NAPLAN 2016
A word from Marilyn McKee, Manager, K-10 Testing
This week, from Tuesday 10 May to Thursday 12 May, students in Years 3, 5, 7 and 9 from across Australia will sit the National Assessment Program – Literacy and Numeracy (NAPLAN) tests.
A word from Marilyn McKee, Manager, K-10 Testing
This week, from Tuesday 10 May to Thursday 12 May, students in Years 3, 5, 7 and 9 from across Australia will sit the National Assessment Program – Literacy and Numeracy (NAPLAN) tests.
If you have a child who is about to sit the NAPLAN you might be concerned about test-related stress and the expectations of performance.
I want to take this opportunity to run through why the NAPLAN is a useful tool and nothing to fear.
Based on curriculum
First of all, the NAPLAN tests are designed to sit within a student’s assessment program. They build on the skills and understandings students are expected to be assessed on throughout the year.
The content of each test is informed by the Australian Curriculum (English and Mathematics). In Western Australia this means that students are being tested on skills developed over time through content from the Western Australian curriculum syllabuses for English and Mathematics. These syllabuses are available on our website at http://k10outline.scsa.wa.edu.au/home/p-10-curriculum/curriculum-browser.
When students are engaging with the curriculum they are developing skills and understandings that they can draw. Teaching the curriculum equips students to complete the tests.
A point-in-time snapshot
The assessments have always been intended as what is known as a point-in-time snapshot. This means they are not expected to give a full picture of a student’s knowledge and abilities. What they provide information of a student’s performance on one day.
The information this snapshot provides is useful to teachers and schools because it provides a strong comparison of their students in relation to other students of the same year group at that same time.
This helps schools put support in place for students. Information from the tests identifies strengths as well as weaknesses. If your child has specific gaps in their knowledge and understandings, the NAPLAN results can help pinpoint these. Your child’s results can be a useful starting point for conversations with classroom teachers and school staff.
Individuals and groups
The point-in-time information is enhanced by being in the context of the larger student population. It can also confirm ongoing student performance. In situations where support, and possibly intervention, is needed, information from the tests can confirm starting points which are likely to have been emerging through a student’s classroom performance.
As students move through school, their performance on tests provides a measurable map of their progress in the context of their own past performances. The ongoing performances of their year group is also indicated. This provides a starting point for conversations with a student’s teacher and school.
Skills for life
The literacy and numeracy skills students need for success at school and participation in the world beyond school develop over time. The NAPLAN tests provide information about how students are going at developing these core skills.
The skills and understandings students demonstrate in the literacy assessment include spelling, grammar and punctuation, developing and organising ideas and showing understanding of texts.
The numeracy assessment involves problems relating to content strands from the mathematics syllabus. In Years 7 and 9, the numeracy assessment involves two parts; one where a calculator is allowed and one where a calculator cannot be used.
Putting fears to rest
As with any test or assessment of a student’s performance, the expectation is that the student performs to the best of their ability on the day.
The NAPLAN tests are not intended to put students under additional pressure. They are an assessment like any other. The difference is the common questions and timing of the tests to coincide on the same day.
The tests reflect the content for the year level. Students are showing what they know in the tests. This is what they are asked to do in assessment activities – including projects, presentations and tests – on any other school day.
NAPLAN, the OLNA and the WACE
In closing, I want to address questions that have arisen about NAPLAN, the Online Literacy and Numeracy Assessment (OLNA) and the Western Australian Certificate of Education (WACE).
From 2016, students need to demonstrate a literacy and numeracy standard to achieve a WACE. The standard is a description of what is expected of Year 12 students. Students demonstrate the standard through the OLNA.
Some students will be able to demonstrate the standard before Year 12 but some will not do this until they are in Year 12. Also, there are provisions for students to continue to work towards demonstrating the standard after Year 12. To ensure students have opportunities to demonstrate the literacy and numeracy standard, they first attempt the OLNA in Year 10. .
There are some students who will not need to sit the OLNA because they will have prequalified as demonstrating the standard by achieving a Band 8 in the Year 9 NAPLAN.
Some Year 9s are concerned they won’t demonstrate the literacy and numeracy standard required for Year 12. The important thing to remember is that they do not need to demonstrate the standard until they are in Year 12. The Year 9 NAPLAN is not a part of the WACE. It is just that some students demonstrate the standard early and there is no need for them to demonstrate it again in another test.
More information
See the information for parents in the NAPLAN section under the Assessing tab of our Kindergarten to Year 10 website http://k10outline.scsa.wa.edu.au/home/assessment/testing/naplan.
Keywords: NAPLAN
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