Statistical Errors Keep 4700 K-3rd Students From NYC 'Gifted' Programs 215
alostpacket writes "The New York times reports that statistical scoring by the standardized testing company Pearson incorrectly disqualified over 4700 students from a chance to enter gifted / advanced programs in New York City schools. Only students who score in the 90th percentile or above are eligible for these programs. Those in the 97th or above are eligible for 5 of the best programs. 'According to Pearson, three mistakes were made. Students' ages, which are used to calculate their percentile ranking against students of similar age, were recorded in years and months, but should also have counted days to be precise. Incorrect scoring tables were used. And the formula used to combine the two test parts into one percentile ranking contained an error.' No mention of enlisting the help of the gifted children was made in the Times article, but it also contained a now-corrected error. This submission likely also contains an erro"
Re:They're Screwed (Score:3, Informative)
Different ac here, but what I think they mean is that they read using only sight words. Basically, there are three levels of reading. The first is the sight word level. Kids at that level read by knowing that "cat" is pronounced in a certain way and is the fuzzy animal. The next level is the decoding level. This is where you can take words and break them down into their component sounds, so you see "dog" and break it down into d-o-g and know it is the fuzzy animal because that is in the audio memory, which is much larger. The third level is the fluency level, where the process becomes almost automatic and paring rules for irregular situations develop. Another interesting part of fluency is that you don't need to have the "voice" in your head read along with you, but rather can read without translating it to audio first. According to the info I found online for our state, you should start to be able to decode in first grade and competent at it by second. Full fluency should be present by fifth or sixth grade.