Giving Compass' Take:
- Christina A. Samuels examines the root causes contributing to why math test scores are dropping in many countries across the world.
- How can educational institutions across the globe listen to student voices to make improvements in how math is taught?
- Learn more about key issues in education and how you can help.
- Search our Guide to Good for nonprofits focused on education in your area.
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The bottom line is troubling. Scores on an international math test dropped a record 15 points between 2018 and 2022 — the equivalent of students losing three-quarters of a school year of learning.
That finding may not be surprising considering the timing of the test. The world was still recovering from the disruptive effects of the global pandemic when the test, called the Program for International Student Assessment, or PISA, was administered.
But in many countries, math test scores began dropping years before Covid-19 and was even steeper than the international average. That includes some of the world’s largest and wealthiest countries, and others acclaimed for their education systems, such as Canada, France, Germany and Finland. Only a few school systems — Singapore, South Korea, Taiwan and Hong Kong — have been able to maintain their top results for the long haul.
Some of the scores set off another “PISA shock” — a term first used in Germany in 2000 when scores there were much lower than expected — that may change how mathematics is taught around the world.
Although there’s no single culprit behind the decline, PISA is more than a math test: It also includes a wide-ranging survey of the students who take the test, most of whom are around 15 years old and coming to the end of compulsory schooling in their countries. From their responses, and analysis by PISA researchers, several themes stand out, including disconnection from school and teachers, a lack of motivation and a sense that math does not clearly connect to their real lives.
Motivation Matters to Improving Math Test Scores
PISA uses a series of word problems that assess how well students can use the math they’ve learned throughout their lives to solve problems they might face in the real world. For example, one question in the most recent test gives students the dimensions of a moving truck and then asks them to figure out how many boxes of a certain size can fit.
Other problems require students to extract information from different types of data, such as a question that asks students to calculate which brand of car has the best value, taking into its price, fuel consumption, and resale value.
Read the full article about math test scores dropping by Christina A. Samuels at The Hechinger Report.