipating the outcome. Equally curious are researchers and other colleges searching for successful ideas. "There is a risk," Mr. Collins says, "but there is also power in being that bold."
  • The Virginia Community College system is poised to find out. Starting in 2012, it will adopt a new systemwide developmental-math curriculum that will allow students to focus only on those math concepts they haven't already mastered rather than taking a series of semester-long math courses.
  • Half of all incoming students in the system need developmental education—and three-fourths of those students fail to graduate or transfer within four years.
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    Great article on a Community College network taking a chance to revamp its remedial math program. Read on!
Rebecca Patterson

Harvard Education Letter - 0 views

  • While most Waldorf schools are elementaries, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation helped launch the first public Waldorf high school four years ago at the George Washington Carver School of Arts and Science in Sacramento, Calif., replacing a failed America’s Choice program in the building. Test scores have since risen dramatically: In 2008, 67 percent of 11th-graders scored “far below basic” or “below basic” in English; in 2011, just 12 percent did. Teachers are happier as well, says principal Allegra Allesandri. While many teachers spent the summer boning up on content, Allesandri’s teachers also honed skills in bookbinding, painting, and felting. Many Carver faculty gatherings include singing in harmony and playing games. “Those skills, which might be about singing, are also about working together successfully,” she says.
  • For example, at the Woodland Star Charter School in Sonoma County, Calif., test scores for 2010 show a stunning 81 percent of the second-graders scoring “below basic” or “far below basic,” compared with 32 percent of district peers. By eighth grade, however, none of the school’s students score in that level (in fact 89 percent are “proficient” or “advanced”), while 19 percent of district peers score in the lowest two levels and just 56 percent in the top two levels. Results have been less dramatic at some Waldorf-inspired charters, whose students in upper grades have scored about the same as district peers.
  • They still do project-based activities, start class with a verse perhaps by Albert Einstein, and end by thanking the teacher. But Bishop says the texts and 40-minute daily math lessons “look more like public school.”
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    Interesting article...wasn't Deborah in contact with these schools?
Rebecca Patterson

Education Week: Math Educators See the Right Angles for Digital Tools - 0 views

  • And just because there’s a lot to choose from doesn’t mean all the programs possess the same ability to teach math on a long-lasting, conceptual level.
  • Although kids are quick to pick [technology] up, they’re not that quick at learning to relate it to a mathematical concept.
  • what you want is for students to realize, ‘I don’t need to memorize a thousand different rules. I’m beginning to observe commonalities.
    • Rebecca Patterson
       
      patterns and metapatterns
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  • Some adaptive-learning software, which tailors lessons and exercises to individual student progress, also uses visual representation to demonstrate relationships.
  • online drawing programs that allow students and instructors to draw and manipulate shapes and graphs—like the Geometer’s Sketchpad, made by Emeryville, Calif.-based Key Curriculum Press, or the independently run GeoGebra, which has established dozens of institutes across the globe—immediately give users a sense of the relationships that govern geometry, algebra, and even calculus.
  • While software from Bellevue, Wash.-based DreamBox Learning also uses visual approaches, it differs from MIND’s software because it lets students in grades K-3 choose their own visual representations. After completing a problem one way, students will often be prompted to solve the same problem by choosing a different visualization to reinforce the concept.
  • its ability to import data from thrice-yearly Washington state standardized testing.
  • content services like Learn360, from Woodbury, N.Y.-based AIM Education Inc., offer the ability to combine resources into playlists of media set specifically for the needs of individual students, to help give some of that multidimensional understanding of content.
Rebecca Patterson

Mathematical model predicts weight with varying diet, exercise changes; Findings challe... - 0 views

  • Researchers at the National Institutes of Health have created a mathematical model -- and an accompanying online weight simulation tool -- of what happens when people of varying weights, diets and exercise habits try to change their weight.
  • However, the computer simulation of metabolism is meant as a research tool and not as a weight-loss guide for the public. The computer program can run simulations for changes in calories or exercise that would never be recommended for healthy weight loss. The researchers hope to use the knowledge gained from developing the model and from clinical trials in people to refine the tool for everyone.
  • "Mathematical modeling lets us make and test predictions about changes in weight and metabolism over time," Hall said. "We're developing research tools to accurately simulate physiological differences between people based on gender, age, height, and weight, as well as body fat and resting metabolic rate."
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  • Moving toward that goal, a more comprehensive mathematical model of human metabolism was used recently to design an NIH clinical trial that is comparing the effects of reducing fats versus carbohydrates in obese adults.
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    Not really stats here, but a mathematical model used for application. Great use of applied math.
Rebecca Patterson

California reports eighth-grade dropout rate for first time - latimes.com - 0 views

  • "We still don't have an accurate way to determine who's dropping out," he said, citing studies that estimate L.A. Unified's four-year high school dropout rate at more than 50%. (The state-calculated dropout rate for L.A. Unified is 26.1%.)
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      More California stats. Not pretty.
  • Statewide, about 3.5% of eighth-graders — 17,257 in all — left school and didn't return for ninth grade
  • Overall, 74.4% of California high school students graduated in four years, according to state data; 18.2% dropped out. The remainder were still in school (6.6%), were in non-diploma programs for disabled students (0.5%) or left high school by taking the General Educational Development (GED) Test (0.4%).
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  • The graduation rate is 68% for Latinos, 59% for African American students and 56% for students who are learning English. This compares with 83.4% for whites and 89.4% for Asians.
  • Among eighth-graders statewide, about 4,200 dropped out during the academic year; more than 13,000 finished eighth grade but didn't show up for ninth, the traditional beginning of high school.
  • L.A. Unified's estimated graduation rate for the four-year period is 55%. However, the state's new system places the district's rate at 64.2%.
Rebecca Patterson

How to Break the Cycle of Remedial College Classes - Education - GOOD - 0 views

  • This month, more than half of community college freshmen and at least a third of university students started college already behind. They're in at least one remedial course that does not count toward a degree, thus beginning at least four months—and sometimes years—delayed in getting the degree they enrolled to earn.
  • Like many of their fellow freshmen nationally, a whopping 95 percent of high school graduates from West Hills who received As and Bs in their senior English courses did not "pass" the placement test. Yet when allowed to enroll in college-level courses instead of remedial classes, 86 percent successfully completed college-level English, lost no time in their progress, and stayed on course toward earning a degree.
  • Only 24 percent of students placed in the lowest level of English remedial courses in California ever get through.
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    Whoops...forgot to write that this is mostly reading stats, but they are remediation percentages.
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