Betyget i matematik : Vad ger grundskolans matematikbetyg för information?

The aim of this study is to investigate what the grade in mathematics tells us about the pupil’s general academic success in other school subjects in Sweden’s compulsory school. What proficiency, except mathematical skills, does a high grade in mathematics indicate? First an inventory of the official arguments for school mathematics was conducted. The inventory shows that the arguments generally can be classified into two main classes: i) utilitarian arguments and ii) cultural arguments. In addition to these two main groups the debate also includes more remote and indirect arguments: iii) the transfer argument and iv) the selection argument .If the two last arguments are valid it is assumed that the so called indication hypothesis should be true: that pupils who succeed in mathematics also will achieve high grades in other school subjects. A statistical analysis was conducted of the grades data for the approximately 124,000 pupils who completed compulsory school in Sweden 2006. The analyses provide support for the indication hypothesis. Those pupils who manage to achieve the highest grades in mathematics often achieve high grades in other school subjects as well. This applies to both the purely theoretical and to the more practically oriented subjects. In the last phase of the study it was assumed that a possible explanation for the results could lie in the reading comprehension hypothesis; that pupils who are successful in mathematics in their ninth year of compulsory school also have good reading comprehension. This hypothesis was tested with data from the pupils’ results in the reading comprehension test that was included in the national exam in Swedish in 2006. The results provided strong support for the hypothesis. Pupils with high final grades in mathematics also have good reading comprehension. However the reverse did not apply. A good result in the reading comprehension test was not a reliable predictor of a high final grade in mathematics