On Thursday, September 25, 2014 I attended the Provincial Assessment for Mathematics 30-1 and 30-2 session that provided “teachers and administrators with an overview of the diploma examination results for the second year of provincial implementation for Mathematics 30-1 and Mathematics 30-2.”
The following are notes and discernible sound-bites:
Big-Picture Things
- Only teachers who are teaching the course in the current semester may peruse the diploma exam.
- One teacher said she might teach a certain course in the next term so it would be helpful for her to see the current exam. Even so, she wouldn’t be permitted to view the exam, even if she’d taught the course in the past.
- A Principal or Principal-designate must be present when the exams are being perused.
- Perusal window is now from 10am to 1pm. Diploma exams must be perused electronically.
- Rewrite fees must be paid in advance using the new online system.
- Eventually, no walk-ins will be permitted for diploma exams.
- Deanna noted that many professional testing agencies do not permit perusals at all.
- Students can access diploma examination results via myPass. Exam grades will no longer be mailed.
- Coming November 2015 and April 2015, all high-demand courses will have diploma examinations.
- Mathematics 20-2 and Mathematics 30-2 Projects are mandatory, though untested. See:
- The Chemistry 30 Exam Lead position is available
- $84k to $114k
- “...And as part of Curriculum Redesign, provincial assessments will also be changing to a more competency based model…” --From the posting.
Mathematics 30-1
- The 2013 Mathematics 30-1 diploma exams were far too easy.
- Kids did too well.
- Exam wasn’t challenging the upper-level students and kids were using the calculator too much.
- Too easy to get the Acceptable Standard and the Standard of Excellence.
- Mathematics 30-1 has 24 outcomes compared to Pure Math 30’s 36.
- Kids were button-pressing and not working through actual math.
- Difficulty was upped quite a bit for the January 2014 exam but the exam is still too easy.
- Over summer 2014 standards were upped again.
- New practice test will be posted.
- Since there is less content in Math 30-1 than Pure Math 30, we need more depth to make the exam difficult enough.
- More items will be “Conceptual” and “Problem Solving” rather than just “Procedural.”
- Looking at partial marks for NR items that test four things at once.
- Equating in a couple of years.
- Alberta Ed uses I for integers even though most mathematicians use Z.
- The schools should use written-response items because the examiners cannot.
Mathematics 30-2
- Some adjustments to difficulty but the exams are pretty good.
- Natural logarithms are removed except with regression.
- Research project is not testable yet. A rubric is provided in the Mathematics 30-2 Information Bulletin.
- Processes are there but are not blueprinted.
- SE items have a different character. More complexity. About 10 items are SE. Challenge the upper-end kids.
- Consider a student who barely passes. That student will answer ⅔ of the AS items correctly and none of the SE items correctly. (One participant raised the possibility that anyone has a 25% chance of answering an MC item correctly.)
- A student who is barely SE (80%) will answer 90% of AS items correctly and 50% of SE items correctly.
Handouts were also provided. If you’d like a copy, please email your request to me.
Regards,
Michael
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Regards,
Michael
