Shutesbury 2005 MCAS 4th Grade Math Item Analysis

Stephen Bannasch <[email protected]>
Oct 19, 2005

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Overview

The graph below shows the average response to the 39 questions on the 2005 4th grade Math MCAS test at Shutesbury Elementary school. These data show where our students are doing better and worse than the state average. Shutesbury students achieved close to the state average only on the topics of Measurement and Data Analysis, Statistics, and Probability. The other topics including Geometry, Number Sense, and Patterns, Relations,. and Algebra were considerably below the state average.
 
Data like these can be used to find out what areas of math students at Shutesbury are having trouble with. Each column on the graph represents one topic area in 4th grade math such as Geometry and Measurement. Each data marker represents one question and the average score Shutesbury students scored on that question. The data plotted have been normalized to the statewide Massachusetts average. This means that the statewide average is equivalent to 1.0. The horizontal lines indicate the average value for the Shutesbury score in that topic.

For example look at the data point at the bottom of the column in Number Sense (NS). That is question 15, it is a Multiple Choice question and has a value of 0.12. That means Shutesbury students scored approximately 1/10 of the state average for that question. Across the state 49% of the students answered that question correctly. At Shutesbury only 6% of the students answered it correctly. The scaled value of 0.12 is produced by dividing the Shutesbury average into the State average.

Questions We Had Difficulty With

The following is a list of 15 questions from the 2004 4th grade Math MCAS where Shutesbury students scored less than 0.9 when scaled against the Massachusetts average for that question. The questions are sorted from the one that the greatest number of students had incorrect to ones with lesser rates of incorrect answers.


Question #: 15
Question Type: Multiple Choice
Topic: Number Sense
Shutesbury (correct): 6%
Massachusettts (correct): 49%
Scaled Value: 0.12
Correct Answer: C

61% selected A, 22% selected B, while only 6% selected the correct answer C.


Question #: 12
Question Type: Short Answer
Topic: Geometry
Shutesbury (correct): 17%
Massachusettts (correct): 52%
Scaled Value: 0.33

83% of Shutesbury kids didn't answer this question. All the kids who answered the question got it right.


Question #: 25
Question Type: Multiple Choice
Topic: Geometry
Shutesbury (correct): 33%
Massachusettts (correct): 63%
Scaled Value: 0.52
Correct Answer: A

50% of the Shutesbury kids selected B which actually has 2 axes of symmetry.


Question #: 20
Question Type: Multiple Choice
Topic: Number Sense
Shutesbury (correct): 44%
Massachusettts (correct): 71%
Scaled Value: 0.62
Correct Answer: D

33% selected C and 17% selected B.


Question #: 13
Question Type: Open Response
Topic: Data Analysis, Statistics, and Probability
Shutesbury (average): 1.50
Massachusettts (average): 2.21
Scaled Value: 0.68


Question #: 10
Question Type: Open Response
Topic: Measurement
Shutesbury (average): 1.44
Massachusettts (average): 2.08
Scaled Value: 0.69


Question #: 37
Question Type: Multiple Choice
Topic: Patterns, Relations, and Algebra
Shutesbury (correct): 39%
Massachusettts (correct): 54%
Scaled Value: 0.72
Correct Answer: C

39% selected A, 22% selected B.


Question #: 24
Question Type: Multiple Choice
Topic: Number Sense
Shutesbury (correct): 44%
Massachusettts (correct): 60%
Scaled Value: 0.73
Correct Answer: D

39% selected B.


Question #: 26
Question Type: Multiple Choice
Topic: Patterns, Relations, and Algebra
Shutesbury (correct): 61%
Massachusettts (correct): 81%
Scaled Value: 0.75
Correct Answer: C

22% selected D.


Question #: 16
Question Type: Multiple Choice
Topic: Patterns, Relations, and Algebra
Shutesbury (correct): 56%
Massachusettts (correct): 73%
Scaled Value: 0.77
Correct Answer: A

33% selected B.


Question #: 22
Question Type: Multiple Choice
Topic: Number Sense
Shutesbury (correct): 56%
Massachusettts (correct): 72%
Scaled Value: 0.78
Correct Answer: C

22% selected A, 22% selected B.


Question #: 39
Question Type: Multiple Choice
Topic: Data Analysis, Statistics, and Probability
Shutesbury (correct): 61%
Massachusettts (correct): 74%
Scaled Value: 0.82
Correct Answer: B

22% selected A, 11% selected C.


Question #: 31
Question Type: Open Response
Topic: Geometry
Shutesbury (average): 2.06
Massachusettts (average): 2.44
Scaled Value: 0.84


Question #: 35
Question Type: Multiple Choice
Topic: Number Sense
Shutesbury (correct): 61%
Massachusettts (correct): 71%
Scaled Value: 0.86
Correct Answer: B

28% selected C.


Question #: 6
Question Type: Multiple Choice
Topic: Number Sense
Shutesbury (correct): 78%
Massachusettts (correct): 89%
Scaled Value: 0.88
Correct Answer: C

11% selected D. This was a question that a large majority of kids in Shutesbury and across the State got correct.

The data used for creating this report was produced by the Department of Education and supplied to me by Tari Thomas.  At some point these data will be up on the DOE web site.