Answer Jake's homework for him please.

[titaniumbean]

maybe these teachers should get an education first too 

[david3103]

Thanks for the answers.

Jake gave the same responses as Kush and when confronted with the questions, so did I.

Obviously the last 3 posts are technically correct and we are wrong.

But his teacher just put two big red crosses next to his answers without any explanation as to why they were wrong.

Terribly worded questions IMO.

Or would she ask trick questions to 9 and 10 year olds?

Just looked back at Kushkin's post and if Jake had the same answers i would expect all teachers to put two red crosses by them since they are wrong whichever way you read the question.

Not going to pursue the debate since having taken guidance from my wife on it I am not going to argue with her. This isn't because I am scared of her, but because on matters educational I know no one better.

[david3103]

So what is the point of saying three oranges, two drinks and six cds, if not to confuse?

To develop the skill of extracting the relevant information from a statement.

If you ask me what time the bus is and I answer, "the blue double-decker bus will arrive at 1633" you extract the relevant piece of my reply.


Yeah I know I said I was done.

[titaniumbean]

Thanks for the answers.

Jake gave the same responses as Kush and when confronted with the questions, so did I.

Obviously the last 3 posts are technically correct and we are wrong.

But his teacher just put two big red crosses next to his answers without any explanation as to why they were wrong.

Terribly worded questions IMO.

Or would she ask trick questions to 9 and 10 year olds?

Just looked back at Kushkin's post and if Jake had the same answers i would expect all teachers to put two red crosses by them since they are wrong whichever way you read the question.

Not going to pursue the debate since having taken guidance from my wife on it I am not going to argue with her. This isn't because I am scared of her, but because on matters educational I know no one better.

the point isn't the nature of marking a question wrong. it's the nature of not then teaching or providing any feedback for the student to actually learn and improve.

[titaniumbean]

it also shows how much students are now taught to 'pass tests' not to learn or explore.


when reading a question they are thinking what similar questions have I done before, what order did I put the numbers in last time to get the marks. not, I read this, comprehend it's meaning and respond accordingly.

[doubleup]

So what is the point of saying three oranges, two drinks and six cds, if not to confuse?

To develop the skill of extracting the relevant information from a statement.

If you ask me what time the bus is and I answer, "the blue double-decker bus will arrive at 1633" you extract the relevant piece of my reply.


Yeah I know I said I was done.

welll apparently 9yos would have difficulty with a properly worded two part arithmetic Q, so I find it surprising that they are expected to cope with an understanding ambiguity question disguised as an arithmetic question.

[The_nun]

So what is the point of saying three oranges, two drinks and six cds, if not to confuse?

To develop the skill of extracting the relevant information from a statement.

If you ask me what time the bus is and I answer, "the blue double-decker bus will arrive at 1633" you extract the relevant piece of my reply.


Yeah I know I said I was done.

How do you know it will be blue?.

[david3103]

it also shows how much students are now taught to 'pass tests' not to learn or explore.


when reading a question they are thinking what similar questions have I done before, what order did I put the numbers in last time to get the marks. not, I read this, comprehend it's meaning and respond accordingly.

It actually shows the opposite.

[doubleup]

David, your "reasoning" explanation is valid as a general point, it is simply unlikely in this scenario given the age of the children and the way the question was marked.  Also my brother considered that children of that age would simply have defaulted to the easiest answer, so the "reasoning" would have wooshed them completely.

[david3103]

David, your "reasoning" explanation is valid as a general point, it is simply unlikely in this scenario given the age of the children and the way the question was marked.  Also my brother considered that children of that age would simply have defaulted to the easiest answer, so the "reasoning" would have wooshed them completely.

I hear what you say, but as i have said more than once, this is not my take on this.
Like you I asked someone 'in the trade'.
I don't know what age children your brother works with, nor how much experience he has, but my wife has been teaching for over thirty years and is the Principal at a school with children of this age. She stays up to date with the methodology and thinking and her immediate reaction to the original post was to raise the point about Bloom's Taxonomy and she saw the question on the basis i described earlier.
I was taught to pass tests/exams throughout my education. Today's children are encouraged and taught to think.

[The Camel]

Thanks for the posts, really interesting discussion.

I've been oscillating since I saw his homework book. Initially I thought they were terribly worded questions and the teacher just read them differently (the were printed off somewhere on the internet), then I kinda changed my mind and maybe it was a lesson in reading the question properly.

Points to note, these are 9 and 10 year olds answering these questions and it was maths homework, not a comprehension test and Jake says his teacher didn't warn the class to read the questions carefully..

Meh, I really don't know.

Meanwhile, before Jake takes his homework book back to school, here is another of the questions (it was a set of 12)

I bought a card costing £1.76 and a chocolate bar costing 63p. There was a 10% sale that day. How much did I spend?

[Jon MW]

David, your "reasoning" explanation is valid as a general point, it is simply unlikely in this scenario given the age of the children and the way the question was marked.  Also my brother considered that children of that age would simply have defaulted to the easiest answer, so the "reasoning" would have wooshed them completely.

I hear what you say, but as i have said more than once, this is not my take on this.
Like you I asked someone 'in the trade'.
I don't know what age children your brother works with, nor how much experience he has, but my wife has been teaching for over thirty years and is the Principal at a school with children of this age. She stays up to date with the methodology and thinking and her immediate reaction to the original post was to raise the point about Bloom's Taxonomy and she saw the question on the basis i described earlier.
I was taught to pass tests/exams throughout my education. Today's children are encouraged and taught to think.

I think the issue is that she is interpreting through the eyes of someone who is good at their job and actually cares about education. When I first saw the questions it was obvious that they 'could' contain multiple levels of analysis - but if you take into account the context it is absolutely clear that this isn't the case.

Their is no evidence that the teacher is using it to evaluate general comprehension - I thought it was pretty clear that it was maths homework and not any kind of cross subject at play - and their is no effort to identify and correct any misconceptions. It seems a lot like they are just told to set homework so they this one probably frequently just sets work they've used before and only takes a few minutes to mark.

I would also add on the other point,  my fiancees Mum works in a poorly rated primary school and my nieces attend a highly rated secondary school - I did teacher training (albeit 10 and 15 years ago) in half a dozen schools; the only school that taught the pupils to think rather than to the test was the private school. State schools have always been somewhat guilty of this, but the difference between seeing what state schools were doing between 2000, 2005 and presently (with my niece's school) was truly shocking. Good luck to anyone who can get their children into a state school that actually teaches their children to think and not pass tests.

[MintTrav]

.

[tikay]

Thanks for the posts, really interesting discussion.

I've been oscillating since I saw his homework book. Initially I thought they were terribly worded questions and the teacher just read them differently (the were printed off somewhere on the internet), then I kinda changed my mind and maybe it was a lesson in reading the question properly.

Points to note, these are 9 and 10 year olds answering these questions and it was maths homework, not a comprehension test and Jake says his teacher didn't warn the class to read the questions carefully..

Meh, I really don't know.

Meanwhile, before Jake takes his homework book back to school, here is another of the questions (it was a set of 12)

I bought a card costing £1.76 and a chocolate bar costing 63p. There was a 10% sale that day. How much did I spend?

Ha, very good.

On the basis of once bitten twice shy, presumably the answer is £1.76 + £0.63 = £2.39. 

[david3103]

Out of curiosity, which school is Jake at Keith? via PM if you prefer.


btw, if these questions had been just about the arithmetic, as some have suggested, they would have been put as

69 + 104 =
5000 - 699 =

Or
0.69 + 1.04 =
50 - 6.99 =

etc


Apropos the skill level of the teacher, as per JonMW's post, is Jake absolutely sure there was no feedback given about the answers? Had they spent time in school on questions of this type before the homework was set?