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There were “irresponsible and false accusations,” lamented Nuno Crato, those made by João Costa, current Secretary of State for Education and that place the burden on Crato of worsening the results of Portuguese 4th grade students in the subject of Mathematics. At stake are the results of the TIMSS (Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study), released today, and show a worsening of Portuguese students, falling from 541 points in 2015 to 525 this year (on a scale of 1 to 1000) .
Nuno Crato affirms that “after almost a decade of continuous improvements that led us, in 2015, to the best international results in history, both in PISA and TIMSS, this is a decline that requires very serious analysis.” “It is regrettable that this analysis is avoided and replaced by irresponsible and false accusations by this ministerial team,” said the former Minister of Education in statements to Lusa.
“There was a great anticipation of content in the goals, some of the topics that were taught in the 5th year went to the 3rd year, for example,” accused João Costa, arguing that this change “generated greater difficulties in learning.”
Nuno Crato believes, however, that the deterioration in performance is due to “a series of measures adopted in the meantime” by the team that succeeded him. “External evaluation in the fourth year, which came from 2001 with benchmarking tests and then with final tests in 2014, has been abolished and has not been replaced by any form of external evaluation. The requirement of more hours in mathematics and Portuguese and the frequency of study support were also eliminated, ”Crato explained.
In 2015, “the 4th graders who filled us with pride had made their entire school career between 2011 and 2015, in a culture of demanding, evaluating and valuing knowledge. Students evaluated by TIMSS in 2019 did not have this path. This is what we have to learn lessons from ”, he emphasized.
Renewal of the Mathematics program
In the session to present the results, João Costa also announced that the Ministry of Education is preparing a reform of the Mathematics program, with no expected date of implementation. The new program will be based on the recommendations of the Mathematics Working Group. A ‘greater balance between content and knowledge apprehension’ is envisaged in the new Mathematics program.
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