First of all, what is NAPLAN?
NAPLAN is the national assessment program that years 3,5,7,9 take part in. The results from these series of literacy and numeracy tests are taken and reviewed by the education department in an attempt to discover the average intellectual abilities of Australia’s school students. The grades of these tests do not influence the students overall grade, which brings in the controversial topic we know as “is still NAPLAN relevant?”
What are the students’ thoughts on NAPLAN?
It’s a popular opinion that NAPLAN tests are tiring and unnecessary, but we need to have a bit more understanding as to why. We interviewed some students from our school about this and we are happy to present them here:
Students:
“I don’t like NAPLAN. I know the reason that we do it is valid but It’s stressful and really boring if i’m being honest.”
‘Don’t like it. It’s very stressful. I wouldn’t mind it if other school assessments were cancelled during it, but right now it just adds unnecessary stress.’
“Well, I can see how it would be useful in some cases, but I don’t see why it's necessary. I think that we have a lot on our plate already and it’s almost spiteful to add on to that. I do like the writing part though…”
Teachers:
“I think NAPLAN is a useful process for collecting data, and has been used for a long time because of this. It has worked for many years, and gives us a snapshot of students strengths and needs. However, to many students it can seem a little unnecessary. At times, I think NAPLAN can contribute to unnecessary student stress, and perhaps standardised assessment has reached its use-by-date. In the future, we may need to consider assessing students on what is really relevant in their lives - whether NAPLAN is necessary or not is very difficult to answer, but is definately worthy of debate.”
“This is a tricky question to answer. I think there’s positives and negatives for NAPLAN. It can be a useful tool for collecting data. But it can cause a lot of anxiety for some students. Students are often confused as to why they do it and don’t see the value, so they sometimes don’t approach it in the way they would approach a school task. It is important for us to have an understanding of how students are learning, and what areas we need to focus on. How we do this effectively is open for debate."
The debate has started! Does the NAPLAN exam, and standardised testing in general, fit into a 21st Century environment? The answer may be a bit complex for us to answer in any definitive way. Even if we could, it is far above us to make any changes. However, as students of APHS, it is always important for us to continually question our world.
Is NAPLAN still relevant?? The jury is out on this one!
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