Teachers attend math seminar in hopes of raising student test
scores
Gilroy – Hung-Hsi Wu looked across at the group of teachers and administrators and asked them a simple question: What would they say Gilroy’s temperature was that Saturday afternoon?
A few different answers sprang from the group, 65, 62 degrees.
But the University of California, Berkeley math professor walked up to the projector and wrote “60s” on the transparency. The temperature will fluctuate depending on if you’re indoors, outside or at a higher elevation.
It’s inaccurate to say it’s 65 degrees, he said.
“You have to round off because CST (California Standards Test) says you must,” Wu said. “You don’t have a choice (on the standardized tests).”
Wu, who conducts summer math institutions, spent Saturday scribbling similar lessons on the overhead, lessons designed to help educators become better math teachers and subsequently improve standardized test scores.
Although the district’s main reason for bringing the professor to Gilroy is to improve CST scores, Wu explained that educators shouldn’t simply be satisfied with proficiency. To stress the point, he told the group cities don’t brag about the number of residents they have passing the driver’s test and claim that that makes them good drivers.
It’s the same with the CST, he explained.
“It should be a minimal level test,” he said. “Pass it and forget it.”
Gilroy Unified School District’s CST math scores begin to plummet in the fourth grade and continue on a downward spiral until 11th grade, the final year of testing. In an attempt to remedy the problem district has staged weekend math seminars for teachers and administrators.
Saturday’s was the third and final one of the year. During the all-day seminar, Wu showed the teachers more effective ways to teach fractions, algebra and other staple concepts.
He told the attendees that shortcomings have to be attacked in kindergarten. If students don’t know the basic concepts – multiplication, subtraction, addition, division, fractions – they will continue to trip on their way up.
Teachers need to ensure that students master those skills in the elementary and middle school, before they enter high school. School Board President Pat Midtgaard who attended part of the seminar, said she was impressed by Wu’s emphasis on explanation, on the concept behind arithmetic. The board member said when she was in school she was just told to do the work and didn’t know why.
She liked Wu’s advice that teachers should let their students try the difficult way, such as adding seven 25 times instead of just multiplying seven by 25. After that long, drawn-out process, they’ll be begging for mercy, she said.
Between Wu’s lessons, a district official facilitated conversations between the teachers on ways to improve math instruction and to implement the district’s five-year math plan and the state’s brand new math framework for K-12. They discussed the importance of the district’s own assessment, which students take three times a year.
Superintendent Edwin Diaz said the district should have a preliminary math plan drawn up by the April 27 board meeting. That’s one of the reasons Wayne Scott said that teachers who didn’t attend any of the summits “will be in for a big surprise.”
The Gilroy High School math teacher pointed out that every teacher in the district will have to incorporate the new math plan into the classroom and they’ll be a little out of it if they weren’t present any of the Saturdays. Also, Scott said that only a few elementary teachers showed up, when there’s more than 200 in the district.
Still, the educator said he thinks the district is heading in the right direction.
“I like what’s going on,” Scott said. “I like what I’m seeing.”
Teachers were paid $27 an hour to attend the math summit. Some educators spent the whole day at the district office, while others opted to leave after lunch.
