Source: Radio New Zealand
The 12-week trial involved 1500 Year 7 and 8 students who received small-group tutoring up to four times a week. Supplied / Ministry of Education
A maths professor has questioned the results of a school maths trial the Education Minister has labelled as “groundbreaking”.
Education Minister Erica Stanford said a maths acceleration programme for Year 7 and 8 students who needed extra support, has seen them make an average of one to two years progress in 12 weeks.
Stanford said the results showed the government’s focus on fixing the basics is working.
“Every parent wants their child to feel confident in maths. These results show that students are catching up faster than anyone expected, thanks to strong foundations, clear teaching, and teachers who are embracing the reforms across the country.”
The 12-week trial involved 1500 Year 7 and 8 students who received small-group tutoring up to four times a week.
Stanford said students not in the trial, simply learning under the new curriculum, also made progress.
“The biggest breakthrough was for the students who were working in their usual classes with their teacher. These students were not part of the first 12-week trial but were benefiting from hour-a-day maths, the new curriculum, and new workbooks. They made, on average, a full year’s progress in just 12 weeks. That shows the reforms are lifting achievement for all children, not just those receiving additional tutoring.”
Education Minister Erica Stanford. RNZ / Mark Papalii
But Massey University’s Jodie Hunter told Morning Report the minister needs to explain how she reached that conclusion.
“I think it’s very problematic to say that these children have made one to two years progress, when potentially looking at what has been released, they are only testing the children in one very small area of mathematics, which is numbers,” Hunter said.
“So you can’t make a claim that children have made one to two years progress when you’re only looking at one out of six areas of mathematics.”
Hunter said there is a lot of missing information.
“The information that’s been released basically says that the children were participating in a trial which was focused on number concepts, so structure of number, multiplication and division, and proportional reasoning and fractions.
“So that would indicate that was the focus of the trial and that was what was tested and the results were found for,”
Hunter said what’s missing is algebra, geometry, measurement, probability and statistics.
The results were collaborated using e-asTTle, an online assessment tool. Hunter said that is problematic in itself.
“E-asTTle is a tool that was developed for the previous curriculum, so that was the curriculum that was released in, I think, 2007 or 2008.
“So it’s not testing against the new curriculum, which then again, raises a whole lot of questions, because the previous 2008 curriculum had significantly lower expectations than what the new curriculum has, and then this makes me question things.
“For example, when we have had the claims of the maths crisis, which was last year, that was tested against the new curriculum.
“Now we’re having claims that everything is being solved and our results are that these interventions are having amazing results, we’re testing arguably against the previous curriculum.
“There needs to be consistency on what’s being tested and what tools are being used if you’re going to say there’s a crisis based on the new curriculum and then say problem is solved based against the old curriculum, that becomes problematic.”
Hunter said despite this, she is not against having extra mathematics for students that need it.
“I think having extra mathematics for students is a great thing and it would be very surprising if children didn’t make progress, if they’re having four small group tutoring sessions each week for 12 weeks.
“Of course, children are going to make progress, so I’m not arguing against that, but I’m arguing against these claims that we’ve solved everything and that these children are making one to two years progress.” she said.
The government is now rolling out the programme to 13,000 students nationwide, at a cost of $40m, which will begin in Term 1 2026.
RNZ approached the Minister, who referred RNZ to the Ministry of Education.
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– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand
