The verdict is final.
In mathematics, French CM1 students rank last in Europe and our 4th year college students, penultimate.
These results come from the TIMSS 2019 ranking, which surveys - every four years - the level in mathematics and science of students from the European Union and the OECD in these two classes.
Published on December 8, they are "
more than worrying
" for Laetitia Grail, mathematician and author of
Being good at math, it can be learned!… And it's not that complicated
(1).
Former teacher for ten years in France and England, she reminds that the subject is not complicated if it is explained correctly.
A major issue warns that which underlines the fundamental role of mathematics in the professions of tomorrow and the development of our modern economies.
MADAME FIGARO
.-
The TIMSS survey confirms the fall in the level of French students in mathematics and science.
Do the results surprise you?
Laetitia GRAIL. -
No, we go deeper each time.
Already in October, the Cedre study made the same observation, and the inventory was identical in 2014… We are in free fall.
France was however previously very famous for mathematics.
Today, when you ask CM2 students what a third of 66 is, less than half answer correctly, and yet we are not talking about complicated problems to solve.
Read also: Significant drop in the level of schoolchildren in mathematics
How to explain this phenomenon ?
First, whole sections of mathematics were removed from school curricula and the changes were made downward.
We watered down.
Before, there were second-grade exercises that we did from CM2.
The number of hours of mathematics has also fallen sharply;
in thirty years, we have lost 1h30 per week.
Students aren't born dumber or less intelligent than they were before, but that can't be learned by cutting off teaching hours.
For thirty years, reforms have also followed one another and the changes are too close together for any impact to be assessed.
Finally, school is also what society wants it to be, and we are in a time of disenchantment with rigor, we have given up on demands.
That is to say ?
We no longer like what is complex and repetitive, as if the acquisition of automatisms by learning by heart were assimilated to a form of stupidity, but it is very dangerous to hold this speech for mathematics.
A student who does not learn automatisms early enough will not be able to think about complex things afterwards.
Clearly, it is impossible to solve a geometry problem if the brain is still busy remembering how much is 6 times 8. Learning math combines two activities: repetitive exercises, until we integrate the automatism, and open problems.
The child is given a problem and the important thing is not whether he is right or wrong, but that he has sought, taken risks.
What more do the other top countries have than us?
The school is intimately linked to the culture of a country.
Finland or South Korea, for example, have excellent results in international tests by pursuing very different educational policies.
It is difficult to extract a single parameter, but the successful countries have in common that they have demonstrated great continuity in their education policies.
However, in France, for over thirty years, reforms have followed one another.
The important thing is not that the child is right or wrong but that he has sought
Laetitia Grail, mathematician
Why do you think the situation is worrying?
In all developed countries, we find the same situation: the share of jobs directly related to mathematics in the working population has been steadily increasing for years.
The drop in level is a national failure that we will pay a high price for because the contribution of math to the development of our modern economies has become fundamental.
To make computers, smart cards, business intelligence, medical imaging, biostatistics, finance, IT, telecommunications ... you need mathematics.
Even marketers use mathematical tools to evaluate their strategy.
Without forgetting that mathematics teaches abstraction, and the future requires a lot to imagine, to understand, to invent concepts.
Clearly, the world and the jobs of tomorrow will not be done without math.
Subject matter is the pet peeve of many students. For what reasons
?
Because we see them as a difficult subject, when it is wrong.
Well explained, they are not.
Of course, material requires effort, brain time.
At some point, you have to stand in front of your sheet and do demonstrations.
But it is very pleasant intellectually.
Read also: Why are French students so bad at math?
The construction of a knowledge "in Gruyère" in primary means that the pupil drops out of college
Laetitia Grail, mathematician
So efforts should focus on primary school?
The OECD keeps repeating it in its studies: the effort must focus on the primary years because the academic system then no longer makes it possible to catch up.
Many realize the difficulties their children have in mathematics in grades 5 and 4, because marks drop at that time.
It is the construction of a knowledge “in Gruyère” in primary school that makes the pupil drop out of college.
Often, the profiles of pupils who - on the facade - do not have great difficulty reflect an acquisition of notions at 75-95%.
The accumulation of gaps - the remaining 5% to 25% - will cause the edifice to falter later.
The concepts studied in college are based on many previous concepts (calculation, operations, problem solving, etc.).
The gaps in knowledge are blocking in the medium and long term.
What role can parents play?
It is by working on math that we understand it.
You have to help your child to see effort as a necessity to achieve a better result, and to accept his mistakes as a way to learn.
Parents can make up for lost time doing math in class by setting up a routine of 10 to 15 minutes per day from CE1 to CM2.
There is no need to be next to them: a system of tracking grids - hung in the kitchen for example - with boxes that children tick off, depending on what they want to do, is fun and effective.
Then, we combine repetitive exercises (for the acquisition of automatisms) with the resolution of open problems.
It doesn't matter if the child does not succeed, he has to model.
For automation, we can take inspiration from the Kumon method or from the application I created myBlee Math (
to learn mathematics in primary school, Editor's note
).
For the problems, a practice of teaching modeling exists, giving simple methods and accessible to all parents.
(1)
Being good at math can be learned!… And it's not that complicated,
from Laetitia Grail, (Ed. Dunod), 16.90 euros.