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PEI·BY THE NUMBERS

P.E.I. student math skills improving, but literacy slipping

With four years of assessment results now available, it's possible to track classes as they move through the school system, and the results are mixed.

Provincial student assessments show mixed results

Kevin Yarr · CBC News ·
Provincial assessments are written by P.E.I. students in the spring. (Lindsay Carroll/CBC)

With four years of assessment results now available, it's possible to track classes as they move through the school system, and there is good news and bad news.

First, the good news.

Generally speaking math skills amongst P.E.I. students are improving. The Grade 3 assessments have slipped a little over the years, but Grade 6 skills have improved significantly, and grade 9 skills slightly.

Math (% meeting expectations)
Grade 3 Grade 6 Grade 9
2013 65 57 64
2014 66 70 65
2015 63 74 69
2016 61 77 69

With four years of results in, it is now possible to track the performance of particular classes as they move through the system, because the Grade 3 students from 2013 were tested in Grade 6 this spring, and the Grade 6 students tested in Grade 9.

Both classes showed significant improvements.

  • The 2013 Grade 3 class performance improved from 65 per cent to 77 per cent.
  • The 2013 Grade 6 class performance improved from 57 per cent to 69 per cent.

Reading comprehension

Now, the bad news.

Literacy skills are mostly on the decline, and even in areas where they seem to be improving the picture is ambiguous.

Students outside of French immersion are seeing scores slipping again in Grade 3, while there is a recovery in Grade 6. The province discontinued the testing for Grade 9.

Reading comprehension
Grade 3 Grade 6
2013 88 76
2014 80 70
2015 80 70
2016 77 82

While the Grade 6 assessments show significant improvement from last year, if you compare that performance with how that class did in Grade 3, there is a drop.

In 2013 88 per cent of that class met expectations. In 2016 82 per cent did.

French immersion

The performance of French immersion students in writing is some of the worst in the assessments.

Less than half of students in Grade 6 are meeting expectations, but there was a significant improvement this year for Grade 3 students.

French immersion: Writing
Grade 3 Grade 6
2013 58 N/A
2014 46 47
2015 52 39
2016 65 39
 

The writing skills of the Grade 3 class of 2013 appear to have fallen off considerably. In 2013 58 per cent were meeting expectations; in 2016 only 39 per cent were.

Full table

Provincial student assessment results (% students meeting expectations)
2013 2014 2015 2016

Grade 3

Reading comprehension

88

80

 80 77
Math 65 66 63 61

French Immersion: Writing

 58 46 52 65

Grade 6

Reading comprehension

76

70

 70 82

Math

57

70

 74 77

French immersion: Writing

 N/A 47 39 39

Grade 9

Reading comprehension

72

77

 80 N/A

Math

64

65

 69 69
Grade 11

Math 521A

 N/A N/A 61 60

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Kevin Yarr

Web journalist

Kevin Yarr is the early morning web journalist at CBC P.E.I. Kevin has a specialty in data journalism, and how statistics relate to the changing lives of Islanders. He has a BSc and a BA from Dalhousie University, and studied journalism at Holland College in Charlottetown. You can reach him at kevin.yarr@cbc.ca.

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