Accuplacer is the standardized test no one ever hears about; it's the test everyone entering a community college takes.
My sister thinks entering students may actually be required by law to take the Accuplacer. Her 8th grade daughter signed up for two courses at their community college this fall, and she had to take the test even though she's still in middle school and was enrolling in Spanish I and Voice.
My sister may be right about a legal requirement, at least for some states if not all.
In any case, zillions of people take the Accuplacer, but you never hear a word about it.
Nor does there appear to be a roaring test-prep industry for Accuplacer tests, even though your results on the test determine absolutely whether you do or do not get to enroll in college.
If you flunk, you can't enroll.
You can enroll in the school's pre-college courses, but pre-college courses aren't college. They're high school that you're paying for.*
Apparently the idea that anyone can enroll in community colleges is one of the misconceptions high school students and their parents share.
Not true.
The rule is: anyone who passes the Accuplacer can enroll in community college. (The College Puzzle puts it this way: "Students usually must take placement tests at community colleges in order to qualify for college-level work.")
what's on the Accuplacer?
Tonight I was trying to get Christian signed up for his next course at Westchester Community College. (He's still fiddling with financial aid, so it will be just one course this winter). Last summer Christian passed the Accuplacer reading test, failed the math. He's supposed to be working his way through Saxon Homeschool Math 5/4, and until a couple of months ago was working his way through Saxon Homeschool Math 5/4, but lately he's stalled.
Everyone's stalled except me, and although I haven't stalled I've slowed.
math woe
I'm going to have to crack the whip if there's any chance of averting a Math Catastrophe around here.
Tonight Christopher melted down because he couldn't figure out how to do a problem Christian made up: "If 5 babies are born every 10 seconds, how many are born in 1 minute?"
Something like that.
This came up because yesterday Christopher had no idea how to do a real-world problem concerning babies: If 1 baby is born every 12 seconds, how many are born every minute?
1 baby per 12 seconds is apparently the actual rate of babies being born in the U.S. according to Ed.
(Just in case you're looking for a cool description of how to estimate how many babies are born per minute in the U.S., it's here. At least, I think it's cool. I leave it to our resident math brains to decide.)
Christopher had no idea how to solve this problem. "12 x 60?" he said.
Ed says the accelerated math curriculum is so incurably procedural that the kids approach word problems the way they'd approach a dartboard; they pick a procedure, fling it across the room, and hope it hits the target not the wall.
Christian didn't know how to do the baby problem, either, at first.
"12 x 60?" he said.
Before I could start banging my head against the wall he decided he could answer the question skip-counting by 12s up to 60.
That was a relief.
Anyway, tonight I got worried about what exactly is on the Accuplacer math test. Christian has to take a math course to get his Teaching Assistant Certificate, which is his immediate goal, and he has to pass the Accuplacer test to take the course.
Christian wants to buy the textbook to see what he needs to know. That's a good idea, but since we couldn't do that tonight and couldn't even look at it on Amazon because we didn't know the title I decided to see if there was an Accuplacer test prep book I could take a look at.
Apparently there's not.
I find this bizarre. People's lives are hanging on the results of the Accuplacer, and no one's ever heard of it or written a test prep manual telling you what's on it or how close you are to being able to pass it.
The good news is that I found what looks like a terrific website for Accuplacer test prep. You can take a free online self-assessment test on 31 different scales including Algebra II. I thought I saw somewhere that Accuplacer also tests college-level math, but I don't see it now.
I took the Algebra 1 test & missed one of 20. Careless error.
May try algebra 2 tomorrow.
College Placement and the College Puzzle of placement tests
____________
* high school you're paying for again
Here in Chicago, the community colleges hit you hard with placement tests. They use COMPASS.
ReplyDeleteIn math, if you don't pass pre-algebra you get to take non-credit remedial courses before you can sign up for algebra.
The link has practice tests. I think I'll use some of the questions with my students.
Well, my 8 year old got the answer to your "how many babies are born in one minute" in about 10 seconds (all while simultaneously watching Ice Age 2). He is working in 3A of Singapore Math.
ReplyDeleteI tell anyone who will listen (EM started here a few years ago), if they can't homeschool - afterschool with Singapore Math. Don't let the skinny textbooks and short lessons fool you, it works.
uh-oh
ReplyDeleteI'm definitely going to have to put in a word identification thingie
sigh
oh boy, Nick's Mama
ReplyDeleteThat is sooooo depressing.
Christopher is 12.
And completely able to learn and do math.
Horrific curriculum.
Horrific pedagogy.
Weak teacher to boot.
Two years in a row.
I realized last week Christopher has to do SOME of his Saxon Algebra 1/2 EVERY SINGLE DAY, come what may.
ReplyDeleteWe've been picking it up as we can, trying to fit it in.
That doesn't work.
He has to do something every day. Like KUMON.
I figured this out because I started finding Algebra II difficult. I had reached the point where I thought I may need to take a class rather than teaching myself.
Then I started doing lessons every day (I'd gotten spotty) and everything became easy again.
Dailyness matters.
Just downloaded the tests - thanks!
ReplyDeletebtw, I need dimensional analysis problems, so if you know any sources, let me know.
ReplyDelete(Haven't looked over the ones I posted on the old site..)
cool
ReplyDeleteI just searched my hard drive.
I have quite a few dimensional analysis problems here.
I'm gonna need them.
Catherine,
ReplyDeleteTry this dimensional analysis problem:
An object travels 23 feet per second. What is the speed in miles/hour?
The students I taught had a hard time with DI, even though I thought I was able to anticipate every source of confusion and make the presentation crystal clear.
Catherine,
ReplyDeleteWhat curriculum are they using in Christopher's class?
Thanks!
ReplyDeleteDimensional analysis is amazingly hard to master!
It's the simplest procedure on earth (I think), and bizarrely hard to conquer.
You know what we need?
We need KUMON for dimensional analysis.
We need to write a day-by-day practice booklet that would start with the simplest problems and work up systematically.
You would assign maybe 5 simple-growing-to-more-complex problems a day over 3 years' time.
(I don't think you'd need daily problems after a few weeks or months, but you would need to do dimensional analysis problems at least a couple times a week.)
Maybe I'll add that to my infinitely long and growing list.
The middle school accelerated math curriculum is appalling.
ReplyDeleteIn 6th grade they use Prentice-Hall Pre-Algebra; in 7th they're using a 40-year old textbook called Integrated Mathematics
The books are ok (not crazy about P-H), but they're used badly.
The accelerated course is a burn-out, "killer" course, a war of attrition waged by the school against the kids. The intent almost seems to be to wash middle schoolers out of the accelerated track in the same way organic chemistry was (or is?) used to wash students out of pre-med.
When parents say their kids are having trouble, they're told the child should "come in for extra help." When extra help doesn't work they're told the child "might feel more comfortable in Phase 3."
The school's goal is never to do everything in its power to keep kids in the track and make sure they succeed.
The conscious or unconscious goal appears to be getting parents off their backs.
Once the child is dropped to an easier track, voila.
No more calls from parents.
Everyone's happy.
You can get the idea from these posts on
ktm 1:
death march to algebra
pre-algebra is bunk
I think that book is for "regular" (not accelerated) ninth graders.
ReplyDelete(secret message to Catherine: I haven't signed up for your merry band yet, as I'm on a deadline with a real-world task. Once that clears up, I'll figure out the logistics of getting a google account.)
I posted link at my site to a video of a presentation by David Klein and James Milgram.
ReplyDeleteDavid Klein has done much work to bring sanity to math education and it is a great joy to watch him. The situation he describes is so absurd it is humorous. The event is hosted by Where's the Math?, an insurgent group in WA. Appealing to KTM insurgents.
Great Link, Instructivist. I can't believe I spent two hours watching Klein and Milgram. Oh well, it is rainy and cold.
ReplyDeleteLoved the comment from David Klein, The greatest obstacle to [math] education is education schools.. . . or something close to that.
Near the end, in response to a question, Klein said there is a Japanese math curriculum that's been translated at U of Chicago. He said it was available through AMS.
Does anyone know anything about this?
I would be interestedin the Japanese math curriculum in translation as well. Please announce a link if you find out more.
ReplyDeleteLynn,
ReplyDeleteWhile I didn't go back and listen to the entire video again to hear the exact reference, could he be refering to some texts by Kodaira Kunihiko? (1954 Fields Medalist)
Here is an article about math education in Japan with reference to his high school texts. I think two of them are in translation because I remembered looking this up in Amazon some time ago.
http://www.msri.org/publications/books/Book36/files/judson.pdf
Myrtle,
ReplyDeleteI am almost certain these are the books Klein mentioned:
[14] Mathematics 2: Japanese Grade 11 - Kunihiko Kodaira, Editor - AMS, 1997, 262 pp., Softcover, ISBN-10: 0-8218-0582-7, ISBN-13: 978-0-8218-0582-4, List: US$32, All AMS Members: US$26, MAWRLD/9
[15] Basic Analysis: Japanese Grade 11 - Kunihiko Kodaira, Editor - AMS, 1996, 184 pp., Softcover, ISBN-10: 0-8218-0580-0, ISBN-13: 978-0-8218-0580-0, List: US$26, All AMS Members: US$21, MAWRLD/11
[16] Algebra and Geometry: Japanese Grade 11 - Kunihiko Kodaira, Editor - AMS, 1996, 174 pp., Softcover, ISBN-10: 0-8218-0581-9, ISBN-13: 978-0-8218-0581-7, List: US$26, All AMS Members: US$21, MAWRLD/10
[17] Mathematics 1: Japanese Grade 10 - Kunihiko Kodaira, Editor - AMS, 1996, 247 pp., Softcover, ISBN-10: 0-8218-0583-5, ISBN-13: 978-0-8218-0583-1, List: US$32, All AMS Members: US$26, MAWRLD/8
I don't know why Klein went esoteric when there are good books like Saxon. I would have liked to hear his views on Saxon.
Hi Myrtle, the question came from a parent of a middle schooler, asking for help.
ReplyDeleteI think both Milgram and Klein responded. They said nice things about SingaporeMath for elementary but that there were "problems" with Singapore's Middle School texts.
Then Klein went on to the effect that there is very little available for middle school kids and then mentioned the Japanese translations. I don't know why he didn't like Saxon.
Here's what I pulled awhile back (this may be the same thing you have):
ReplyDeleteResource Materials available from the UCSMP Director's Office
• Soviet Studies in Mathematics Education, vols. 7-8
• Japanese Grade 7 Mathematics
• Japanese Grade 8 Mathematics
• Japanese Grade 9 Mathematics
• Russian Grade 1 Mathematics
• Russian Grade 2 Mathematics
• Russian Grade 3 Mathematics
• Developments in School Mathematics Education around the World, vols. 1-3
About UCSMP's Translation Series
That is a ratio and proportion problem.
ReplyDelete5babies/10seconds=xbabies/60seconds
when you cross multiply 60*5= 300
when you cross multiply 10*x= 10X
so you divide and get 30 babies are born every 60 seconds (1minute)
Apparently a lot of universities and community colleges are using ALEKS for math placement tests now. (UC Irvine, several Cal States, Purdue, UA, MU, UT...)
ReplyDelete