Постигнуће ученика из математике: главни налази, трендови и наставни програм

Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to describe mathematics achievement of grade 4 students in Serbia, based on TIMSS 2015 results, as well as to compare it to the achievement obtained in TIMSS 2011. The achievement in TIMSS 2015 is significantly above the scale average and it is higher than the achievement of many European countries with better socioeconomic status. Therefore, Serbian student achievement can be considered satisfactory. The achievement was observed in the first place with regard to four international benchmarks defined by this study: advanced, high, intermediate and low. A satisfactory percent of students achieve an advanced benchmark, and by this criterion, our country takes better position than majority of countries participating in TIMSS. On the other hand, a relatively large number of students in Serbia do not reach even the low reference value, and in this sense, we can consider the education system not efficient enogh. Hereinafter, student achievement in mathematics was observed according to the cognitive domains: knowing, applying, and reasoning. The results suggest that there is a relative unevenness among students in Serbia with regard to their achievement in three cognitive domains – unexpectedly, students are more successful in applying than in knowing domain. Also, students made progress in the applying domain in comparison with the previous TIMSS cycle. Regarding content domains, in geometric shapes and measures student achievement is lower than the achievement in other two domains – number and data display. Achievement in the geometric shapes and measures field is considerably worse than that of the countries which had an equal overall achievement in mathematics. Also, relatively high student achievement in performing operations with whole numbers, odd and even numbers knowledge, determining unknown numbers or operations, stood out; at the same time, low achievement was made in calculating the surface area of geometric figures as well as in subdomain point, line, and angle. The matching of TIMSS items and Serbian mathematics curriculum was analyzed. We have noticed that in our curriculum for grades 1 to 4 data display does not exist as a defined topic. Also, in geometry domain, the focus differs in comparison with the item contents in TIMSS. The content that refers to the development of visual perception of space is either missing or it is not given enough attention in school curriculum. It was also noticed that in comparison with the ratio of geometry shapes and measures items in TIMSS tests, our curriculum from the first to the fourth grade considers these areas less. When the achievement of Serbia in TIMSS 2011 and 2015 is compared, we notice considerable progress within applying and data display domains. This progress has been interpreted as the consequence of teaching practice change, TIMSS and other international studies popularization, changes made in the textbooks, and the introduction of the standards for end of the elementary education. Finally, on the basis of the discussion, certain recommendations for improving mathematics teaching were made, primarily, those concerning a possible improvement of the curriculum.