SIMS

Second International Mathematics Study

As with previous studies, the IEA Second International Mathematics Study (SIMS) examined mathematics education at three levels: curricula, classroom practices, and student achievement.

Student performance was measured and reported separately for five areas at the middle school level: arithmetic, algebra, geometry, measurement, and descriptive statistics. At the final year of secondary school, student performance was assessed in nine areas: sets, relations and functions; number systems; algebra; geometry; elementary functions and calculus; probability and statistics; finite mathematics; computer science; and logic. In addition, student, teacher, school, and national context questionnaires were administered.

The study had some features that involved a replication of the IEA First International Mathematics Study. It also incorporated a detailed longitudinal component in eight countries, for which additional teacher questionnaires were used as well as a pre-test and post-test administered to students, in order to investigate what mathematics was taught and learned during the school year. Data were collected in 1980–1982.

The target populations for the study were 13-year-old students and students in the final year of secondary school who were studying mathematics as a substantial part of their academic program.

Belgium (Flemish), Belgium (French), Canada (British Columbia and Ontario), England and Wales, Finland, France, Hong Kong, Hungary, Israel, Japan, Luxembourg, Netherlands, New Zealand, Nigeria, Scotland, Swaziland, Sweden, Thailand, and United States.

Student achievement

At the middle school level, there was no single subtest on which students performed in the same general way across countries. For example, students in some countries performed best on the arithmetic subtest, while students in others had their poorest performance on the same set of items. One apparent trend was that students from any participating country were more likely to have their best or worst performance on either the arithmetic or geometry subtests than on any of the other subtests.

Japan and Hong Kong were the highest achieving countries at the final year of secondary school. At this level, geometry curricula differed substantially across countries, more than any other branch of school mathematics.

Gender differences

At the middle school level, girls tended to outperform boys in computational skills and algebra. Boys performed better in geometry and measurement. By the end of secondary school, boys were outperforming girls in every subtest and in every country.

Teaching mathematics

Wide differences between systems were observed in the degree of opportunity provided to students to complete secondary school to the twelfth grade or equivalent. However, during the nearly 20-year period between the first and second IEA mathematics studies, growth occurred in this measure, in some countries substantially (in Belgium and Finland, the proportion of the age cohort completing secondary school rose from 13% to 65% and from 14% to 59%, respectively).

Also during this period, substantial changes took place in the mathematics curricula of many systems. At the middle school level, emphasis on arithmetic declined while emphasis on algebra and geometry increased. At the final year of secondary school, diversity in the nature and extent of the mathematics being taught increased, particularly with respect to calculus, geometry, and probability and statistics.

There were many similarities among teachers at both grade levels and across countries in their approach to teaching mathematics. Teachers often used whole-class instructional techniques and relied heavily on prescribed textbooks, rarely giving differentiated instruction or assignments.

While there was a generally good match between the content covered by the assessment and the intended curriculum of participating countries, there was greater variation in the extent to which the SIMS topics were actually taught by teachers (i.e., the intended curriculum). In some countries, a substantial gap existed between the intended and implemented curriculum.

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Garden, R.A. (1987). Second IEA Mathematics Study: Sampling report. Washington, DC: Center for Education Statistics.

Robitaille, D.F., & Garden, R.A. (Eds.). (1989). The IEA Study of Mathematics II: Contexts and outcomes of school mathematics. Oxford: Pergamon Press.

Travers, K.J., & Westbury, I. (Eds.). (1989). The IEA Study of Mathematics I: Analysis of mathematics curricula. Oxford: Pergamon Press.

Westbury, I., & Travers, K. (1990). Second International Mathematics Study. Urbana, IL: University of Illinois.

Wolfe, R.G. (1987). Second International Mathematics Study: Training manual for use of the databank of the longitudinal, classroom process surveys for Population A in the IEA Second International Mathematics Study. Washington, DC: Center for Education Statistics.