Slugs and snails and puppy dogs' tails

In maths the variation of the results was very large. If a child got nothing right at all then he was given a maths attainment age of 6.0 years. The highest possible result was 21.0 years. The students were 11 rising 12-years-old when they entered the school and were given the tests. Every year some poor little things only managed 6 point something years, not even able to get to 7 years. Hence mathematically they were little 7-year-old children at best. Also every year a number of boys scored over 15, sometimes 16 and the highest was a result of 17.6 years.

At this stage some will be making all sorts of grunting, snorting and whining noises to the effect that such tests are not valid and should never have been given. Nobody but a fool imagined that the testing was super precise or told everything there was to know about each student's maths. However the results most definitely said two things that were certain.

First, on those tests, whatever they were measuring, the boys were weaker than the national average at English but were average at maths, so they were relatively better at maths than English.

Second, and again on those tests whatever they were testing, the boys varied from being mathematically little tiny boys to mid teenagers. To deny that there is any useful information in the results is simple rubbish. Which raises the question, why would anybody say that? That is easy to answer - because the spread of results is so clear, so huge, that it is impossible even for die-hard education establishment theists to defend their beloved mixed ability groups for maths. So they deny the existence or validity of the data.

Those boys were virtually all from rough and often quite poor backgrounds. Nevertheless they were not “below par” at maths. There is a stack of other evidence that boys, especially from poorer areas, show similar educational behaviour. They are weaker at English than maths, and they are weaker at English than girls from similar areas. A simple example is that a much greater percentage of boys than girls from poorer areas of Melbourne fail their English VCE.

It is my observation over many years and on different continents that where a boy comes from what rather posh Poms would call a “naice” family background his English performance is little different to a girl from a similar “naice” background. For the majority of boys the maths - and by reasonable extension the physical sciences - is an area of comparative advantage i.e. they are no worse than the girls. It is highly probable that such a comparative advantage is most pronounced for boys from lower socio-economic backgrounds.

It is interesting and perhaps disturbing to look at how well or otherwise our children do in the standardised year 3 and year 5 “benchmarks” for both “numeracy” and “reading”. Those results also enable the general public and in particular parents to see what the schools collectively are doing for our children especially the boys. Or should that be what the schools are doing to our children?

The results show the percentage of girls and boys that have “achieved the numeracy (or reading) benchmark”. They merely show how many of them have jumped over a low hurdle, they do not show how well they have done, that is they make no distinction between just scrambling over or clearing the bar with ease.

For the Year 3 “numeracy” test and for the nation as a whole 92.7 per cent of the boys and 92.8 per cent of the girls reached the benchmark. In some states the boys had a higher percentage than the girls, it was vice versa for other States, and overall it is effectively even. For the Year 5 “numeracy” test the percentages were 89.4 for the boys and 89.8 for the girls. There was variation between the States but overall the education systems have started to open a gap to the detriment of the boys. Fortunately the gap is small.

Give 'em time, they're working on it!

For the Year 3 “reading” test and for the nation as a whole 87.9 per cent of the boys and 92.0 per cent of the girls achieved the benchmark. An appalling gap of 4.1.

For the Year 5 “reading” test the percentages were 85.2 for the boys and 89.6 for the girls giving an increased gap of 4.4.