Alberta Grade 6 math scores tumble 3 years into new curriculum

Nearly half of Alberta’s Grade 6 students failed the provincewide math test in 2024, three years after the province started rolling out its new elementary school curriculum.

Only 53 per cent of students achieved an “acceptable” score on the Provincial Achievement Test, or PAT, down from 72 per cent who achieved acceptable in 2019, before the pandemic and new curriculum.

The results came out as each school district reported local results to their board of trustees. Alberta students write standardized tests in Grades 6, 9 and 12; and this was the first year students wrote the PAT for math under the new curriculum.

Teachers have previously criticized the new curriculum as teaching core concepts too early. In their report to trustees, Calgary Board of Education officials described the new curriculum as emphasizing problem-solving and deeper understanding of math concepts, which they call a “positive long-term shift.”

Chief superintendent Joanne Pitman said the problem is that key concepts were moved to earlier grades. Because of the timing, students in Grade 4 through Grade 8 will have missed the concepts during implementation.

It’s going to take work to get them back on track. CBE will be bringing in extra support and strategies for teachers to do that.

“We need to back it all the way up to sometimes Grade 2 and Grade 3 outcomes. It's understanding which parts of the particular curriculum they're missing and re-teaching that,” Pitman said after the trustee meeting this month.

“Anytime we implement a new curriculum it takes multiple years before you level-set around that.”

As kids struggle, Calgary public has also seen students lose interest in math. The number of Grade 4 to 6 students who say they like math dropped to 67 per cent last year, down from 72 per cent five years ago.

Changes expected to the test

At Calgary Catholic, Kathleen Kostiuk, superintendent for student learning, said her team was shocked to see the scores from the Grade 6 provincial tests. Then, they noticed math scores were down across the province, and like Calgary public students, the Calgary Catholic students were still above the provincial average.

“It wasn’t terribly alarming once we figured out what subject it was,” she said. “Teachers are brand new in the curriculum; students are brand new in the curriculum.”

In a statement, Alberta Education press secretary Garrett Koehler said the government will continue to analyze the results and consider changes both to future tests and the math curriculum.

The new curriculum for junior high is expected by next fall.

Reading is up, but large classes take a toll

Alberta school districts report on student success each fall in their Annual Education Results Report, which gets filed with the provincial Ministry of Education. Individual schools also have access to their own data, which is generally shared with parents through school councils.

For both boards, officials said that in general, the results show improvements in reading, especially as the districts saw the impact of new screening tools and early intervention.

But there were real challenges, they said, often tied to struggles with growth, like large class sizes and the increasing complexity of classrooms.

Grade 9 math results were down, and those students wouldn’t have experienced the elementary curriculum changes. Officials point instead to growth and tight resources.

“When we look at our middle schools currently, we have full schools,” said Pitman. “We have many needs and that range of needs across multiple grades. In a Grade 8 classroom, a student could be working from Grade 1 to Grade 12, and you have 33 of them in your Mathematics 8 class.”

She said they’re hoping improvements in elementary school will gradually filter up, and to help the kids currently in middle school, they’ll support teachers to target specific weaknesses.

Intensive English help rolls out

For the Catholic school board, one area officials are also seeing challenges is with the three-year graduation rate.

It dropped to 88 per cent last year, down from 91 per cent in 2020, and Kostiuk said larger class sizes play a role there, especially for kids in the lower academic stream.

The number of new students who need intensive English support is also a factor.

"We're seeing more students coming in who are not yet at a level one,” Kostiuk said. “You've got students coming in who do not even know the sounds of our alphabet, and you have kids coming in who aren't familiar with our number system — really foundational knowledge and they're floundering."

The Catholic district started offering six-week intensive English instruction to help.

Small wins in student sleep and stress

In terms of positives, Calgary Catholic was celebrating small wins in student well-being.

In its annual student survey last year, 57 per cent of kids said they have difficulty sleeping. That’s down from 58 per cent the year before. The metrics of "having an adult to talk to" and "feeling stress" also improved, by half a percentage point and 2.3, respectively.

People might think that such a small change is insignificant. But Calgary Catholic has 64,195 students.

“People are, like, one to two per cent, that doesn't mean anything. [But] it means a lot. It's a lot of kids," said Kostiuk.

The district introduced mental health specialists in every school and worked with teachers to stress safety before learning. Officials believe those efforts are paying off.

How to get results for your school

Ed Tse is a Calgary-based director with the Alberta School Councils’ Association. He said school principals often present results for their individual schools to parents at the first school council meeting in the new year.

It’s a great way to find out how the school is doing, he said.

“Student safety is recorded there. They also talk about the quality of education. So, it helps us know if there's anything that we could improve on as a school and as a community. Parents are welcome to ask questions,” he said.

But, in his experience, principals aren’t always great at telling parents ahead of time which meeting they’ll be presenting the report at. So parents might want to email their school office to check.

“If a parent isn't able to attend the school council meeting," said Tse, "they can just email the principal and get access to the report.”