More attention needs to be given to the reading, writing and numeracy skills of Tasmanian students who do not meet the national minimum standards, and less attention on comparing average scores, an expert says.
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Focusing on average National Assessment Program for Learning Outcomes scores ignores the most valuable data on vulnerable students, Peter Underwood Centre’s Professor Kitty te Riele said.
“Having a measure that is consistent across all schools across the country is really useful, because that means you can actually compare results,” she said.
However, she said attention needs to be on “the pointy ends”.
“Those are the students that are really missing out, and that is endangering their life chances – how are they going to look after themselves, how are they going to do the shopping, open a bank account, if they haven’t got the basic literacy skills that you need to function in society?” she said.
Tasmania’s Year 3 pupils out-performed their Year 9 fellows in the 2017 averages, with the oldest students reporting the worst scores across the tested cohorts in reading and numeracy.
Year 3 pupils were the only cohort to record a positive increase in scores in reading and numeracy, but all years tested reported a decline in writing.
The Peter Underwood Centre is undertaking new research over the next two years for the state government investigating the causes of poor literacy and potential actions for the future.
“If young people aren’t meeting that minimum standard, then that’s where there’s a real concern, that’s where we need to target our attention,” Professor te Riele said.
“The proportion of students who are not meeting the national minimum standard increases between Year 3 and Year 9, so that gives us some information to say, well, hang on, we should … try and make sure more and more students meet the minimum standard.”
While the information NAPLAN provides for schools is important, she questioned the methods of releasing the data.
Professor te Riele said she had heard anecdotes of interstate schools reporting high NAPLAN scores and then dealing with mass enrollments, only for those schools to then reporter lower scores the next year.
“There is potential for misinterpretation when you don’t have all of the background information, and there’s a potential … that parents will make choices that are not fully informed because they don’t have all that information,” she said.
“I’m not entirely sure about the best way to make those results available so they can be put to good use.”
