Regents Recap — June, 2017: Three Students Solve a Math Problem
I will never understand why so many exam questions are written like this (question 5 from the June, 2017 Algebra exam):
What is the purpose of the artificial context? Why must the question be framed as though three people are comparing their answers? Why not just write a math question?
This question not only addresses the same mathematical content, it makes the mathematics the explicit focus. This would seem to be a desirable quality in a mathematical assessment item.
Instead of wasting time concocting absurd scenarios for these problems, let’s focus on making sure the questions that end up on these exams are mathematically correct.
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1 Comment
Josh Britton · September 2, 2017 at 3:41 pm
Hey, Mr. Honner, I really appreciate you calling this out! Part of my profession is to write software that dynamically generates practice questions that support teachers’ needs. I HATE the fact that in order to mimic texts and tests, I need to gussy up straightforward problems with artificial stories. I can’t ignore this nonsense and cut to mathematical chase because teachers need their students geared up to survive high stakes tests. Ick! All of us trapped and sullied.
Josh Britton