Alberta’s scores, including local schools, showing improvement
The Ministry of Education announced on Oct. 18 that Grade 6 mathematics Provincial Achievement Test scores have increased over the past year, which Medicine Hat’s public and Catholic school boards say is consistent with their scores as well.
This is the second year the math PAT has included a noncalculator portion in its testing.
Chuck Hellman, the Medicine Hat Catholic Board of Education’s associate superintendent, says their Grade 6 mathematics test scores improved by seven per cent from 2017-18.
There was a “dip” in the 2017-18 scores, due to it being the first year the non-calculator portion was introduced, he added.
“Our teachers got an idea of what the government’s looking for in terms of mental math,” said Hellman.
“Once you know, then you can start planning lessons so that students can increase their capacity to be able to solve mental math-type questions.”
He said mental math is important to teach students to think in mathematical terms, as opposed to just inputting numbers in a calculator.
“If you can do some of these things quickly and easily in your head, it strengthens you all the way along, right up through Grade 12 and into university,” said Hellman.
Corey Sadlemyer, Medicine Hat Public School Division’s assistant superintendent, says the board divides scores into “acceptable” and “excellent”.
Provincially, the acceptable score was 71.9 per cent, while MHPSD’s was 76.3.
Sadlemyer said MHPSD typically scores above the provincial average for acceptable.
The province’s three-year average is 70.6 per cent and MHPSD’s is 71 per cent.
“Year-over-year is hard, because you can have very different groups of kids, so we tend to try to look at those three-year averages,” said Sadlemyer.
Overall, MHPSD’s PAT math scores increased 12 per cent from 2017-18, he said.
“We generally have some strong results for our students in Grade 6, but there’s definitely an intentional focus around math,” Sadlemyer said.
“Schools have a good handle on where they’re heading with this. It’s exciting times.”