A research paper into how Bayside Christian College’s students are achieving an average of 1.4 years of learning every 12 months, according to PAT-M results.
Bayside Christian College was searching for a solution to the challenge all schools face, how to cater to the differing learning needs of every student. Teachers and school leaders at Bayside Christian College know that in any year level, there is at least a six to eight year spread of ability between the most advanced and the least advanced ten percent of students.
“In our school’s context, we observed that by the commencement of Year 7, the gaps between our student’s different capabilities in Mathematics appeared to be at least eight years- with some students missing understandings from Year 2 and others capable of challenging work at a Year 9 or 10 level” explained Toni, Deputy Principal.
As students commenced Year 7 with vast gaps in their understanding which noticeably grew as they progressed through high school, the team at Bayside knew they needed to make a change. Traditional strategies and resources were not able to support their teachers in a meaningful way, meet individual learning needs, or prepare students for senior mathematics.
That’s why Bayside Christian College partnered with Maths Pathway in 2019 with the hope of differentiating instruction, targeting students at their point of need, promoting mastery, and allowing all students to grow along a continuum from wherever they happen to be.
That’s exactly what happened! Students have seen outstanding growth year to year, impressive improvements in students’ readiness for Year 11 and 12, and positive results across NAPLAN.
“Since implementing Maths Pathway, we have observed growth in the capacity of students to take on higher maths subjects, such as Mathematical Methods and Specialist Math in the VCE. NAPLAN growth data also suggested strong growth in Mathematical understanding for students from Years 7-9.” – Toni, Deputy Principal
An important assessment that takes place each year at Bayside is PAT-M. Through an extensive analysis of the results, it’s been made clear students grew at 142% of the Australian norm making approximately 1.4 years of learning every 12 months.
“We find very strong performance overall, with approximately 1.4 years’ growth per year as measured by PAT-M; and we find clear positive associations with Maths Pathway dosage.” – Toni, Deputy Principal
The students at Bayside are not the only ones experiencing success with Maths Pathway, their teachers are loving it as well. “Being able to really differentiate for every student in my class without killing myself is wonderful and being able to stretch their mathematical thinking with rich learning tasks which are creative and engaging makes maths fun.” – Fiona, Teacher
How was this all determined?
Bayside Christian College conducted research into the effectiveness of Maths Pathway through the analysis of PAT-M results. They scrutinised that data to identify the rate of growth in maths attainment from year to year and whether that growth is more rapid than the stated norms. Moreover, they compared this against Maths Pathway dosage data to probe whether any positive results are associated with usage of the program.
Explore all the data and insights in the research paper, Maths Pathway at Bayside Christian College: Analysis with PAT-M Data.
