Seattle meteorologist Cliff Mass, who is a prolific blogger, as well as a UW professor, is also an active member of Where’s the Math?, a parent advocacy group working to improve mathematics instruction in Washington.

Cliff recently had a post on his blog suggesting that OSPI (the Office of the Superintendent of Public Instruction, our state board of education) under Randy Dorn is failing to correct the mistakes of his predecessor when it comes to math education and assessment.

First, I should point out that Cliff does a good job of describing our need to back off a bit from the overly-fuzzy approaches to teaching math that were in vogue until recently. However, it’s easy to make the pendulum swing too far in the other direction, or to be distracted by irrelevant issues such as whether kids today are being taught to do math in the same way older generations were taught.

We’re big fans of Cliff’s weather blog in my house, so I’m writing from a position of respectful disagreement. As much as I respect his expertise as a meteorologist, I must say that Dr. Mass appears to fundamentally misunderstand how academic content standards are assessed in Washington:

Recently, Dorn’s staff released the Test Development Guidelines that will guide the writing of new WA standardized tests. These are on the OSPI website in the What’s New box at this link. In these guidelines, bold text is used to indicate what parts of each state math standard should be tested.

That’s correct. In fact, many parts of the standards are not assessed on the state test, because there are too many standards to assess in a single test.

It’s always been this way, and not just for math – every subject area tested by the WASL contains many content standards that simply don’t make it into the test. Dorn is making the MSP much shorter than the WASL, so even greater selectivity will be needed.

Some standards are difficult or impossible to assess on a standardized test, and must be assessed by the teacher through classroom-based assessments. The science standards contain many obvious examples, but so do the math standards. I find it odd that Cliff writes:

Even a cursory examination of these guidelines reveals that state standards are being compromised to further a Discovery math agenda. Fluency, competency, and standard algorithms are not deemed important enough for evaluation. To illustrate this problem, consider the following key grade 3 standard, with the bold text representing content to be assessed:

“3.1.C Fluently and accurately add and subtract whole numbers using the standard regrouping algorithms.” (page12)
As you can see, neither fluency nor standard algorithms will be tested.

Where Cliff sees a sinister agenda, I see OSPI being very realistic about what the WASL/MSP can actually measure. By “fluently,” he means “quickly.” Measuring fluency would require the state to create a timed test like the ones teachers routinely give in class to ensure that students are learning their basic math facts. It would also require a statewide definition of math fact fluency.

While I want students to be able to quickly recall and use the basic math facts, I don’t think it’s helpful to insist that all students – with their range of fine motor skills, memory recall speeds, and responses to the pressure of a timed test – be held to whatever arbitrary standard could be created. The WASL/MSP is an untimed test – students have as much time as they need to complete it. Changing this would surely prevent some students from demonstrating what they really do know, and would invite lawsuits from parents whose children have disabilities or otherwise complete tests more slowly than other students.

Fluency with basic facts is best tested by teachers in the classroom, who have the best sense of what level of fluency is acceptable for each student, based on the many factors that affect the speed at which they can complete a test. While knowing the basic facts should be a nonnegotiable expectation for all students, being able to write them out quickly does not strike me as a nearly as important a concern as, say, strong conceptual understanding.

You’ll also note that “using the standard regrouping algorithm” is not bolded. Is Mass suggesting that the WASL/MSP penalize students for using the “wrong” technique to solve a problem, even if they solve it correctly? If so, this is ironic considering Where’s the Math?’s complaints about homework that requires students to use non-standard procedures for solving problems. “Who cares if we use a certain technique, as long as the answer’s correct?” is a common complaint. When it comes to high-stakes assessments, I agree. If students understand the concepts and can solve problems using one or more of the algorithms or techniques at their disposal, I don’t see a reason to penalize them for using a technique other than the standard algorithms.

Cliff continues:

The same undermining was applied to multiplication and division, with none of this standard bolded:
“4.1.A Quickly recall multiplication facts through 10 X 10 and the related division facts. “ (page26)

So none of our state students have to worry about knowing multiplication and division facts very well! So students won’t have to know that 4×5=20, or 36/6=6!
According to discovery math supporters, that’s for calculators to know, not kids.

Again, the bolded text Cliff is referring to indicates standards that are actually tested on the WASL/MSP. Bolding this standard would require a timed test, which OSPI can’t create. Even if a standard isn’t tested by the state assessment, it’s still a standard which teachers are to help students meet, and this one is clearly best assessed by the teacher.

He concludes:

You can look through the rest yourself, but the bottom line is that the State math standards are being gutted by these folks. Fluency in basic operations will not be tested and they are trying to push the reform approach of heavy reliance on calculators and inefficient discovery-math algorithms.
…
Editing standards is clearly subverting the expressed written intent of the Washington State legislature and the needs of our state.

Again, the standards are not being “edited,” but marked as to what can actually be tested. The WASL has never tested every standard, and cannot.

If Dr. Mass would like to measure every single math standard on our annual state test, I would invite him to draft an assessment that is capable of doing so, and to submit it to Mr. Dorn for consideration. I would also be happy to review it, along with his plan for enduring peace in the Middle East and his list of suggestions for how to solve a problem like Maria.

Until then, I would suggest that advocacy groups such as Where’s the Math? attempt to understand what good math teaching actually looks like, and do the more challenging work of supporting good instruction K-12, rather than focus on the impossible goal of testing every standard.