If only we had a massive federal department of education and spent the most money per student in the world then that level of commitment for our kids' education would pay off. The new math is working as well as our elites abandonment of phonics for reading instruction. Ern has it nailed, we just need to spend more money for administrators. Nothing says commitment to the kids education like voting for a democrat. Time for another lockdown.
https://www.joannejacobs.com/post/u-s-math-scores-show-devastating-decline
https://www.chalkbeat.org/2024/12/04/timss-international-test-result-us-math-scores-decline-post-pandemic/ between 2019 and 2023 for fourth- and eighth-graders, according to new
https://timss2023.org/results from the Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study, known as TIMSS. Some countries improved, passing the U.S. in international rankings, writes Erica Meltzer on Chalkbeat.
The declines were "steep" and "devastating," said Peggy Carr, commissioner of the National Center for Education Statistics. While high achievers held their own, low-performing students lost the most, widening achievement gaps.
"One in five U.S. eighth graders scored below the low benchmark, meaning they lacked even basic proficiency," Meltzer writes. That's way up from earlier years.
The drop in science scores was less extreme, but U.S. fourth-graders now score worse in science than they did in 1995.
Singapore, South Korea, Hong Kong, and Japan topped the rankings. Poland, Sweden and Australia made the greatest gains, passing the U.S. “We have countries leapfrogging over us,” Carr said.
It's not clear whether school closures, which lasted longer in the U.S. than in Europe or Asia, led to more learning loss. But one of the countries that raised achievement, Sweden, didn't close elementary schools or mandate masks. TIMSS now ranks Sweden 14th in math achievement, while the U.S. is ranked 24th.
"American students’ scores
https://www.chalkbeat.org/2021/10/14/22725293/test-scores-naep-pandemic-high-low-achievers/ for reasons that are not entirely clear," writes Meltzer.
"The U.S. is
https://www.the74million.org/article/four-insights-into-u-s-students-drop-in-math-science-on-international-test/Stanford economist Thomas Dee told Kevin Mahnken. "Nearly three decades of math achievement growth" evaporated in a few years.
Before the pandemic, federal accountability laws were weakened, notes Dan Goldhaber, director of the
https://caldercenter.org/. That may have hurt students who were already behind, he speculates.
Every mistake American education made regarding phonics vs whole language, it’s about to make again with math instruction,"
"And once again a handful of gurus and education professors are about to make millions off of miseducating kids based on pseudoscientific theories and vibes."
He's talking about groups of students struggling with problems -- standing up and with white boards! -- instead of listening to a teacher's explanation first. That's not how they do it in Singapore.