Addressing weak mathematical foundations in Nepal: early grade mathematics and remedial interventions in upper primary

• In Event: Mathematics teaching and learning in world education programs in Ghana, Nepal, and Cote d’Ivoire: taking stock of where we are and sharing lessons learned

Proposal

In Nepal, as in many other low-income countries, donor interest has resulted in intensive efforts to improve early grade literacy over the past five years. Yet, there has been no commensurate attention to numeracy. While interest and investment has improved reading scores, mathematics outcomes actually decreased over the same period.

This paper will present some of the first efforts in Nepal to assess mathematics learning and develop scalable interventions. With data from Nepal’s first Early Grades Mathematics Assessment (EGMA) for grades 1-3, diagnostic testing for struggling students in grades 4-8, and the National Assessment of Student Achievement, the presentation will paint a detailed picture of how the status quo is failing to develop students’ core conceptual understanding in foundational mathematics topics. The combination of data from early grades and grades 4-8 will show how weak foundations haunt children later in school. The EGMA results showed less than 5% of children in grades 1-3 could demonstrate grade-appropriate mastery of core number sense and operations skills. Two rounds of diagnostic testing for remedial mathematics support in upper primary found that more than 60% of children in grades 4-8 struggled with basic mathematical concepts.

The paper will first discuss the development of two assessment tools, EGMA and diagnostic testing for remedial math support based on the upper primary curriculum, and challenges and lessons learned faced through this process—for example, the tradeoff between testing time and assessment of a variety of mathematical domains; written versus oral assessments, etc.

The paper will then share lessons learned from the processes of developing an early grade mathematics intervention and developing a remedial mathematics intervention for children in grades 4-8. Of particular interest to other practitioners will be a discussion of the curriculum review process to identify core learning outcomes appropriate for early grades. This effort engaged a Nepali university and a U.S. university and drew on comparative research examining early grade mathematics benchmarks from Kenya, Jamaica, South Africa, and the United States in order to inform minimum learning targets. Because the existing curriculum in Nepal is quite ambitious, the process involved negotiating a compromise between existing high targets (which children were not achieving) across a large number of mathematical domains and a desire to encourage adequate attention to a smaller number of core foundational understandings.

Finally, the paper will share lessons learned about designing interventions based on a combination of assessment data, core concepts pulled from complex curricula, and frameworks established by other interventions, such as those in early grade reading. It will also discuss engagement with the Government of Nepal and other stakeholders for both interventions. Examples of both project-produced materials that draw on local context and community-made materials will be shared. The paper will share results from remedial mathematics interventions for students in grades 4-8 (two cohorts of baseline compared to endline), demonstrating that gaps in early mathematics teaching and learning can also be addressed in later grades through targeted, intensive efforts to pull children back on track.

Authors

• Catharine Morgan, World Education, Inc.

• Seema Acharya, World Education, Inc.

• Ranjit Mahato, World Education, Inc.