Mathematics: the level of students in free fall

You don't need to be a strong subject to analyze the mathematics level curve of French schoolchildren.

Just watch: she dives!

This is the worrying picture that shows the Cèdre survey, on the performance of CM2 students in arithmetic and geometry, published without fanfare, Wednesday evening, by the National Education.

The study, carried out every 5 or 6 years by the statistical studies department of the ministry (Depp), covers a representative sample of 200 schools, comprising a total of 6,000 CM2 students.

All answered, on tablets, a series of 291 questions on three themes: numbers and calculations (1), sizes and measures (2), and space and geometry (3).

The determining social origin

“While between 2008 and 2014, the average score had remained stable, it fell by 17 points in 2019 to reach 232 points”, explains Depp, in its analysis note.

Behind this poor overall score hides another very bad news for the French school system, long known in international studies to be one of the most unequal in the world: it is for students from working-class backgrounds that the fall is the most dizzying.

To observe educational inequalities, the study classified children into four categories, according to their social background.

Those of the first "quartile", that is to say the least advantaged schoolchildren, show a drop in their math results of 22 points between 2014 and 2019. The drop is 16 points for the second quartile, and 21 for the third quartile, corresponding to the intermediate social categories.

On the other hand, “the drop in performance between 2014 and 2019 does not concern students belonging to the most advantaged schools”, underlines the study.

And "it does not affect students in private sector schools."

A result to be put in touch with the public welcomed in these structures, generally easier.

Inequalities girls - boys

Inequalities between girls and boys, without increasing, also remain glaring: schoolchildren have a score 9 points higher than schoolgirls.

Overall, 54.4% of the children “show a fragile mastery, even great difficulties” in solving questions corresponding to the level of the end of CM2.

For example, for a quarter of the students (25.8%) in the classes, "the use of deductions in the subtraction is not acquired".

Only one in five schoolchildren (20.2%) is able to reuse math concepts seen in class in everyday situations or in solving “complex problems” that require independent thinking.

Newsletter - Most of the news

Every morning, the news seen by Le Parisien

I'm registering

Your email address is collected by Le Parisien to enable you to receive our news and commercial offers.

Learn more

However, these worrying results are not surprising.

In 2016, the international TIMSS survey, carried out every 4 years since 1995 in around fifty countries on 9-year-old children, had already ranked the French school 35th out of 49, and last in the class in the Union. European.

READ ALSO>

High school reform: why math is essential

"Unacceptable results," had reproached the then Minister of National Education, Najat Vallaud Belkacem, blaming his right-wing predecessors, accused of having widened the gaps with school programs that were too heavy and poorly put together, a wave of 80,000 redundancies of teaching posts and the dismantling of the teacher training system.

Alas, the reforms subsequently undertaken by the left did not stem the fall.

Worse, it seems to have widened for the generation tested by the study, who arrived at CP in September 2014, and which experienced the reform of school rhythms, new school programs (from 2015) or even the "more of teachers than of classes ”in priority education zones.

Proof that education reforms still miss their mark?

The reality is in fact more complex, and there is not necessarily a direct correlation between a reform and the level of pupils observed a few years later.

The OECD, in its regular reports on public education policies in the world, recalls the same observation each time: the countries which have raised the bar of their report cards are those which have initiated a policy of reform on duration, and focused their efforts on demanding teacher training, and a significant enhancement of the teaching profession.