TIMSS and TIMSS Advanced are international comparative studies of students’ performance in Mathematics and Science in grades 4, 8 and at the end of upper secondary school. These international comparative studies under the auspices of IEA (International Association for the Evaluation of Educational Achievement) were carried out for the first time in 1995. TIMSS is an abbreviation for Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study, while ‘Advanced’ refers to the fact that the study relates to students selecting to specialize in Mathematics or Physics in the upper secondary school. TIMSS is a major source of information about level of achievement in Mathematics and Science. Decrease in Norwegian students’ achievement in Mathematics and Science has been measured since the mid 1990s, at all levels from primary, through lower secondary till the end of upper secondary school (Grønmo et al. 2010). The same is true for Sweden. Norway and Sweden have a lot in common in education, as organization of school, curriculum content in subjects, methods for instruction as well as how and when initiatives for changes took place. I will mainly present results of analyses based on Norwegian data, but we have done some of the same analyses based on Swedish data, and the conclusions seem to be the same for both countries (Grønmo and Gustafsson 2010). The problems I discuss here today are therefore most likely a Scandinavian issue, not only an issue for Norway. The Scandinavian countries have, for good reasons, been seen as a place to look for how to give the whole population a good education. Because of that, it may be even more important to be aware of some problematic issues related to education in these countries which it is not advisable to copy.

TIMSS in TIMSS Advanced sta mednarodni primerjalni raziskavi znanja matematike in naravoslovja pri učencih po 4 in 8 letih šolanja in v zadnjem razredu višje srednje šole (višje sekundarno izobraževanje). Te mednarodne raziskave, ki potekajo pod okriljem organizacije IEA (Mednarodno združenje za vrednotenje izobraževalnih dosežkov – International Association for the Evaluation of Educational Achievement), so prvič izvedli leta 1995. Kratica TIMSS pomeni raziskavo trendov v znanju matematike in naravoslovja (Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study), ‘Advanced’ pa pomeni, da gre za raziskave pri učencih, ki so izbrali specializacijo iz matematike ali fizike v višji srednji šoli. TIMSS je glavni vir informacij o stopnji dosežkov pri matematiki in naravoslovju. Od sredine devetdesetih let 20. stoletja smo na vseh stopnjah izobraževanja, od osnovne do nižje in višje srednje šole pri norveških učencih izmerili upad v znanju matematike in naravoslovja (Grønmo et al. 2010). Enako velja za Švedsko. Norveška in Švedska imata veliko skupnega v izobraževanju, šolskem sistemu, vsebini šolskih predmetov, metod poučevanja in tudi v tem, kdaj so nastopile spremembe v šolskem sistemu in kakšne so bile. V glavnem bom prikazala rezultate analiz norveških podatkov, čeprav smo podobne analize izdelali tudi na podlagi švedskih podatkov in zaključki kažejo enako stanje v obeh državah (Grønmo in Gustafsson 2010). Problemi, o katerih razpravljam, so torej najverjetneje skandinavski problem in ne le norveški. Skandinavske države so, iz dobrih razlogov, tudi drugi jemali za vzgled, kako celotni populaciji zagotoviti dobro izobrazbo. Zato je še toliko bolj pomembno, da se zavedamo nekaterih problematičnih dejstev, povezanih z izobraževanjem v teh državah, ki jih ni priporočljivo posnemati.