Tuesday, October 7, 2014 9:31 AM
News outlets are having a field day trumpeting that “Manitoba Gr 8 Students Rank Dead Last in Canada” thanks to a recently released report called the PCAP 2013 – Report on the Pan-Canadian Assessment of Science, Reading, and Mathematics. You can read the full report here.
The Minister for education is already making the rounds on radio and will be announcing something at 10AM. The opposition will lambaste them on why our students are doing so poorly and how this is a blight for Manitoba against the backdrop of Canada. People will demand to know what our teachers are doing (or aren’t doing) and on and on it will go.
But let’s boil down what the report actually says. We got better at Math, we got worse at reading, and while they didn’t provide year-to-year comparisons on sciences we can assume from the numbers that we have some work to do there.
Check it out – we got BETTER at math! This is a good thing. We got WORSE at reading – this is a concerning trend. But now that we know, we can take action.
I don’t see this report as being negative. I see this as a great source of information for our schools and school boards to use to adjust curriculum and approaches. Don’t think that will help any? Again – WE GOT BETTER AT MATH! So obviously we are doing something right.
The whole backdrop of Canada is a red herring – don’t fall for it. Firstly, if your goal is to be better than everyone else you’re focusing on the wrong thing. I work out at least 3 times a week and I’m seeing gains. Will I ever look like The Rock? No. Should I be disappointed in my gym gains because of that? Of course not! Same here – our focus needs to be on Manitoba and how to make us better than we were last year.
And before we start grilling school officials on what our teachers are doing, we as parents need to start looking at what *we* are doing at home. Are we following up on homework? Are we touching base with teachers regularly to get updates on how our kids are doing? Are we trying to incorporate activities that will bolster their abilities in reading, math, and science?
I think its great that we have this information from the PCAP 2013 report! It gives us the information on where to focus our efforts to change things and to continue doing the things that are showing results.
So chill out Manitoba, all this means is we have some more homework to do.