My reply pretty much agrees with what Richard posted earlier:
That quiz shows a "common mode failure" in the less-than/greater-than/equal-to section. It appears (to me at least) the quiz was intended to test the student's comprehension of what various numbers mean. Just what is "3" compared to "7" for example. There were a handful of basic addition problems to demonstrate "math" ability with the numbers, then a whole slew of the less-than/greater-than/equal-to problems. A single miss-understanding of the ">" and "<" symbols though totally destroyed the intent of that section: does the student understand the numbers. The test answers indicated "no, the student doesn't comprehend numbers at all" which is not the case - most folks reading this thread have commented it is clearly a problem with the symbol comprehension - thus the "come see me" suggestions.
Instead of so many similar less-than/greater-than/equal-to problems - which leads to the "common mode failure" - a test with only 3 or 4 of a particular type of problems and instead a lot more varied types problems would have probably have resulted in a far more representative testing of this student's math/numbers comprehension. Testing ONE method over and over won't help determine what a student did or did not learn - if you test the thing he "didn't get" then it appears he didn't learn anything. It's the testing equivalent to beating a dead horse. This test was graded fairly... but I think it was a poorly designed test thanks to a common mode failure.
Understanding the "why" is often more important than "what" in events: why did the bridge fall down, why did the student miss every single question in the less-than/greater-than/equal-to portion of the quiz? With multiple types of questions, a teacher/student/involved parent can isolate what is the weak spot in a student's understanding. With big class sizes today, limited time, and parents that expect the schools to do everything, unfortunately students rarely receive the analysis of where their weak understanding spots are and what they need to focus on. A friend of mine, with a struggling junior high school aged son, was an example of this. The son struggled in just a few areas in school... during a semester his mother spent the money to send him to the Sylvan program. They took the time to figure out just where his understanding was lacking and worked on that. One semester of weekend classes made all the difference in the world.
mpc
That quiz shows a "common mode failure" in the less-than/greater-than/equal-to section. It appears (to me at least) the quiz was intended to test the student's comprehension of what various numbers mean. Just what is "3" compared to "7" for example. There were a handful of basic addition problems to demonstrate "math" ability with the numbers, then a whole slew of the less-than/greater-than/equal-to problems. A single miss-understanding of the ">" and "<" symbols though totally destroyed the intent of that section: does the student understand the numbers. The test answers indicated "no, the student doesn't comprehend numbers at all" which is not the case - most folks reading this thread have commented it is clearly a problem with the symbol comprehension - thus the "come see me" suggestions.
Instead of so many similar less-than/greater-than/equal-to problems - which leads to the "common mode failure" - a test with only 3 or 4 of a particular type of problems and instead a lot more varied types problems would have probably have resulted in a far more representative testing of this student's math/numbers comprehension. Testing ONE method over and over won't help determine what a student did or did not learn - if you test the thing he "didn't get" then it appears he didn't learn anything. It's the testing equivalent to beating a dead horse. This test was graded fairly... but I think it was a poorly designed test thanks to a common mode failure.
Understanding the "why" is often more important than "what" in events: why did the bridge fall down, why did the student miss every single question in the less-than/greater-than/equal-to portion of the quiz? With multiple types of questions, a teacher/student/involved parent can isolate what is the weak spot in a student's understanding. With big class sizes today, limited time, and parents that expect the schools to do everything, unfortunately students rarely receive the analysis of where their weak understanding spots are and what they need to focus on. A friend of mine, with a struggling junior high school aged son, was an example of this. The son struggled in just a few areas in school... during a semester his mother spent the money to send him to the Sylvan program. They took the time to figure out just where his understanding was lacking and worked on that. One semester of weekend classes made all the difference in the world.
mpc
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