Math prof gives calc students arithmetic quiz = results not good

Here’s a fun academic paper to read. I realize that sounds like a contradiction in terms, but the paper is only three pages long and well written.

W. Stephen Wilson, math professor at Johns Hopkins University, was told by a colleague heavily involved in K-12 math education that only a small fraction of college kids would be able to do multiplication problems. So Professor Wilson gave his 229 Calculus III (multi-variable calculus) students a 10-question arithmetic test. The students were “highly motivated, highly achieving”—an average 740 on the math SAT. They weren’t allowed to use calculators.

The results were not good. Professor Wilson writes:

There were also 4 questions using decimals. The highest miss rate (for problem # 9) was 33%, but 111 students, or 48%, missed at least one. That’s half of my reasonably elite students who couldn’t get all four arithmetic operations correct with decimals in one sitting. I don’t think they get decimals.

Seven of these problems were each missed by 8% or more of my students and 69 students, or 30%, missed more than 1 problem.

He concludes, “I now feel compelled to assume that they are chronically accident prone or they really are arithmetically handicapped.”

The test problems were not crazy difficult. Check them out on page 2 of the paper “Arithmetic Versus the Elite” here. The results are the end product of math curricula like Investigations and its ilk. You may remember Prof. Wilson, as he was quoted in the Pelham Math Committee’s launch news release. He said this in testimony to the Frederick County, MD, school board:

“I am not really here today to talk to the Board, but to the parents. If your child goes to a school that uses TERC Investigations, you should understand that it means your child’s school has abdicated its responsibility to teach your child mathematics. By doing so, the responsibility now rests with the parents. Good luck.”

Good luck indeed.

If you want the highest quality math for the children of Pelham, click here to see and sign the petition to replace “Investigations.” For copy-and-paste fans, here’s the url:

http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/pelhammath/

This also appears on PelhamMath.com.