Timed Multiplication Tests: A Thing of the Past?

Jo Boaler, in her book Mathematical Mindsets (2015), cites research by Sian Beilock and her colleagues who studied people’s brains through MRI imaging. They determined that math facts are held in the working memory part of the brain and when students are stressed, such as during timed tests, the working memory becomes blocked and many cannot access the math facts they know (Beilock, 2011). This, in turn, creates math anxiety, which can erode students’ self-confidence in their ability to do mathematics. I asked my preservice elementary teachers to share their experiences with timed multiplication tests. These are from the mouths of those who are currently teaching elementary classes. 

“For me, third grade was the time when the majority of our class time in math was spent doing timed multiplication tests. We had a reward for doing them correctly and fast, we would build up an "ice cream sundae" for every test that we got a perfect score on for under a minute. For me, I always struggled with it and these tests would stress me out. I ended up doing alright, but it made me sad whenever I would see someone with a bigger "sundae" than me. As a result, I have always had bad feelings associated with timed multiplication tests.”

“I dreaded when the teacher would say, get your pencils out and everything else off your desk. I just felt this pit in my stomach start to form. He would place the sheets upside down on each of our desks and say "you have a minute to complete as many as possible, do your best." He would stand at the front of the room and say "go" and then walk around the room to see how we were doing, which made me even more anxious. After completely bombing my test, I would have to listen to all the other students around me add up all the ones they got right and start bragging to their friends.”

“For me, third grade was the time when the majority of our class time in math was spent doing timed multiplication tests. We had a reward for doing them correctly and fast, we would build up an "ice cream sundae" for every test that we got a perfect score on for under a minute. For me, I always struggled with it and these tests would stress me out. I ended up doing alright, but it made me sad whenever I would see someone with a bigger "sundae" than me. As a result, I have always had bad feelings associated with timed multiplication tests.”

“When I was in elementary, timed multiplication was all the rage. It was a requirement. If you didn't get it in class, you had to go to tutoring before or after school to practice. (Which was super embarrassing.) I was one of the slower ones. I understand math well, I love math, but I was not good under pressure. You had one minute to do the 7's or whatever you were doing that time. It was 10 facts of each number. When you got them all you got to go to the class party, but if you were a slower one, you didn't get to. In the end, I finally got to go, but it was not a good experience. The frustration and negative emotions behind it made me just want to give up.”

“I absolutely hated timed tests. The time limit really stressed me out because I needed to think about certain problems. The reward for passing a test what an "ice cream scoop" on a paper bowl we cut out. (These were also posted in the room) Once every table was passed, there was a giant ice cream party at the end of the year for those who were able to pass every test. I didn't like the result to be posted for all classmates to see. I remember nights crying because I didn't pass a test and my parents would make me write problems over and over. Also, we did not learn our 12's and until this day, I cannot do them without adding up totals in my head. “

“I always hated timed multiplication tests when I was younger, and still to this day. My fourth grade class is where I remember doing them the most. My teacher made it a competition all the time and whoever could move on to the next time test or who could do the best on one would get a prize and get praise and it made me feel like I was not good enough because we never worked on it or strategies to help my timed multiplication test time and accuracy improve. I do not like the idea of doing that to kids, and it gives them anxiety when you hear that you only have a certain amount of time to complete something.”

Like me, though, it was not a bad experience for everyone.

“I always did really well on the tests. They stressed me out but I loved the competition against time. There were only a few times I did not score perfectly but that just made me do better on the next. I don't remember getting rewards though. We just got bragging rights and a sticker on our paper. The class was pretty impressed with how fast I could do it. If someone beat me, I saw that as a defeat.”

“I remember at first never really liking them and having anxiety. But as I started to learn the multiplication facts I began to enjoy them more. I was pretty good at them and always looked forward to doing them just to see if I could be the quickest to finish.”

Timed multiplication tests should be a thing of the past because our mathematical and societal goals have changed and I don’t think we, as an educational establishment, ever considered the unintended consequences of a practice that is still widespread in many U.S. classrooms. Forty-five years ago (1970) when Fortune 500 companies were asked what they most valued in new employees the second most important skill was computational skills. The need to compute quickly and efficiently was a workforce expectation so timed multiplication tests seemed at the time like a reasonable education instrument to assist in meeting this goal. Now shifting forward thirty years (1999) Fortune 500 companies see the most valued skills of employees as teamwork, problem solving, and interpersonal skills. Computation skills are now 12^th on the list of the top “most valued” skills by Fortune 500 companies.

As I reflect on my own experience, although I was good at these tests, I think it had some unintended consequences. I started to view mathematics as all about speed. I needed to be the first one done with the homework and I didn’t have time to really reflect on a problem. If it took too much time I simply gave up or asked for help so that I could get done quickly. It took many years to shed this belief about mathematics and learn to appreciate the beauty of a problem that took a long period of time to solve. It also was not until I became a teacher myself that I began to appreciate the power of having a sense of numbers.

As stated earlier our educational goals and the goals for my students are different now. I want my students to be able to think and reason about the meaning of 9 * 5 (i.e., 9 groups of 5). I want them to have mental strategies as to how to reason about 9 * 5. That is,  thinking about 9 groups of 10 and taking half of that amount or as 10 groups of 5 minus 1 group of  5. I want them to be able to connect what they know about 9 * 5 to quickly answer 9 * .5--9 * 5 tenths is 45 tenths or 4 ones and 5 tenths, 4.5.  I no longer want my students to see the numerals representing numbers as static objects but as flexible objects that can be thought of differently depending on the students’ needs. I want to give them the power to think and reason in a way that enables them to begin to appreciate the beauty of mathematics through number sense. This does not happen if all we care about is speed.