Teachers concerned about new math requirements in MBO
From this school year, math counts towards the diploma and students can fail the subject. The new calculation requirements also come into effect. Three quarters of math teachers are concerned.
Image: Rob Niemantsverdriet
Lecturers fear that students who have a lot of trouble with maths will fail in the course. In that case, they cannot obtain a diploma at their desired MBO level. There is also a fear that students will drop out if they have difficulty with maths. 'There are not enough hours available for maths, so there is not enough time for the weak student,' wrote a surveyee earlier this year in a poll among 166 mathematicians from the bureau ICE. ICE, known as the provider of the IEP Final Test in primary education, also makes tests for ROCs with which they determine the level of MBO students in mathematics, for example.
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Math teachers indicate in the survey that they have headaches about the extra work that awaits them. They expect to spend more time marking both the exams and the assignments in preparation for the math tests.
Just over half of the math teachers surveyed were aware of the new math requirements during the poll, and exactly half think it's an improvement. This applies in particular to the better connection of the new computational requirements with students' perceptions of the world.
Issues
Researcher Annemarie Groot has been working on maths in senior secondary vocational education for many years for the Expertise Center for Vocational Education (Ecbo). She nuances the concerns that emerge from the poll. “There was also the fear that good professionals would not receive a diploma in Dutch. In practice I have never heard of this happening. Furthermore, the demotivated drop-out seems strange to me: after all, the subject arithmetic is on the timetable for every MBO programme. And it's important to know that a good craftsman or woman who can't count will really get into trouble on many fronts in the future. Will the good professionals become low-grade professionals in the future? That does not seem desirable to me.”
The fear that good professionals would not receive a diploma was also present in the Netherlands. In practice, I have never heard of this happening
For senior secondary vocational education teacher Koen Weijters, who works at the Trade & Entrepreneurship degree program in Tilburg at the Rooi Pannen, the change means that arithmetic is important again. In the past ten years, he thinks that attention for arithmetic has waned in MBO. Together with two other colleagues, Weijters now focuses entirely on the calculation profession. “We share knowledge within the umbrella school group and I can see that it is serious. It is no longer all crammed into leftovers. The only thing I'm really concerned about are the individual cases: that enthusiastic professional who has bad luck that the math doesn't work. That has major consequences from now on and what do you do then? It is still a question mark how we deal with that.”
Motivation
In class, Weijters often tried to avoid discussion when a student started talking about why they had to calculate. “I said you need it daily in your life, came up with examples. Only then followed that one question: if it's so important, why doesn't it count? That is why I am in favor of counting counting towards the diploma. Student motivation will improve 100 percent. In the beginning, students are docile, but I saw them drop out halfway through the second grade. They shift priorities and I saw them practicing for Dutch or English in my lessons.”
An important change is the distinction in calculation requirements between the MBO levels
For him, it is mainly the marking that changes, says the MBO teacher. “That results in more work, because now it is automatic, but later it will no longer be. Students receive partial scores for the elaboration. It used to be 0 points for a rounding error, but the intermediate steps now also yield points. At my school math teachers are given 80 hours in the year to mark. I think there was an advice for 160 hours, so perhaps the board will adjust this later. Furthermore, I will not teach 4 or 5 subjects this year, but only math, so that saves on work pressure.”
Students who start an MBO study this month are the first batch for whom the math test counts. They may obtain a 5 for this, but then they must have obtained at least a 6 for the subject Dutch (MBO level 2 and 3). Students who do level 4 can also get a 5 for math, but then they must score at least a 6 for both the Dutch and English subjects. As a result, arithmetic becomes part of the weighting of the diploma.
Iron
Together with this change, new calculation requirements will also come into effect. It was already agreed in the 2017 coalition agreement to review the current reference levels. Mathematics had to be more tailored to different professions and MBO wanted its own math approach because the math test in secondary education was abolished in 2020. This makes it more difficult for ROCs to estimate the level of students.
Researcher Groot van Ecbo was part of the expert group that developed the new math requirements: “These requirements ensure that math is more appropriate and better suited to the target groups in MBO. Calculation becomes more functional. So no bare sheet with rows of adding and subtracting sums.” According to the researcher, it is special that an inventory has been made for these requirements among MBO students and teachers into functional and realistic situations. They have become the starting point. However, not everything has been thrown away from the 'old' reference levels, because the calculation requirements are derived from them.
An important change is the distinction between the MBO levels. Each MBO level -with the exception of the entrance course- has its own calculation requirements. That is a difference with how it is now, where the entrance training, levels 2 and 3, use the reference level 2F and students who do level 4 have to master reference level 3F. “The target groups are so diverse,” says Groot. “It's crazy that students at different levels should be able to do the same thing.”
It is a missed opportunity if you keep doing the same thing in lessons
With the new calculation requirements, the 'numbers' section, which contained fractions and multiplications, has been dropped. So the old sums. MBO teacher Weijters suspects that this is better for students. “It does take away my concern, because they can calculate more with calculators and those parts work well.” Weijters is looking forward to being able to focus more on students' perceptions of the world in his lessons. “They are very interested in crypto currency and aspects of personal finance, such as investing. I can share all of that in the lessons.” Researcher Groot says that teachers should check their math lessons to meet the new requirements. "It's a missed opportunity if you keep doing the same thing."
Hard calculation requirement in MBO was discussed for a long time
In MBO, there has been a lot of talk about counting calculations for the diploma. Researcher Annemarie Groot: “Ten years ago, the ministry introduced the reference levels and with it a compulsory central examination for all MBO programmes.” It took until now before the math actually started counting. In front of professional journal Profile sGroot wrote an article about this in 2020. With the introduction of the reference levels, it soon became a matter of a math exam that had to be taken centrally. After that, schools could start organizing math education and the exam became a pilot. At that time, the discussion in the House was mainly about the reliability of the exam and another project was started to further develop the math education and exam. In 2015, the House of Representatives decided to postpone the counting towards the diploma for MBO. However, students had to continue taking the exam.
According to the 2017 coalition agreement, the reference levels needed an update. Mathematics had to be professionally oriented again and separate requirements and institutional exams were introduced for each MBO level. An expert group was allowed to formulate these new requirements. In 2020, this group will deliver the calculation requirements. The requirements will be laid down in law and math exams will be developed in a cooperative that institutions may conduct themselves. Mathematics counts towards the diploma from this academic year.
The math test did count in secondary education, but in April 2020 the House of Representatives agreed that the math test was abolished. Mathematics will now be tested as part of the mathematics course. Pupils who do not have mathematics in their package will take a school exam for mathematics from 2020-2021, but this does not count in the pass/fail scheme.
