KC teacher takes on math problem
Published:Friday | August 12, 2011 | 12:00 AM
Nadisha Hunter, Staff Reporter
CONCERNED ABOUT the dismal results in mathematics over the years, an educator is taking the lead in trying to improve students' performances in the subject.
"I feel like the competency in mathematics is reducing, which is sad because the students normally come out of Grade Six Achievement Test very good in mathematics, and so, to me, it is an erosion from first to fifth form when at that point they should be advancing and improving," said Raffic Shaw, a mathematics teacher at Kingston College .
Shaw explained that the problem exists as some teachers who are teaching the subject at the Caribbean Secondary Education Certificate (CSEC) level do not grasp the full understanding of some of the topics covered under the syllabus.
Don't understand
"There are some topics that some persons just don't understand, and it is not just now, because people have been failing mathematics for a very long time, and what you find is that a lot of persons who actually struggled to do CSEC mathematics are the ones teaching it now," he charged.
Shaw added, "The reason for the high failure rate comes down to the teachers, if the teachers are not good enough to bring out the potential in the students they will not do well."
He further stated that the general fear for the subject, which is evident in the classes he taught, is also a contributing factor for the failing rate.
It is in this light that Shaw said he has been producing study guides with solutions to exam question for mathematics and accounting, both at CSEC and CAPE levels, and is now launching a video solution on DVD for the subject.
Shaw said emphasis is placed on the areas in mathematics that students tend to have problems with, and are not properly taught in the schools.
Voice record
"What I do is voice record myself, explaining on screen how the question is to be done, and even for construction questions you actually see me animating the construction. Where diagrams are to be developed, I go through the steps one at a time, because when you do the book, you basically just give the finished diagram. Seeing the diagram built from scratch is a big difference," he said.
The educator is confident that the video solution is one way that could improve the performance of mathematics in the country.
"It offers a greater level of understanding of the subject because of the audio-visual presentation," he said.
Some 16,000 students passed mathematics in CSEC last year, up from about 13,000 in 2009. A total of 77,924 students wrote the examination last year.