How difficult was this year's high school graduation math exam for students?

High School Graduation Math Exam 2024

More than 1 million candidates have just taken the Math test for the 2024 high school graduation exam. The test was assessed by candidates as highly differentiated.

More than 1 million candidates nationwide have completed the 2024 high school graduation exam. This is the final exam according to the 2006 program, and is also the 8th year that the Math graduation exam is in the form of multiple choice. Although the exam has ended, the echo of the Math exam still lingers in many candidates and experts when candidates said that the exam was difficult and many teachers also agreed with this point of view.

Analyzing this year's Math exam, Dr. Tran Nam Dung, Vice Principal of the Gifted High School (Ho Chi Minh City National University), said: The exam has 50 questions, divided into 3 sections. The first section from questions 1-30 are easy questions. The second section from questions 31 to 38 is challenging for students. The third section, from questions 39 to 50 are difficult questions.

With this exam, the graduation requirement will not be a problem because candidates do not need to get high scores. The first 30 questions are easy for students, except for those with poor academic performance. The concern here is the classification of students. Surely many people will think that the exam is highly classified because of many difficult questions.

However, because the exam has very difficult questions, there will be some element of luck involved as students will "fail" to answer them. It will be very difficult to get a 10 on the exam, unless there is a little luck.

W-Luong The Vinh 2.jpg — Candidates for the 2024 high school graduation exam

In particular, in questions 39-50, the exam has questions that are not mathematically meaningful. In this section, there are questions with cumbersome conditions, making it difficult for students. Specifically, the question about functions (question 45 - code 105, in other codes it is question number 48), here the application parts are purely technical, not really mathematically meaningful.

The person who asked the question tried to “overlay” the conditions to make the question extremely difficult. Meanwhile, in Mathematics, when asking a question, the problem must be meaningful. Specifically, in terms of functions, finding the largest value, the smallest value of a function, in practice when researching a problem, it is reasonable to be interested in the largest, smallest, and extreme values. But here, the question raises a situation that has no meaning in Mathematics and practice.

To create a multiple choice test in Math requires careful research, investment and science. The current construction of a test bank and the model of sample questions does not seem to be in accordance with the way a multiple choice test is made.

The difficulty of multiple choice math questions lies elsewhere, not in the math questions that are essay-based and offer multiple choice answers. In English, difficult multiple choice questions are easy to get wrong, and only those with solid knowledge can get them right. Even if the test-taker spends a lot of time, he or she may not get it right if he or she does not have the background knowledge and reasoning.

According to Dr. Dung, the questions in the Math exam pose problems that require students to calculate and solve problems to come up with the correct answer. Thus, sometimes students who spend time doing the test may not get the correct result, while other students may choose to take a chance and guess randomly and may get it right. Surely this year's exam will have many of these types of questions because there are relatively many difficult questions.

A difficult multiple choice test should be designed in such a way that students can understand the problem correctly and come up with an accurate model to solve the problem. This year's Math test has questions that have clear directions but to do them correctly requires students to spend a lot of time, effort and technique.

The difficulty of multiple choice tests must be based on solid knowledge and rigorous thinking, not on technique or muscle. Difficult questions that force students to practice a lot are the "trick" of today's training centers. Such practice is really not beneficial for students, but the important thing in Mathematics is to master knowledge and reasoning methods.

The article represents the author's personal views. Readers with opinions and views on this issue can comment below the article or send an email to [email protected]. Thank you!

Dozens of Math exam questions for high school graduation in 2024 were found to be blurred

Dozens of math exam questions for the 2024 high school graduation exam in Dak Lak were blurred. Currently, the Dak Lak Provincial Examination Council is directing the handling to ensure the rights of candidates.