A high school English teacher is calling for more guidance and examples of content ahead of NCEA literacy and numeracy tests being rolled out in June.
The compulsory reading, writing and literacy NCEA standards will form part of students achieving NCEA qualifications from next year, but this year schools can participate in the tests if they chose to in June and October.
Preparing students for the writing exam is a significant difference from how writing is taught, Tuakau College Head of English Julie Lawson says.
“Everything about education has been ‘think, pair, share’, and now we're ‘go alone, work alone, be assessed alone’, and that’s not compatible at all.”
That’s why she’s urging the Ministry of Education to provide more information so she can help students prepare.
“It’s a little challenging right now because we have so little information that’s available to us.
“I think the Ministry are afraid that we're going to teach to the test but what we're really trying to do is make sure that we're prepared so our students can be prepared,” Lawson says.
In a statement, Ministry of Education curriculum centre leader Ellen MacGregor-Reid said further resources are being designed but there are resources already available.
‘These include resources to support effective classroom practices and curriculum learning.
‘We expect many schools will use the teacher only day early next term to focus on these,’ she stated.
Schools are being encouraged to prepare ahead of the compulsory introduction, she said.
An evaluation of the second NCEA pilot test carried out in September 2022 revealed just 46% of students involved passed the writing test, up from 34% in June.
The September pilot had participation from 170 high schools out of 566 composite and secondary schools in the country.
“It's certainly not the results that we had hoped for in terms of being a little bit more positive but certainly seeing a bit of an improvement over the course of the year when you understand the workings of the test, the intricacies of it and also have a bit of time to advise, guide and prepare students for that mode of assessment,” Secondary Principals' Association of New Zealand president Vaughan Couillault says.
The evaluation also found it was likely the online test format and design of the assessment wasn't equitable for all students, according to teacher feedback.
“There’s a massive difference between a family that has a lot of internet availability and a lot of device availability in their home, those students tend to do better in digital exams and that is playing out in all of the data,” Lawson said.
“It does look like, unfortunately, this exam is widening the success opportunities for Māori and Pasifika, and that’s a tough cause that’s our students.”
MacGregor-Reid said the Ministry and NZQA are designing assessments that don’t disadvantage any students.
"NZQA is working to strengthen assessment design starting this year and continuing. We are confident that this can be resolved through the piloting process," she stated.
NZQA Deputy Chief Executive for assessment Jann Marshall said in a statement the authority has considered all recommendations from the evaluation report and is receiving input from Māori and Pacific people throughout assessment creation.
She stated that NZQA is supporting schools that haven’t participated in online assessments before.
"While this transition occurs, NZQA will work with individual schools, kura and providers to implement an approach that best meets their needs and those of their students, which may include providing students with printed papers.
"Support and resources available are being refined to help schools prepare, have confidence in delivering tests and to put effective teaching in place without “narrowing learning or ‘teaching to the test,” she stated.
Students will have multiple attempts at gaining the corequisites if they fail throughout high school.
SPANZ president Vaughan Couillault said he has concerns about high schools being able to implement the corequisite tests with the required and sustained effort over the next 18 months.
“My call has been to change the nature of the (NCEA) Change Programme because we’ve got curriculum refresh, we’ve got NCEA change, we’ve got some stuff around student restraint, we’ve got reporting issues that we’ve got to deal with in terms of strategic planning and on top of that we’ve got a real problem in our workforce being able to recruit," Couillault said.
"If you’re wanting to implement a significant change programme in whatever period of time, you’ve got to have the capacity in your workforce to do that, and I don’t believe we’ve got the capacity at the moment to do that,” he said.
High school teachers are currently taking part in industrial action as part of their collective agreement negotiations with the Education Ministry, with actions set to ramp up next term.
Couillault says there’s no contention with the introduction of the tests to lift the literacy and numeracy performance of students, but the current timeline isn’t achievable.
In a statement, Education Minister Jan Tinetti said she’s in near constant contact with schools and understands the past couple of years have been tough.
"I remain open to considering changes to implementation timelines.
"But any possible changes need to balance ensuring we’re making progress on improving outcomes for students but are also achievable for those working at the chalkface," she stated.
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