Post on 26-Aug-2020
2017 WMC PRESENTATION
IMPROVING MATH ACT SCORESACT-ALIGNED BY DESIGN - SMALL SCHOOL UPDATE
SCOTT ANDERSON
HS MATH TEACHER
JUDA, WISCONSIN
sa@judaschool.com608 934 5251 ext 255twitter/blog: 21stmathteacher
WHERE IT STARTED….
Aligned by Design Workshop - Summer of 2010 in Monona Grove.
UW-System's Growth Agenda – 09/10 School Year
WHERE IT HAS GONE….
Data Driven Curriculum decisions
Curriculum - Fewer, Clearer, Higher
Problem Based Learning – STEM!!!
Eliminating College Remediation
OUTLINE
Review Aligned by Design
Discuss the “required adjustments” for a small school
Review Initial Targeted Goals & Program
Discuss goals & Continuous Improvement progression
Discuss Current Program (20% of class represents 60%+ of grade)
Review Results to date
Where it is going….
Curriculum Expanding
Flipping
Questions
ACT
STANDARDS
Consistent
Simple
Direct
Targeted skills
of Aligned By Design
Fewer, Clearer, Higher
http://www.act.org/standard/planact/math/index.html
ALIGNED BY DESIGN
FEWER, CLEARER, HIGHER
Aligning assessment, curriculum and instruction (pretty exciting)
Deconstructing the ACT standards (not too exciting but required)
CurriculumAssessment
Instruction
HOW WE ASSESS MATTERS!
The typical math assessment:
Focuses on algorithms
Skills assessed in isolation (no context)
Partial credit awarded (Partial Learning Rewarded)
Clustering of questions (many of same type)
COURSE DESIGN & ALIGNMENT
Aligned by Design is based on certain things only a
large school could do.....
THE “I HAVE BEEN SENT TO A WORKSHOP I
CANNOT USE” POINT….
Saw a student centered system based upon data
driven decisions. But kept seeing a entire curriculum
always created by a team of math teachers.
Also discovered that there was going to be nothing to
"steal."
REALITY BITES
So Aligned by Design was all good, but how does a school of a few, or just one math instructor do it?
So I asked and I will never forget his answer to my question “Ok – you have a big staff, can easily divide up tasks. How do you do this in a much smaller school, say one HS teacher in the district?” His reply “I don’t know how you could do this.”
In many ways that answer was correct. As a smaller district you don't have the resources: staff, time, money to make a large shift as discussed....
This presentation tells you what I do now….
ROI (RETURN ON INVESTMENT)
So looked at the ideas and tried to decide which were
scalable and low work & high return for my students!
Conceptual understanding was key, but could not
make an entire curriculum shift.
Hershey HS had made a huge improvement in their
ACT score in 4 years, so it felt like there was some
way to use Aligned By Design in a continuous
improvement matter.
INITIAL GOALS – FALL 2010
Goals:
To increase mastery of topics measured by Aligned
By Design assessments
To increase ACT math composite by 0.5 points/year
from ~21.5 to ~22.5 (~4.5% increase) in first 2 years
Stay within current curriculum and basic syllabus!
GOALS SET, HOW TO PROCEED?
How many times have you heard a student say
this after the ACT, or any other power test....
“I knew them, but I just could not
remember how to do them.“
The worst part is they usually don't even realize
what they missed....
ACT EXAMPLE
Look at the following problem
-2 + 6 - |3| - (-2)2
A. 3 B. 11 C. 5 D. -3 E. 1
-2 + 6 - |3| -
(-2)2
4 - 3
- 4
1 - 4
-3
NON - MASTERED TOPICS….
There are 2 common mistakes our “I knew them”
students make.
- |3| - (-3) 3
&
- (-2)2
- (-4) 4
THE ACT ALLOWS FOR THESE ERRORS
those distractors are there
ACT EXAMPLE
Look at the following problem
-2 + 6 - |3| - (-2)
A. 3 B. 11 C. 5 D. -3 E. 1
-2 + 6 - |3| - (-2)2
4 - 3 + 4
1 +
4
5
-2 + 6 - |3| - (-2)2
4 + 3 -
4
7 -
4
3
RESULTS OF EXAMPLE!
Small mistakes are huge ACT score killers.
Indicative of real conceptual problems
So my silent answer to
"I knew them, but...“
became
"You saw it before but never really learned it"
KNOWING THE “TRUE” ALIGNED BY
DESIGN SYSTEM WOULD NOT FIT….
So figured the high return item was to set up a
system where students really know the low band
standards - really have the foundation.
Don’t screw up the easy….
Need to make the students understand that they
owned the learning
SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS
Student accountability
Recursive materials (cause if you don’t use it, you lose it)
All or nothing mentality (no partial credit)
Only could take 30-40 minutes per week!
So per the conference – Developed context based
assessments (quizzes) based on the ACT standards.
ACT SKILL
CHECK
Context Quiz
based on ACT
Standards & Bands
PHILOSOPHY
Believe we grade academic mastery (not behavior, not responsibility, not time – have strong belief that my mission is to teach all students, not just the willing)
Wanted students to master topics and removed the constraint of time as much as possible.
Since time isn't a constraint I had to be ready to offer multiple opportunities to show mastery – re-quizzes....
Re-quizzes were often
Personally had a hard time accepting no partial credit.
DEMONSTRATING MASTERY
The quizzes were suppose to be summative, they
ended up formative....
Initially thought only re-quizzing missed problems
was needed, no need in showing mastery again on
correct items.....
Unless everything isn't mastered....
MEASUREMENT TOWARDS GOALS
SPRING 2010
Results on subsequent quizzes were not showing
improvement. Both missed problems and problems
done correctly were missed at nearly the same rate as
initial quizzes.
How I was quizzing was the problem…
HOW YOU ASSESS REALLY MATTERS!
How you re-quiz is important as how you quiz!
Must avoid “Pump and Dump“
Pump & Dump is the school skill where students only
learn something long enough to reproduce once on an
assessment.
The entire quiz must be retaken....
CONSTRAINTS
Problem: It takes a lot of time to put problems in
context – especially for re-quizzes
Solution: Using a worksheet generator for quizzes,
traded context for multiple re-quizzes....
TRADED CONTEXT
FOR ABILITY TO
REQUIZ
Quiz created on KUTA
Side note: Working on a program based
upon ACT standards (using access)
that generates context quizzes.
QUIZ FINDINGS
On partial credit = partial learning
A Non Believer turned to Believer!
Now embracing recursive quizzes and no partial
credit, but
What about accountability?
STUDENT
ACCOUNTABILITY
Expectation to understand & mastery topics both
conceptually and application.
You will know when it is working – students ask to learn
problems they struggle with.
Scoring of work supports mastery.
GRADES REPRESENT LEARNING
Total points system (Weekly example)
100 point test
Homework 6 points (Community Expectation),
Quizzes (2) 150 points (30 problems – 5 points per),
Projects – 25 to 40 points.
By Percentage
Quiz ~55%
Test ~34%
Project ~10%
Homework ~1%
GRADING SCALE NOTES
Scale/percentages are not as important as the
emphasis on conceptual understanding and
performance; that is critical.
Juda uses a general scale based on total points; that
allows flexibility – BUT at least 85% or greater is
from from summative assessment.
Goal is to continue to lower homework to
approximately 1%
(Coupled to a special homework policy and project
requirements).
RESULTS
So is it working?
Year Math ACT
Average
Benchmark Scores (≥22)
2018 21.14 41%
2017 23.06 50%
2016 20.73 47%
2015 23.55 64%
2014 22.89 68%
2013 22.53 58%
2012 23.00 67%
2011 22.33 56%
2010 21.72 50%
2009 18.64 18%
15.00
17.00
19.00
21.00
23.00
25.00
27.00
2002 2004 2006 2008 2010 2012 2014 2016 2018 2020
AC
T A
vg
Sco
re
Year
ACT scores Composite & Math
Composite
Math
Linear (Math)
15.00
17.00
19.00
21.00
23.00
25.00
27.00
2002 2004 2006 2008 2010 2012 2014 2016 2018 2020
AC
T A
vg
Sco
re
Year
ACT scores Composite & Math
Math
State Average 20.42016 data
R² = 0.3214
15.00
17.00
19.00
21.00
23.00
25.00
27.00
2002 2004 2006 2008 2010 2012 2014 2016 2018 2020
AC
T A
vg
Sco
re
Year
ACT scores Composite & Math – Survey Yes
Composite
Math
Linear (Math)
15.00
17.00
19.00
21.00
23.00
25.00
27.00
2002 2004 2006 2008 2010 2012 2014 2016 2018 2020
AC
T A
vg
Sco
re
Year
ACT scores Composite & Math – Survey Yes
Composite
Math
Linear (Math)
15.00
17.00
19.00
21.00
23.00
25.00
27.00
2002 2004 2006 2008 2010 2012 2014 2016 2018 2020
AC
T A
vg
Sco
re
Year
ACT scores Composite & Math
Composite
Math
Linear (Math)
20.00
20.50
21.00
21.50
22.00
22.50
23.00
23.50
2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019
3 Year Math ACT Average – Survey Yes
3 Year Math Average
Linear (3 Year Math Average)
20.00
20.50
21.00
21.50
22.00
22.50
23.00
23.50
2004 2006 2008 2010 2012 2014 2016 2018 2020
3 Year Math Average – All Students
3 Year Math Average
Linear (3 Year Math Average)
R² = 0.3165
0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
60%
70%
80%
90%
100%
2002 2004 2006 2008 2010 2012 2014 2016 2018 2020
Pe
rce
nt
Year
Juda - Scores at or above ACT Math Benchmark (<= 22)
National Average
R² = 0.4612
0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
60%
70%
80%
90%
100%
2002 2004 2006 2008 2010 2012 2014 2016 2018 2020
Pe
rce
nt
Year
Juda - Scores at or above ACT Math Benchmark (<= 22) –
Survey Yes
National Average
0
5
10
15
20
25
30
35
40
45
2004 2006 2008 2010 2012 2014 2016 2018
Pe
rce
nt
of
Gra
de
Year
Quarter Letter Grade versus Year
A
B
C
D
F
0
5
10
15
20
25
30
35
40
45
2004 2006 2008 2010 2012 2014 2016 2018
Pe
rce
nt
of
Gra
de
Year
A Grade versus Year
RESULTS
So is it working?
Year Math ACT
Avg. Survey
Benchmark (≥22) Survey
2018 21.1 22.2 41% 50%
2017 23.1 25.4 50% 69%
2016 20.7 22.9 47% 70%
2015 23.55 64%
2014 22.89 68%
2013 22.53 58%
2012 23.00 67%
2011 22.33 56%
2010 21.72 50%
2009 18.64 18%
18.00
19.00
20.00
21.00
22.00
23.00
24.00
25.00
2004 2006 2008 2010 2012 2014 2016 2018
Ma
th A
CT
sco
re
Year
3 Year ACT Math Moving Avg - All Test Takers
18.00
19.00
20.00
21.00
22.00
23.00
24.00
25.00
2004 2006 2008 2010 2012 2014 2016 2018
Ma
th A
CT
sco
re
Year
3 Year ACT Math Moving Avg Survey - Yes
WHAT IT ISN’T….
Not Curriculum
Not a cure for gaps or missing skills Sure identifies them though…
Not a lot of time – even though a high
portion of the grade
QUIZZING IS NOT TEACHING….
WHERE IT IS GOING…. Continue to focus on raising the top scores, set goals for
students who take upper level courses to score > 26 on the math ACT
Measuring end product – HS graduate’s skills
Post HS surveys
EMPT (UW-system, Early Math Placement Test) – also CAPP Placement Testing (Algebra 2 & PreCalc)
Using MAPS data to put 2015/2016 ACT Scores into a context
Context
Problem Solving & Math Practices
Flipped
New Curriculum (BIG IDEAS)
QUESTIONS2016 ACT PRESENTATION
IMPROVING MATH ACT SCORESACT-ALIGNED BY DESIGN - SMALL SCHOOL UPDATE
SCOTT ANDERSON
HS MATH TEACHER
JUDA, WISCONSIN
sa@judaschool.com608 934 5251 ext 255twitter/blog: 21stmathteacher