Lack of positive factors somehow still added up to success in math tests

It turns out that when Quebec Grade 8 students outscored the entire country in mathematics in 2010, they did it against the odds.

A follow-up study to the 2010 cross-Canada assessment tests has identified a number of factors, like personal confidence and a high level of ambition and persistence, that help students succeed in their school work. Quebec students scored at the top in mathematics despite fewer of these success factors playing in their favour.

In the follow-up study, made public Friday, the Council of Ministers of Education compared the test scores with a number of variables to see which ones were associated with the highest scores. Among the variables with marked positive effects were an educated family background measured by a mother’s university attainment and the number of books in a home; a positive attitude toward school and mathematics; persistence in dealing with difficult math problems; homework every night to a maximum two hours; being taught math in a traditional way, using textbooks and direct instruction; and being taught a strategic approach to math learning.

Surprisingly, given their success, not many of these positive factors seemed to apply to Quebec students. In Ontario, which, like Que- bec, scored significantly higher in math in 2010 than other provinces, 30 per cent of students had university-educated mothers compared with 23 per cent in Quebec. As for books in the home, there were 10 or fewer books in the homes of 20 per cent of Quebec students, but only seven per cent of Ontario students. The higher number of books in a home, the higher the math scores. (In Quebec, there was a marked difference between francophone and anglophone homes at the level of 100 or more books in the home, with 44 per cent of anglophone households in this category, compared to 24 per cent for francophone homes.)

Students who aspire to go to university were found to have scored highest. In Ontario, 63 per cent of students said they intended to get a university degree, but among Quebec francophones, that was true of only 45 per cent (and 61 per cent for anglophone Quebecers).

Attitude counted for a lot, but here, too, Quebec students lacked confidence compared to Ontario students. In Ontario, 53 per cent thought “math is easy;” only 48.7 per cent of Quebecers felt the same. Francophone Quebec students scored lowest on general confidence, at 46.8 per cent, with Ontario students higher at 51.7 per cent (and anglophone Quebecers at 49.4 per cent).