Texas Mathematics Teacher Spring/Summer 2020 - 29

Cumulative Exam Review in Upper Secondary Mathematics Classrooms:
Observations on Best Practices

To achieve this, I created a score projection chart, shown
in Table 2, that allowed students to use their score on the
mock exam to predict where they may score on the actual
AP exam in May.

"Using a score-projection is beneficial
in that it allows students to set their
own, individualized goals that are
achievable based on their current
mastery and willingness to work."
Two activities that I have implemented with this in mind,
an exam sorting activity and an exam gallery walk,
are described in sections 2.2.b and 2.2.c, respectively.
Both of these activities break up the monotony of
worksheets, allow students to be active and interactive,
and have a direct relationship to the exam for which they
are preparing.

Table 2: Score projection for AP Exam,
based on mock exam results and student work
The purpose of this chart was to help students understand
where they currently stood after the mock exam and to
give them a realistic outlook on what goals would be
achievable and what they would need to do to reach those
goals. A score projection chart can help to make a
classroom more goal-driven by creating motivation for
teachers "and students alike to work harder and smarter
every day in single-minded pursuit of success" (Stevens,
2014, p. 1). Below the score projection chart, I provided
students with descriptions of each column, giving specific
steps that students could take to meet each successive
work threshold. These descriptions are reprinted in
Appendix A.
Using a score-projection is beneficial in that it allows
students to set their own, individualized goals that are
achievable based on their current mastery and willingness
to work. According to Usher and Kober (2012), realistic
goals involving student ownership are a valid and
valuable source of motivation, and one which a teacher
must tap into during a cumulative review unit to inspire
students to continue working toward their goal.
2.2 In-Class Activities
In-class review time should be structured to maximize the
efficacy of the instruction. Providing students with a daily
review calendar helps to set students' expectations for
what is to be covered, allows students to prepare ahead of
time, and creates a sense of purpose for each class.
My review calendar can be found in Appendix B. Students
should have the opportunity to interact with released
test items in a variety of ways during review time. This
promotes a feeling of confidence because students will be
comfortable with the structure and format of the exam
they are to take. Best review time practices will allow
students to access their prior knowledge and remind
students of how much material they already know.
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2.2.a Establishing structure. Routines in the classroom
allow class time to be used most efficiently and enable
students to predict and prepare for what is expected of
them (Lemov, 2010). To create predictably, during the
review unit I designated specific days of the week for
predictable activities. This past school year, I used "Tiny
Topic Tuesday," "Working Wednesday," and "Free
Response Friday." Students appreciated knowing what
would be covered, and this practice allowed students
who missed class to come back with targeted questions to
supplement the material they missed.
2.2.b Exam sorting. In this interactive review activity,
students were sorted into groups of three to four. Each
group had a printed copy of a released exam. Students cut
out the questions and wrote the exam year on the back of
each question. Then, working with their groups, students
sorted all questions from the exam into three main
categories: limit, derivative, or integral (these are the three
"Big Ideas" from the AP Calculus AB course in the 2016
College Board course and exam description). As students
worked, they filled out the "Exam Analysis Form"
(reprinted in Appendix C), which asked them to tally the
number of questions of each type, then to classify
how each question was represented. Figure 1 shows
students participating in the exam sorting activity.

Figure 1: Students exam sorting
Spring/Summer 2020

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Texas Mathematics Teacher Spring/Summer 2020

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