De-Streaming In Ontario
In this past week we’ve talked a lot about Ontario’s de-streaming of grade nine math classrooms. This change is in line with advice from Organization for Economic Co-Operation and Development (OECD) to de-stream classrooms in grades nine and ten, though there haven’t been changes announced in other subjects or grades yet. This blog post is going to get into why those changes have been made, the advantages for students, and how the RabbitMath curriculum aligns with the objectives of a de-streamed classroom.
The OECD is a multinational organization made up of 37 member nations, including Canada. Their goal is to improve quality of life for sustainable economic growth on a global scale. Their three main tenets are soft law for international best practices, peer review to help member nations “examine and compare experience,” and public policy research. The public policy research end of things involves huge amounts of statistical data from member countries used for both new and existing research initiatives with the goal of creating “better policies for better lives.”
Their advice to de-stream grade nine and ten classes is based in data showing that streaming in early grades disadvantages students and exacerbates existing racial and socio-political inequalities. The Education Quality and Accountability office has found that with similar ingoing academic records, students are more likely to succeed in academic stream courses than applied ones. This becomes even more problematic when paired with a higher chance of students of colour, students from low income families, and students from other systemically disadvantaged communities being steered towards applied level courses.
Ontario is the only province in Canada to start streaming as early as grade nine. The decision to take academic or applied courses can be a major education and life choice. In theory, academic stream courses prepare students for university while applied courses are geared for students going to college. In practice, students in academic courses are more than twice as likely as those in applied to courses to pursue post secondary education out of high school. Grade eight students needing to make that kind of decision about their education is a big ask.
De-streaming grade nine math classes is far from a quick fix. Teachers will need strong teaching resources to help them adjust to a new kind of classroom. There’s a lot of discussion about whether the curriculum should move up or down in difficulty. At RabbitMath we prefer to think of the curriculum shifting sideways. Richness can be added to the curriculum in the form of low floor, high ceiling activities that focus on mathematical thinking rather than pure technical proficiency. There’s a lot of work ahead to shift to de-streamed classrooms. There’s also great benefit to be gained if it can be done thoughtfully, carefully, and with a commitment to equity in education.
Peter Taylor Quote of the Week: “As part of de-streaming we need to change our course objectives.”