The limits of online assessments
How tough is it for a math teacher to know if his or her students understand basic math?
Tougher than you think, according Marilyn Burns, a veteran math educator and founder of Math Solutions, a unit of Scholastic Inc.
She found that an alarming number of middle-school students couldn’t subtract 998 from 1000 in their heads. Instead, they cross out zeroes and subtract digit by digit without really understanding or thinking through what they’re doing. Burns says teachers too often assume that students who compute properly understand what they are doing, but often these students are unable to apply simple math in the real world.
“Right answers can mask confusion and wrong answers can hide understanding,” says Burns.
Burns’ latest math solution? Teachers in grades 4 through 8 should spend oodles of time interviewing students