In South Africa most teachers follow the ‘Curriculum and Assessment Policy Statement’, which is commonly referred to as ‘CAPS’. Anecdotal evidence from the AIMSSEC winter school held in Stellenbosch in July 2014, conversations with teachers and elsewhere (e.g. twitter), suggests that teachers value activities which are closely aligned with CAPS. Further, our understanding from stakeholder meetings is that they are more likely to implement new activities for formative assessment if these fit in with CAPS.
We will be working with Grade 8 and Grade 9 teachers from a range of schools. As a starting point, we have therefore identified topic areas that are
- common to both grades in the first term
- known to be difficult to teach.
For each, we have proposed one activity, taken from the Mathematics Assessment Project and adapted for the South African context.