WHAT AFFECTSSTUDENT

PERFORMANCE?

S ANAND, GRAMENER

DOES YOUR NAME MATTER?

When I was young, I thought I was unlucky. My name starts with "A". I used to get called very early for questions, submissions, etc. in class.

Often I was unprepared, and didn't do as well as classmates whose name started with "V".

Later, I was told this was an advantage, as I'd always learn to be prepared.

Does the first letter of the name actually affect the marks?

“

2005First letter marks

APVDSNKRBGM

VAPDSKNBRGM

59.2%59.9%58.9%58.8%57.9%56.3%56.2%56.1%55.4%54.5%54.4%

66.5%65.9%65.8%65.2%64.3%64.0%63.4%62.8%62.6%61.5%61.1%

2011First letter marks

Why is this?

Is this pattern distinguishable from randomness?

Source: Karnataka State Board exams (8 – 8.5 lakh students per year)

Jain

Harini

Shweta

Sneha Pooja

Ashwin

Shah

Deepti

Sanjana

Varshini

Ezhumalai

Venkatesan

Silambarasan

Pandiyan

Kumaresan

Manikandan

Thirupathi

Agarwal

Kumar

Priya

WHAT ABOUT ASTROLOGY?

Based on the results of the 20 lakh students taking the Class XII exams at Tamil Nadu over the last 3 years, it appears that the month you were born in can make a difference of as much as 120 marks out of 1,200.

June borns score the

lowest

The marks shoot up for Aug borns

… and peaks for Sep-borns

120 marks out of 1200

explainable by month of birth

An identical pattern was observed in 2009 and 2010…

… and across districts, gender, subjects, and class X & XII.

“It’s simply that in Canada the eligibility cut-off for age-class hockey is January 1. A boy who turns ten on January 2, then, could be playing alongside someone who doesn’t turn ten until the end of the year—and at that age, in preadolescence, a twelve-month gap in age represents an enormous difference in physical maturity.”

-- Malcolm Gladwell, Outliers

Pattern of “births” in India is skewedThis is a birth date dataset that’s obtained from school admission data for over 10 million children. When we compare this with births in the US, we see none of the same patterns.

For example,• Is there an aversion to the 13th or is there a local cultural

nuance?• Are holidays avoided for births?• Which months have a higher propensity for births, and

why?• Are there any patterns not found in the US data?

Very few children are born in the month of August, and

thereafter. Most births are concentrated in the first half

of the year

We see a large number of children born on the 5th, 10th,

15th, 20th and 25th of each month – that is, round

numbered dates

Such round numbered patterns a typical indication

of fraud. Here, birthdates are brought forward to aid

early school admission

More births Fewer births … on average, for each day of the year (from 2007 to 2013)

This adversely impacts children’s marksIt’s a well established fact that older children tend to do better at school in most activities. Since many children have had their birth dates brought forward, these younger children suffer.

The average marks of children “born” on the 1st, 5th, 10th, 15th etc. of the month tend to score lower marks. • Are holidays avoided for births?• Which months have a higher propensity for births, and

why?• Are there any patterns not found in the US data?

Higher marks Lower marks… on average, for children born on a given day of the year (from 2007 to 2013)

Children “born” on round numbered days score lower marks on average,due to a higher proportion of younger children

PERFORMANCE: BOYS VS GIRLS

Subject Girs higher by Girls BoysPhysics 0 119 119Chemistry 1 123 122English 4 130 126Computers 6 137 131Biology 6 129 123Mathematics 11 123 112Language 11 152 141Accounting 12 138 126Commerce 13 127 114Economics 16 142 126

What do the children in schools know and can do at different stages of elementary

education?

Have the inputs made into the elementary education system had a beneficial effect or

not?

The report studies response distribution

Number of siblings Computer usage

Number of books read Private tuition

LET’S STUDY WHAT AFFECTS THEIR

ABILITIES

Having books improves reading abilityHaving more books at home improves the performance of children when it comes to reading. (But children typically only have only 1-10 books at home) Number of students sampled

What is the impact? How many more marks can having more books fetch?

Circle size indicates number of students with this response. Few students have no books.

Is this response (“25+ books”) good or bad? Small red bars indicate low marks. Large green bars indicate high marks. Students having 25+ books tend to score high marks.

The most common response is marked in blue. This is also the circle.

The graphic is summarized in words

Indicates whether the best response is the most popular. Blue means that it is not. Green means that it is. Red means that the worst level is the most popular response.

… but the impact in science is lessWhile having more books improves the reading % score by 8%, it only increases the science % by 4%

Having more siblings doesn’t help readingChildren with 1 sibling do much better than children with many siblings

… but helps a lot in mathematicsChildren with 4+ siblings do very well, children with 1 sibling fare poorly

Tuitions help a little

… but not children with 4+ siblings

Tuitions help a little

… but not children of illiterate parents

Children like games, and they’re good

… but playing daily hurts reading ability

Watching TV occasionally is goodChildren who watch TV every day don’t do as well as children who watch TV only once a week.

But children who never watch TV fare the worst.

Watching TV every day helps improve children’s reading ability a little bit more…

… but mathematical abilities fall dramatically at that point

Reading books every day is not good

Reading magazines every day seems to be

But having educated parents helps mostThis table shows the % improvement in score due to each factor

Its impact is less with more children

The same holds for mother’s education

Fathers help their boys study

… but mothers help the girls

… except in mathematics

We have a website that you can explore

GRAMENER.COM/NAS

WHAT NEXT?

How does school / teacher behaviour affect

marks?

What topics pose hurdles to different

segments?

Group questions into topics based on

similarity of student answers?

Group students into segments based on

similarity of answers?

EXPLORE & LEARN FROM DATA