Teaching Tips........

Math Skills Assessment

R.W. Hartel and M. Adem

Introduction ABSTRACT: A math review exam, written and administered in conjunction with the Quantitative Assessment Program at the Univ. of Wisconsin-Madison, is used at the beginning of the 1st food engineering course to evaluate math skills needed for successful completion of the course. Students who do not score well on the math exam are targeted for individual remedial work to help bring their math skills up to a level that allows successful completion of the food engineering course.
In the Food Science curriculum at the Univ. of Wisconsin at Madison, a single 5semester credit course in calculus (Math 221) is required beyond the satisfactory completion of college-level algebra. This single calculus course covers all aspects of both differential and integral calculus, and fulfills the level of math required for successful completion of the food engineering sequence of classes, typically taken in the students senior year. We expect the students starting the 1st food engineering class (FS 440Principles of Food Engineering), a 3-credit lecture course with 1 period of discussion, to have sufficient math skills to be able to complete engineering calculations at some minimum level. However, experience has shown that not all students starting FS 440 have math skills sufficient for the course. The lack of quantitative calculations in the curriculum between Math 221 and FS 440 means the students often do not recall the necessary math skills. Thus, we initiated a math review exam in FS 440 through the Quantitative Assessment Program (QAP) on campus (see www.math.wisc.edu/~assess/ for more detail). The intent of this math review exam was to assess the level of skills for each student in class to identify which students are at risk in the food engineering class because of poor math skills. These students are targeted for remedial help to develop those math skills. Based on an initial assessment of math skills needed in the food engineering course, an 8-problem exam was developed in collaboration with QAP personnel. This exam (see Appendix 2) covers algebra as well as simple calculus skills (differentiation and integration). Although this particular exam was not written in terms of food-related problems, it would be a simple matter of converting the questions to a food emphasis. However, it is the principal skills targeted by each question that are important. The 1st question is a simple example of plugging variables into an equation to calculate the solution for specific parameters. The 2nd problem requires the students to calculate the cross-sectional area of pipes of 2 diameters. Differentiation skills are covered in Problem 3, which requires students to verify that an expression is indeed a solution to the given differential equation. Problem 4 requires that students solve an exponential equation for a specific value of the dependent parameter. Integration skills are tested in Problem 5, where students must separate variables for a simple differential equation and integrate to obtain an analytical solution. In Problem 6, the students must demonstrate their skills at interpreting data provided in graphical form. Problem 7 requires students to interpolate within a set of data. Finally, Problem 8 is a simple mass balance problem where students must calculate how much of a certain cleaning solution is needed, and the final concentration after mixing. The skills needed for successful completion of this math exam are those needed for the completion of typical engineering problems required of food science students. The math exam is traditionally administered on the 2nd day of classes. On the
MS 20040127 Submitted 2/28/04 Revised 3/3/04 Accepted 3/9/04. The authors are faculty members of the Univ. of Wisconsin, Madison. Author Hartel is a member of the Dept. of Food Science, 1605 Linden Dr., and author Adem is a member of the Quantitative Assessment Program of the Mathematics Dept., Univ. of Wisconsin, 480 Lincoln Dr., Madison WI 53706. Direct inquiries to author Hartel (E-mail: rwhartel@wisc.edu).

26

JOURNAL OF FOOD SCIENCE EDUCATIONVol. 3, 2004

2004 Institute of Food Technologists

Math skills assessment . . .

Table 1Partial credit scoring for math proficiency exam (4 points per problem)
Score 4 3 2 1 0 Remarks Completely correct Essentially correct student shows full understanding of solution and only makes a minor mistake (for example, wrong sign when calculating a derivative or arithmetic error) Flawed response, but quite close to a correct solution (appears they could do this problem with a little review or help) Took some appropriate action, but far short of a solution Blank or nothing relevant to the problem

Students scoring below a certain level (typically a scoresum less than about 20) are identified as potentially needing extra help to develop the math skills needed for food engineering. These students are encouraged, through a personal invitation, to meet with the course instructors once a week to work through the book Math Concepts for Food Engineering (Hartel and others 1997), which was written specifically with this purpose in mind. These extra-help sessions develop confidence in the students math skills by first working through relatively simple problems so that they are then capable of solving the more complex problems needed for successful completion of the food engineering course.

1st day, the purpose of the exam is discussed and a hand-out with details of the exam and advice on how to prepare is given to the students (see Appendix 1). The handout goes so far as to provide specific chapters in algebra and calculus texts for students to review to better prepare for the exam. Whether students actually prepare for the exam has not been assessed in this course. Note that the math exam does not count in any way toward a students grade in FS 440, a point that may lead to some students not performing as well as they may have had they reviewed the material. The exam is administered and scored by QAP personnel. Exam scores are returned to the students, along with a solution key,

within 2 wk of the exam. Two scores are providedthe total score (or the number of problems completed essentially correctly) and a scoresum, which allows for partial credit for partial completion of problems (as detailed in Table 1). The total score has values from 0 to 8, whereas the scoresum has values from 0 to 32.

References
Hartel RW, Howell TA, Hyslop DB. 1997. Math concepts for food engineering. Lancaster, Pa.: Technomic Publishing, Inc. 177 p.

Appendix 1
Available on-line at: www.ift.org Vol. 3, 2004JOURNAL OF FOOD SCIENCE EDUCATION 27

JFSE: Journal of Food Science Education

Appendix 2Test
28

JOURNAL OF FOOD SCIENCE EDUCATIONVol. 3, 2004

Available on-line at: www.ift.org

Math skills assessment . . .

Appendix 2Test (continued)

Available on-line at: www.ift.org Vol. 3, 2004JOURNAL OF FOOD SCIENCE EDUCATION 29

JFSE: Journal of Food Science Education

Appendix 2Test (continued)

30

JOURNAL OF FOOD SCIENCE EDUCATIONVol. 3, 2004

Available on-line at: www.ift.org

Math skills assessment . . .

Appendix 2Test (continued)

Available on-line at: www.ift.org Vol. 3, 2004JOURNAL OF FOOD SCIENCE EDUCATION 31

JFSE: Journal of Food Science Education

Appendix 2Test (continued)

32

JOURNAL OF FOOD SCIENCE EDUCATIONVol. 3, 2004

Available on-line at: www.ift.org