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Wednesday, March 25, 2015

Failing Grades For K-8 Math Content

A review of K-8 math instructional material gave most publishers failing grades. EdReports.org found that 17 of 20 math series evaluated failed to align with the Common Core State Standards.

“In general, the results are pretty bad for all publishers,” Morgan Polikoff, assistant professor of education, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, told Education Week. “I think people will really pay attention to this.”

Publishers have, and they are not happy. They are particularly concerned that the use of thresholds content needed to pass to continue through the EdReports.org review process led to an incomplete review, according to Jay A. Diskey, executive director of the Association of American Publishers’ P-12 learning.

The report used a three-tiered rating system that broke down each criterion into “meets,” “partially meets,” or “does not meet.” The group’s website provides a more detailed report for each textbook rated and documentation on how reviews came up with their scores.

“There can always be methodological quibbles,” Polikoff said. “It would be useful to look at all three gateways for all the books, but this seems to me a perfectly reasonable way to constrain the task.”