DIAMYND Berkovic, 8, and Georgie Cunningham and Coupar Pryke, both 9, will sit their first NAPLAN test tomorrow morning.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
The three Punchbowl Primary School pupils are among more than a million year 3, 5, 7 and 9 Australian children who will spend today brushing up on their spelling, grammar, punctuation and writing skills in preparation for the first of three days of national testing.
Tomorrow all students around the country will sit language conventions and writing tests.
That will be followed on Wednesday with a reading test and on Thursday with numeracy, with each test to go from 40 minutes to just over an hour for older children.
Co-principal Denise Hay said NAPLAN was a good way to gather data that could be used to focus on areas of improvement.
``But it's just one point in time that is measured, and that should be remembered,'' Ms Hay said.
The launch of the state government's NAPLAN Toolkit in April had been of great help to teachers and principals in preparing for the tests this week, she said.
The online resource allows teachers and principals to view, sort and analyse students' results quickly for an accurate picture on how they performed and areas to focus on in the lead-up to this year's testing.
Ms Hay said it had saved teachers a significant amount of time in being able to quickly compare results between classes and also look at where they may sit nationally.
``We don't have a significant focus on practice testing but students certainly need to know how the tests will look, including multiple choice questions,'' Ms Hay said.
Students were probably a little bit anxious about the tests because there was so much talk about them.