NAPLAN’s move from May to March, as well as the shift from paper to digital, may hinder schools and teachers in testing delivery.
Experts also argue moving the test toward the end of the year could yield more accurate, relevant results for both teachers and students, as concerns grow that schools with already stretched budgets and staffing shortages may struggle to accommodate NAPLAN testing when it starts in schools around the country today, 13 March.
With discussions around the efficacy of NAPLAN in the current education climate growing louder, Professor Karen Murcia says the digital NAPLAN may not be all that is promised.
“For data to be useful and to inform teaching, moving the testing to the end of the year could provide an insight into what children achieved in that school year,” she says.
Professor Murcia is a specialist in STEM education at Curtin University and has a research focus on young children’s digital technologies education and multimodal capabilities. Her teaching interests and research work span the intersection between learning theory, learning design, and professional development.
“Amongst educators, there is strong scepticism and criticism towards the NAPLAN testing system. Many voices are emphasising the inefficacy of preparing students for the test, the time and resource allocation involved in schools, and the lack of meaningful outcomes it provides to children. Testing in March and going digital, may not be the promised panacea.”
Her concerns follow yesterday’s announcement by the Australian Curriculum Assessment and Reporting Authority (ACARA) that NAPLAN results will be available earlier than ever, this year, in a move that was promoted as helping teachers better identify and support students’ educational needs.
Staffing shortages make timetable disruptions difficult
As students in years three, five, seven, and nine prepare to undergo NAPLAN testing this week, teachers and schools around the country are gearing up to facilitate the thousands of students who are required to take part.
Whilst this cycle may be ‘business as usual’ for many, smaller schools with low staff numbers may be forced to stretch their resources to accommodate the timetable disruptions that NAPLAN can bring.
Couple this with the timing of the test – which has seen a recent move from May to March – as well as a shift to digital delivery of NAPLAN testing and it’s easy to see why some teachers and schools feel the strain that this school-wide testing brings. For schools ill-equipped with digital equipment required to deliver the test, that strain can be made even greater.
“It became apparent last year that testing in March and using digital marking still didn’t get the results into schools and with teachers in a timely manner, with some as late as October. School leaders and teachers questioned what the test results showed that they didn’t already know about their classrooms and children’s learning needs,” Professor Murcia says.
“Arguably, for the data to be useful and to inform teaching, moving the testing to the end of the year could provide an insight into what children achieved in that school year. Informed by the data, teachers would then be able to address children’s learning needs and knowledge gaps when planning at the start of the following school year.”
Lack of digital literacy skills highlighted in online testing
With many struggles faced by schools in planning and conducting digital NAPLAN testing – “especially those with limited resources and children with low digital capabilities” – Professor Murcia says issues around access to technology, digital literacy skills, and the time-consuming nature of online testing are taking time away from quality learning for the children who need it most.
“There are still schools that are not adequately equipped with suitable computers, related hardware, and reliable access to the internet,” she says.
“With an insufficient number of devices, it is a challenge for schools to ensure children have access to the digital NAPLAN tests.
Digitial capabilities can be compromised
To further exacerbate the inequality, Professor Murcia says children have not necessarily progressed sufficiently on the continuum of ICT capabilities to manage and operate test question functions.
“The numeracy testing requires fluency with a range of mouse and keyboard functions and literacy testing requires adequate typing skills for success,” Professor Murcia says.
“Is NAPLAN now also indirectly testing children’s digital capabilities and is this clouding test results? Arguably, the ability to show working-outs and mathematical reasoning has also been lost through the efficiency of the digital click, drag and drop and selecting from a dropdown option box.”
