Mathematics and Science in the Eighth Grade

Mathematics and Science in the Eighth Grade Findings from the Third International Mathematics and Science Study

NATIONAL CENTER FOR EDUCATION STATISTICS

Statistical Analysis Report

July 2000

Mathematics and Science in the Eighth Grade
Findings from the Third International Mathematics and Science Study

U.S. Department of Education Office of Educational Research and Improvement

NCES 2000-014

Mathematics and Science in the Eighth Grade
Findings from the Third International Mathematics and Science Study
Patrick Gonzales, Project Officer National Center for Education Statistics

U.S. Department of Education Richard W. Riley Secretary
Office of Educational Research and Improvement C. Kent McGuire Assistant Secretary
National Center for Education Statistics Gary W. Phillips Acting Commissioner

Early Childhood, International, and Crosscutting Studies Division Val Plisko Associate Commissioner
International Activities Program Eugene Owen Director

The National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) is the primary federal entity for collecting, analyzing, and reporting data related to education in the United States and other nations. It fulfills a congressional mandate to collect, collate, analyze, and report full and complete statistics on the condition of education in the United States; conduct and publish reports and specialized analyses of the meaning and significance of such statistics; assist state and local education agencies in improving their statistical systems; and review and report on education activities in foreign countries.
NCES activities are designed to address high priority education data needs; provide consistent, reliable, complete, and accurate indicators of education status and trends; and report timely, useful, and high quality data to the U.S. Department of Education, the Congress, the states, other education policymakers, practitioners, data users, and the general public.
We strive to make our products available in a variety of formats and in language that is appropriate to a variety of audiences. You, as our customer, are the best judge of our success in communicating information effectively. If you have any comments or suggestions about this or any other NCES product or report, we would like to hear from you. Please direct your comments to:
National Center for Education Statistics Office of Educational Research and Improvement U.S. Department of Education 1990 K Street, NW Washington, DC 20006
July 2000
The NCES World Wide Web Home Page is: http://nces.ed.gov The NCES World Wide Web Electronic Catalog is: http://nces.ed.gov/pubsearch/index.asp
Suggested Citation U.S. Department of Education. National Center for Education Statistics. Mathematics and Science in the Eighth Grade: Findings from the Third International Mathematics and Science Study,
NCES 2000-014, Washington, DC, 2000. For ordering information on this report, write:
U.S. Department of Education ED Pubs P.O. Box 1398 Jessup, MD 20794-1398 or call toll free 1-877-4ED-Pubs. Content Contact: (202) 502-7421 Fax: (202) 502-7455
Email: [email protected]
Available for downloading at http://nces.ed.gov/timss

Table of Contents

List of Tables List of Figures List of Exhibits Acknowledgments

Page v
viii xi xiii

Chapter 1 Mathematics and Science in the Eighth Grade
Dan Levine

I.

Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1

A Short History of TIMSS. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3

Goals . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4

II. International Studies of Student Achievement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6 First International Mathematics Study. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7 First International Science Study . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8 Second International Mathematics Study . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9 Second International Science Study. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10

III. U.S. Participation in Previous International Studies . . . . . . . . . . 12 First IAEP Study. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12 Second IAEP Study . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13

IV. ` The TIMSS Design . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15 U.S. TIMSS Design, Population 2 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16 Videotape Classroom Observation Study . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17 Case Studies in the United States, Germany, and Japan . . . . . . . 18

Chapter 2 Student Achievement
Trevor Williams Leslie Jocelyn

I.

International Perspectives on U.S. Mathematics and

Science Achievement. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19

International Studies of Student Achievement . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19

An International Perspective on the Achievement of U.S.

Middle School Students . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20

Focusing on U.S. Performance. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20

II. Where We Stand Among Nations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21 Comparing Average Students . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21 A Restricted Set of Comparisons . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21

i

Extending Comparisons to Forty-one Nations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24 The Distribution of Achievement. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28 Comparing the Best Students . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28

III. U.S. International Standing in Content-specific Areas of Mathematics and Science . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38

IV. Comparisons Across Three Decades . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43 Mathematics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44 Science . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46

V.

Explanations? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48

Chapter 3 The Distribution of Student Achievement
Trevor Williams Leslie Jocelyn

I.

Population Groups . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49

Defining Population Groups . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50

II. Between-group Comparisons. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52 Gender . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52 Race/Ethnicity. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52 Language . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 54 National Origins . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 54 Parental Educational Attainments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55 Family Economic Circumstance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 56 Family Configuration . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 56

III. International Comparisons . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58 Race/Ethnicity. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58 Gender . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62 National Origins . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 64 Language . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 68 Father's and Mother's Education . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 70 Family Economic Circumstance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 74 Family Configuration . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78

IV. Benchmarking American Subpopulation Groups Against an International Average . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82

ii

Chapter 4 Teachers and Teaching
Trevor Williams Leslie Jocelyn Patricia Butler Camilla Heid Jacqueline Haynes

I.

Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85

Describing Instruction in Mathematics and Science . . . . . . . . . . 85

Description and Explanation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 88

A Note on Sampling and Interpretation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 89

Teachers, Teaching, and Achievement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91

II. Eighth-grade Mathematics and Science Teachers . . . . . . . . . . . . 92 Demographic Characteristics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 92 Education and Training . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 92 Experience . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 93 Knowledge . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 94 Teachers' Beliefs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 96 Eighth-grade Mathematics and Science Teachers. . . . . . . . . . . . 101

III. Teachers' Working Conditions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 102 Teachers' Work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 102 Teacher Workload . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 103 Teaching Responsibilities . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 104 Nonteaching Responsibilities . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 106 The Profession of Teaching . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 108 Contextual Constraints. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 111 The Work of Teaching . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 115

IV. Instructional Resources . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 116 Technology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 116 Course Differentiation: Tracking, Remediation, and Enrichment . 120 Instructional Time . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 125

V.

Instructional Practices . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 128

Lesson Planning . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 130

Introducing New Topics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 132

Organizing and Interacting with Students . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 134

Classroom Activities . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 136

Promoting Higher Order Cognitive Processes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 138

Responding to Students' Errors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 138

Homework . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 139

Assessment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 145

Mathematics and Science Instruction in the Middle School . . . . 148

iii

VI. The Last Lesson . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 151 Lesson Content: Topics Covered in the Last Lesson . . . . . . . . . . 151 Instructional Activities During the Last Lesson . . . . . . . . . . . . 156 Learning Mathematics and Science . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 159
Chapter 5 Summary
Achievement and Instruction in Eighth-Grade Mathematics and Science . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 161

References

165

iv

List of Tables

Table

Page

3-1 Between-group Comparisons . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53

Appendix A: Tables
4-1 Demographic characteristics; eighth-grade mathematics and science teachers, 1995. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A-1
4-2 Education, teaching, and grade-level experience; eighth-grade mathematics and science teachers, 1995. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A-2
4-3 Familiarity with curriculum documents; eighth-grade mathematics and science teachers, 1995 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A-3
4-4 Level of topic preparation; eighth-grade science teachers, 1995 . . . A-4
4-5 Beliefs about the nature and teaching of mathematics (science); eighth-grade mathematics and science teachers, 1995. . . . . . . . . . A-5
4-6 Student skills required for success in mathematics (science); eighth-grade mathematics and science teachers, 1995. . . . . . . . . . A-6
4-7 Hours per week spent teaching and on teaching-related activities; eighth-grade mathematics and science teachers, 1995. . . . . . . . . . A-7
4-8 Grade levels taught; eighth-grade mathematics and science teachers, 1995. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A-8
4-9 Level of influence on selected topics; eighth-grade mathematics and science teachers, 1995 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A-9
4-10 Professional activities; eighth-grade mathematics and science teachers, 1995 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A-10
4-11 Class size; eighth-grade mathematics and science classes, 1995 . . A-11
4-12 Reported achievement level of class; eighth-grade mathematics and science teachers, 1995 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A-12
4-13 Constraints on teaching; eighth-grade mathematics and science teachers, 1995 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A-13
4-14 Shortages of computer hardware, software, and calculators; population 2 schools, 1995 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A-14
4-15 Student access to calculators during lessons; eighth-grade mathematics and science teachers, 1995 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A-15
4-16 Student use of calculators in the classroom; eighth-grade mathematics and science teachers, 1995 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A-16

v

4-17 Student use of calculators in the classroom; eighth-grade students, 1995 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A-17
4-18 Use of computers during instruction; eighth-grade mathematics and science teachers, eighth-grade students, 1995 . . . . . . . . . . . A-18
4-19 Course differentiation in mathematics and science; population 2 schools, 1995 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A-19
4-20 Remedial and enrichment provisions; population 2 schools, 1995 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A-20
4-21 Instructional time for eighth-grade students; population 2 schools, 1995 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A-21
4-22 Resources used in lesson planning; eighth-grade mathematics and science teachers, 1995 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A-22
4-23 Resources used in making instructional decisions; eighth-grade mathematics and science teachers, 1995 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A-23
4-24 New topic introduction; eighth-grade students, 1995 . . . . . . . . . A-24 4-25 Teacher-student interaction; eighth-grade mathematics
and science classes, 1995 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A-25 4-26 Instructional activities; eighth-grade mathematics and
science students, 1995 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A-26 4-27 Use of experiments; eighth-grade science teachers, 1995 . . . . . . . A-27 4-28 Cognitive demands of instruction; eighth-grade mathematics
and science teachers, 1995 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A-28 4-29 Error correction strategies; eighth-grade mathematics and
science teachers, 1995 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A-29 4-30 Frequency and minutes of homework assigned; eighth-grade
mathematics and science teachers, 1995 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A-30 4-31 Use of out of school time; eighth-grade students, 1995 . . . . . . . . A-31 4-32 Tasks assigned as homework; eighth-grade mathematics
and science teachers, 1995 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A-32 4-33 Homework followup activities; eighth-grade mathematics
and science teachers, 1995 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A-33 4-34 Weight given to different types of assessment; eighth-grade
mathematics and science teachers, 1995 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A-34 4-35 Use of different kinds of assessment; eighth-grade
mathematics and science teachers, 1995 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A-35
vi

4-36 Topic focus of the last mathematics lesson; percentage of eighth-grade mathematics teachers nominating topic, 1995 . . . . . A-36
4-37 Topics covered in last mathematics lesson; percentage of eighth-grade mathematics teachers nominating topic group by class type, 1995. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A-37
4-38 Topic focus of the last science lesson; percentage of eighth-grade science teachers nominating topic, 1995 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A-38
4-39 Occurrence and order of instructional activities in the "last lesson"; eighth-grade mathematics and science teachers, 1995 . . . . . . . . . A-39
4-40 Length of activities during the "last lesson"; eighth-grade mathematics and science teachers, 1995 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A-40
vii