"John Knight" <johnknight at usa.com> wrote:
>"Bob LeChevalier" <lojbab at lojban.org> wrote in message
>news:7ifmju0otk5i5b3u53o9ribai2id7eulu2 at 4ax.com...>> >The issue is that
>> >American 12th grade girls answered this question in a way that suggests they
>> >were misled.
>>>> Really? I thought you said that most of them guessed?
>>How many times does a normal person have to repeat a simple fact before a
>"liberal" finally catches on.
I don't know. There is no normal person talking to any liberal in this
discussion. There are some above average people, apparently most of them
female, talking to a nincompoop and a Norwegian ignoramus who thinks he is a
Mensa'n.
>The correct statement is "ONE THIRD of American girls scored lower on the
>test than if they'd just guessed".
And that statement is nonsense. It is not even wrong. You have no data on
how any one girl scored. You have no idea what they would have scored on the
test if they'd just guessed.
All you have is data on what percentage were correct on *some* of the
questions of the test, and you are being quite selective of those questions,
ignoring those where boys scored worse than girls, for example. Now indeed,
on some questions, girls and boys, and sometimes one or the other, had a
lower percentage getting the question correct than if they had guessed
randomly. There are many possible explanations for such a phenomenon. If
you actually understood the question H04 yourself, and why one particular
answer is correct, then it would be possible to explain to you how someone
might erroneously get the other answers, while still "understanding the
question", and without guessing. Each of the other answers CAN be gotten by
making a particular error in reasoning. Not in understanding the question,
and not necessarily in understanding physical principles, but in applying
those physical principles to a new problem that they had NOT seen before, and
had NOT been taught about. TIMSS did NOT give kids problems that they might
have seen in their textbook; it had problems that required applying what was
in the textbook to something new. The US doesn't usually teach kids how to
tackle novel problems of the sort that differ from the typical textbook
problem, so we do poorly on a test like TIMSS. This is not a failing of the
kids, and it isn't even a failing of American education, because parents and
legislators seem more concerned with passing state standards tests which are
even more strictly defined than the textbooks, so the schools not producing
TIMSS scholars may be doing precisely what the American people TOLD them to
do.
>By necessity, this means that SOME girls
>did not guess, but instead answered in a way they thought was correct, but
>wasn't.
Indeed, possibly NONE of them guessed, and ALL of them figured out wrong, but
some who figured it out wrong got the right answer by the wrong reasoning.
The point is that you don't know, and not understanding the question
yourself, you couldn't possibly figure it out. All you can do is speculate
and play number games with your spreadsheets, and then mischaracterize your
results. Because regardless of what you meant, you SAID that girls scored a
negative percent correct, adjusted for guessing. And since a negative
percent correct is nonsensical, it means that your calculation is
nonsensical, and your statement is nonsensical.
>You keep ignoring the big question, which is how is it
>possible to score consistently lower than if they'd just guessed on all
>these questions?
They did NOT score "consistently lower". On some questions, more than half
got the question correct, on others they scored very low. In general the
problems they scored very low on were DESIGNED to be harder problems than a
typical 12th grade would be expected to figure out, with traps in the
question to lead a kid to pick the wrong answer if he knew part of the method
of solution.
>> (The truth is probably that few of them were taught anything at all that
>> pertained to the question, and they attempted to solve it using false
>> analogies to things that they did know, with different false analogies
>> leading to each of the wrong answers given because that was what the test was
>> designed to do - figure out what kids were being taught and how well)
>>The truth is that the girls taking the test were just as confused as the
>feminazis on this list. Feminazis are obviously stupider than normal girls,
The girls (and boys) taking the advanced physics TIMSS test were NOT "normal"
girls and boys. They were *above average* girls and boys, because very few
normal girls and boys take that level of math and science.
Meanwhile, one of the posters you are criticizing showed that she IS smarter
than the girls by making it clear that she knew the correct answer to H04 and
WHY it is correct. You on the other hand have NOT shown that you know this,
so it is YOU who are stupider than the girls that took the TIMSS test.
>but
>the way they've misled themselves just with H04 is a process that isn't at
>all as systematic as you propose.
If you understood the question, it would be possible to explain to you
exactly how systematic it is. The TIMSS people were very smart and designed
a test that would discourage random guessing and encourage making "educated
guesses" (which are non-random) based on limited understanding of how to
apply what they know to the problem. MOST of the TIMSS questions are
designed in this smart way, where the particular wrong answer that a kid
selects tells something useful about how that kid tried to solve the problem.
>Even when their errors were pointed out to them, they were still so arrogant
>and ignorant that they came nowhere close to grasping the most basic
>concepts.
YOU are the one who does not seem to understand the basic concepts. Not the
basic concepts of probability, nor of good test design, nor the physics and
advanced math that you are criticizing the girls for not knowing.
>Yes, they were misled. They misled themselves.
In a sense, yes. They were intended to.
>> >The reason we know they were misled is that only 22.8% of them got it
>> >correct, compared to an international average for girls of 26.3%, 42.6% of
>> >American boys, and 53.9% of Swedish boys.
>>>> Even 53.9% is not a particularly good score, if they had in fact been taught
>> the test. But we have no reason to believe that even the Swedish boys were
>> taught the test problem.
>>Swedish boys scored infinitely higher than the Swedish girls who scored 9%
>lower than if they'd just guessed, who were taught (or not taught) in the
>same classrooms as the Swedish boys.
You also do not know the concept of "infinity".
>Why?
If you understood the question, then a discussion would be possible.
>> Or perhaps they had some ideas on what MIGHT be the correct answer, but were
>> less than sure, and didn't much worry about it because TIMSS is a test that
>> doesn't really matter to the kids.
>>Oh, I see. 43% of American boys DID get it correct, because they DID "worry
>about it", but because only 14% of American girls got it correct, they
>didn't?
Possible, but I did not say that.
>Is that how it works? And the 53% of Norwegian boys who got it
>correct DID worry about it, but because only 27% of Norwegian girls got it
>correct, they didn't "worry about it"? I get it. 42% of Danish boys DID
>worry and got it correct, but because only 18% of their girls got it
>correct, they did NOT? Same symptom in Canada--with 38% of boys, but only
>21% of girls getting it correct? And Germany, 45% to 13%?
>>Since boys and girls are in coed classes,
They aren't necessarily in coed classes in all the countries, or even in all
schools in this country, though they usually are. Furthermore, we don't know
that any two kids taking the test came from the same school, much less the
same class.
But if you are concerned, then why were there a couple questions where the
girls did better than guessing and the boys did not?
>why do you think boys all around
>the world DID worry about it, but girls didn't?
I don't think so. That is your strawman version of what I said.
>> >This is a bit worse than knowing absolutely nothing about the problem,
>> >wouldn't you say?
>>>> No.
>>Why would you believe that thinking you're right but being consistently
>wrong is better than having no opinion at all?
Because picking certain answers means that you understand *parts* of the
concepts and how to apply them.
>> >If it was just one question, you could chalk it up to
>> >some kind of error in the test,
>>>> I would NEVER chalk it up to an error on the test. I might chalk it up to
>> GOOD test design, however.
>>Certainly the design of the test is excellent. The simple fact that it
>presented the kinds of problems that challenge students rather than attempt
>to "enhance their self esteem", by itself, is a real breakthrough in this age of
>"political correctness" [read: jewish terrorism]. That few
>students in other countries had this problem is proof enough that the test
>isn't flawed.
Except that most students in other countries DID have this problem. Kids in
EVERY country, of BOTH genders had some problems where they scored less than
if they had guessed, even highest-scoring Switzerland.
>If the test is not flawed, then the only explanation is that our 12th grade
>girls were misled, isn't it?
"Misled" is the wrong word.
>How do you think they got so misled, across so many different
>types of questions, in so many different subject areas?
For a variety of different reasons, each depending on the different question
in the different subject areas.
Unlike you, I don't presume there has to be a simple explanation. And indeed
the TIMSS people and all the researchers who have looked at the TIMSS data
and have all agreed that there are a variety of different reasons.
lojbab
