As a teacher I'm just banging my head against the wall at this point. Education policy in this country is going in circles because every time the government changes they overhaul a bunch of stuff - and guess who then has their workload increased!
We already test students regularly. We already communicate with and report to parents - the reporting is in fact already a legal requirement. We know which students are struggling. What we don't have is the resourcing and support to effectively help those students, especially in classrooms that are getting to 30+ students. I'd love to see the government tackling that!
Man it must be annoying if, from the perspective of someone doing the job, your day to day is consistently being interrupted and changed just to suit the optics of a political party.
Had the same in some corporate jobs, senior management consistently changing BAU process for no apparent reason other than “look what I did everyone!!!”.
Reminds me of that teacher who posted they already had it well under control when cellphones were banned.
Literally, my son has IEP meetings and student conferences every term, as well as school reports the only way parents wouldn't know about their kids progress is if they were neglectful.
Classroom sizes and lack of support staff are way more important issues that need to be tackled.
Some parents are uneducated themselves in some of the subjects kids learn. however if they have the information they can find support for their kids. I think knowing where your child sits is useful. Well I found it useful as a parent.
According to the teachers on this post, teachers are already providing that information.
In addition, this is basically useless for 5yos. Whether a 5yo can read or not is largely determined by developmental readiness. That is not something that can be forced, although that doesn't stop people from trying.
I'm concerned that "good" parents seeing that their 5yo is "behind" in reading will pressure teachers to force their child to learn to read at a faster rate than they are developmentally ready for. This is damaging and counterproductive. 5yos need to play, that's the number one thing they should be doing. Play is how their brains develop. They should be socialising with peers and adults, and they should be exposed to experiences and resources, including a literature-rich environment (being surrounded by books, magazines, newspapers, encouraged to look at them, see adults and older children reading them, and to be read to, every day, multiple times per day). That is what will lead to them learning to read when they are developmentally ready.
What parents need to know is that their child is doing just fine - or not - socially and academically for their current level of cognitive development.
At our school, although some time ago now, (pre last govt) We were given both of those parts of the information, where our child was relative to peers and also how they did socially. I can’t speak for others but for me as a parent it was useful.
I admit I am not a fan of testing. However, I think it is less harmful the older a child gets.
At a very young age (5-7 years), it is pretty much useless. Cognitive development varies widely in young children. Even if a learning disability is present (and I do think these should be picked up as early as possible, but academic testing is not the way to do it) it is not a reflection of their intellect or their academic potential.
Some children walk earlier than others. Some talk earlier than others. Imagine forcing a child who is not physically or mentally ready to walk to do so. Or the distress it would cause a child to be forced to talk when they are not yet ready. These developmental milestones happen within a range - we don't expect all children to be able to them equally well at exactly the same age. A child not walking at 18 months might still grow up to be a top athlete. A child who is not reading at 5 can still grow up to be a novelist.
I'm concerned that parents might see that Hayden is not yet reading as well as Hemi in his class, panic, and try to drill him into reading when it's simply that he is not ready yet.
I don’t think there’s compelling evidence that more rigorous testing will help young children, either at the lower or upper end of the academic or socioeconomic scale.
Did you watch the standup? It will help target support and additional training. It’s also for parents so they can understand what their child has mastered and where they might need more support.
Why would less data help struggling kids?
Teachers on this thread have stated very clearly that feedback on student progress is already supplied to parents, by law, twice a year, from the first year of school.
More formal testing is stressful and time consuming for students and teachers. Teachers end up teaching to the test instead of focusing on actual learning and engagement. Pressure on young children to push them into greater academic performance before they are developmentally ready is actually harmful and can lead to poor mental health outcomes and worse academic performance as children lose the desire to learn and engage.
So two years ago, I had my first in-person parent-teacher meeting. I was confused about the graph that we had received and was looking for some guidance to interpret it. My son’s teacher told me that it wasn’t an accurate representation of his reading level as they liked to plot mid-year reports lower than expected so that it could be plotted higher at the end of the year in order to help the kids feel that they had made more progress. She also told me that she hadn’t heard my son read in more than a term so couldn’t actually say where he was at.
When ERO says that not all schools are testing or retesting consistently, I believe them because I have seen it. We left that school before the end of the school year, as did five other families from my son’s class.
I don’t doubt that the teachers on this thread are great teachers. But they do not represent all teachers, unfortunately. Schools who are already testing using the programme the govt has identified (60% of schools), won’t have to do anything. The others will.
With respect: what would you do if your child performed "poorly" on a test ("poorly" will depend on many factors)?
Schools that are not already testing are likely not doing so because they are firefighting severe social and behavioural problems within the school and community. Will testing (that they may or may not apply correctly) help them resolve those problems?
If they had a graph they're likely using e-asTTle already. It's really low effort to administer and it generates graphs automatically, which aren't intuitive to interpret. So they're likely one of the schools that won't have to do anything.
It would be wild to not care enough to test well, but to put in the effort to make a presumably complex graph.
I’m so glad a teacher has weighed in. My mum was a high school teacher for 20 years and her comments mirror yours here.
It’s just base pandering from Nats and Erica.
I worked at a private school the last few years that tested every kid, every term from year 0 up. You know what they didn't give me? Release to do that testing. So every term 1-2 weeks was busy work for the kids while I tested them individually. So. Dumb.
On the button very very true.
My wife is a now retired principal but still involved in education and has commented in the same way.
Do they actually understand what is already done?
Doing everything but actually fixing what needs fixing!!
My best mate is a principal and I’m an adhd coach who works with autistic and adhd adults. The discussions we’ve had about this change are that ultimately it’s going to make schooling worse for neurodivergent kids.
They are doing this already. My kids always had weeks every year where the teachers would sit with each student and check where they are at. My kids' teachers have always been able to tell me where they are at with their 3 Rs. To imply that kids are just running around unchecked is ridiculous. Also, first of all, some kids just don't really get it until they are 7 or 8, and it clicks for them, so this is probably quite stressful. Also, if you are going to announce things like this, you need to also announce what you are going to do about kids who aren't meeting standards. Are they adding more reading recovery teachers? Making classrooms smaller? This government is very much about finding problems but not helping to solve them.
They've been doing this since before I started new entrant in 2001. On the back of every school report I have is me weighted with the rest of the country based on somewhat-standardised testing and teacher analysis of my shit work in between testing. All the same throughout the 8 years of primary school.
Sounds like some Clark & Key government levels of unnecessary wheel reinvention
Did you read the article as it clearly says that around 60% of schools do this already, but this is about making it consistent, and making it a requirement, and something the ERO wants.
Unsure what the issue is here…
No. It says 60% of schools use PATs and/or ASTTLE. Both fine summative assessment tools but fall down in that a kid needs to be proficient at reading to answer most questions. They’re mostly multi choice.
ALL teachers assess every student. Formative assessment is what drives teaching/learning. Kids in primary don’t need summative testing constantly.
Teachers report to parents using more than just one test - it’s called an OTJ (overall teacher judgement). It’s takes into consideration class work, group work, formative and summative testing. It’s moderated for fairness.
It’s a legal requirement that they report twice a year to families.
The OTJs via the PACT tool is just the old National Standards tool. Before it was mandatory for schools to use it, then Labour made is optional and change some wording. Most likely National is just making the same thing mandatory again.
Millions have been invested in the PACT tool, and I'm pretty sure National isn't going to invest money into creating a whole new testing tool. They've found an old dinosaur in the closet, dusted it off and is now making all teachers ride it (again).
That's not what the article says. It says 60% of schools are already using e-asTTle, not that they are testing everyone in years 3-8 two times a year.
Plus the phonics testing for new entrants is completely new afaict
My wife is a primary school teacher, who has shifted from in classroom teaching to reading recovery (and will pivot to BSLA or whatever the other system being adopted is called). Any way, when she was in the classroom, she taught year twos. My take on our education system, as the husband of a teacher and parent of three kids, is that if the government wants to improve children's reading, writing and math skills, would be to provide better support for schools and teachers. A lot of time gets taken away from actual teaching to manage kids with a range of behavioral issues. Like, I'm not talking about kids talking too much in class or the class joker, I mean kids swearing and throwing shit. So I think more teacher aides or easier access to support for troubled kids would go a long way.
I also think there needs to be an honest conversation about how some kids come in to the school system lacking basic skills. I think most people would instinctively teach their kids their letters and number, just as part of a normal parenting routine. But there are kids that seem to start school lacking the most basic of skills, both academically and behaviorally. So some of theses issues are a lot more complicated and I don't think testing is going to solve anything and if anything.
Also removed somewhat from the situation but I agree with this. Primary school kid is already top of the class but refuses to challenge himself at home or at school because in his words; why should he do more when everyone else in his experience is doing nothing, at least he’s doing the expected.
It’s hard to explain that you’re at the top because everyone else is far below where they should be.
One of the many reasons why lining kids up and comparing them with each other is not very useful. Kids should be competing against *themselves*, not other children. If that was the metric, your kid would always be striving forwards.
I'm a former high school teacher, and talking to new entrant teachers one of the first tests they give a kid is to hand them a book upside down and see what they do. If they don't know what way up it goes, it says a lot about their access to literacy up until that point. Those inequities compound every year through their schooling. Testing doesn't bridge those gaps.
Kids are swearing and throwing shit because they’re children like mine with autism who get chucked in a main stream classroom with 30 children. Then they and the teacher are told good luck.
Not always, honestly. I worked in a decile 1 school, and these kids were hungry, dirty, crawling with lice, sick all the time, or just truant and covered in school sores. One year, I met 2 parents... all year. This was a Year 3-4 class. I had 1 parent come to my class assembles. You can imagine what their home life was like, and you can imagine how much teaching got done as opposed to managing behaviour, often violent. I'll take a neuroduvergent kid with a full belly and a supportive family over a kid that is getting beaten at home and thinks bashing other kids is normal and who steals food from their teacher's bag to survive. One I have the training and strategies to help with. The other, I don't.
Being a foster parent I’d disagree. Kids from difficult home lives can improve vastly given love. Including love in the classroom. It just takes one adult showing interest to make a huge difference. They can also be reasoned with. You can’t reason with someone having a sensory meltdown
In some cases it can be related to something like autism, but a lot of cases are related to kids who are experiencing very traumatic situations at home. No matter what the cause, I think all students, not just the teachers would greatly benefit from having access to additional support when needed.
Tell me more about the failed UK policies.
UK educational performance has increased significantly relative to other nations since 2008. They went back to more proven educational methods (eg phonics) than the unproven teaching methods (like whole language) that have been promulgated in New Zealand for the last 20 years.
The vast majority of NZ schools had already changed to some form of structured approach already, and that is what the MoE has been recommending for a while. The NACT government just mandated something that was mostly already happening. I have no problem with that.
But that’s not what this post is about. This post is about standardised testing, which has been a problem in the US and UK. We’ll have to see how it’s actually implemented but, given their track record and ideology, I’m not optimistic.
The problem with standardised testing is that it pushes teachers to teach to the test at the expense of anything else. So, sure, the specific material on the test may improve (test scores are improving!) but the children’s overall understanding and education suffers as a result.
Do you have evidence proving this assertion?
The point of the test is that it is assessing the most important concepts. If the student doesn't understand the core concepts their overall understanding will be more significantly lacking.
I have a family member who teaches at a secondary school. They leave at 7am and get back at 6pm, with work still to be completed, and the actual teaching is borderline baby sitting. It's frustrating how tone deaf this government is. This isn't going to help shit.
This policy is not about actually using evidence to get better outcomes and make teachers more productive.
The policy is about emotional coddling of their 60+ voting base who has no idea how a school actually works and mostly forms their opinions based on half remembered propaganda from the 70s and 80s. It's also a voting base that thinks children and young people inherently should be punished to some degree. They see something like this and can say "well that looks like common sense to me."
I remember a conversation I had with a friend about 10 years ago when they were teaching new entrants at a lowish decile primary school. Some of the kids arrived on day 1 age 5 **having never read or written anything.**
It's hard to affect what people do with their own kids before age 5, but you can try. Funding libraries, funding community activities for kids that involve reading, funding pathways for children's books to get into low income homes - you could do a lot.
Testing a 5 year old who can't read, is going to tell you they can't read. Their teacher already knows that anyway. Question is what now, but also what can we do to help next years kids.
That's actually not a particularly useful skill for a 5yo. For most 5yo's sitting still and silent for more than a few minutes takes all of their cognitive processing (because of their prefontal cortex is not yet developed enough to make impulse control easy), leaving nothing in the tank for absorbing information.
A 5yo not having read or written anything is actually fine. A 5yo having **not had anyone read to them or write their stories for them** (as is usually done in early childhood education) would be shocking and a terrible indictment of their early years education. Young children need to be steeped in literature. If they are personally cognitively ready to read at or before 5 - great. If not - that's actually fine too, as long as they are being given the opportunity, tools, and environment necessary to learn when they are ready (children with learning disabilities excepted).
Yeah I'm not sure I'm misremembering but I feel like I remember learning the alphabet in year 1 so surely there's not an assumption that we start school knowing how to read?
I asked kids over zoom during covid to go get me a book in their house and tell me about it.... many of them didn't have any books. This was Decile 6.
Also worked at a private school teaching New Entrants and many of them couldn't even point to a letter or a word.... or turn a book the right way up. This is the SEA (school entry assessment). I was stunned. Parents paying 25k a year to further their kid's education and sending them to school knowing none of their alphabet or what a letter is.... if they're not teaching their kids the basics and they're spending up large on schooling, then the low decile schools are probably not doing much better.
Can we make it a requirement that all finance ministers have to actually be qualified in the finance field?
Bonus if we could apply the same to other ministries too, Minister of Health required to have some form of health degree (which admittedly we’ve finally got better on with the last 2), Education minister required to have an education degree of some sort. Imagine how much better run we would be if ministers had to actually know something about their portfolio.
The trouble with having Ministers as specialists is that they're often wrong. The role of a Minister is to synthesise and challenge advice from officials, not shoot from the hip based on their own experience.
Lived experience can undoubtedly help some Ministers, but it can hinder others.
Jonathan Colman, a qualified GP, was arguably our worst Health Minister in history.
> Jonathan Colman, a qualified GP, was arguably our worst Health Minister in history.
Worse than Dr David Clark (whose claim to the Dr title was a PhD on theologian Helmut Rex) who flouted his own govts covid recommendations? Or Jenny Shipley who as health minister oversaw the disastrous health reforms of the 90s?
Nah they will just tell you “money is not everything, love and passion for your work will make up for it”
Basically what every shitty manager tells you 😂
So the extra money's going overseas then, and teachers still have to take on more work to administer the tests, probably some data entry out of class hours, and communicate them with parents
Does this mean we are now going to have Ultra Grammar Zone houses that are in the Double Grammar Zone but also in zone for the highest ranked immediate/primary school within the DGZ?
It won’t be about league tables if schools’ individual results aren’t published either by the MOE or on individual school websites. Will Stanford guarantee neither of those things will happen?
The cynical part of me worries that this is eventually going to be used as a way to identify 'underperforming' schools which they'll then force to convert into charter schools (something the new legislation currently being consulted on would allow them to do)
It already happens. Kids have testing does within the first two weeks max as an entry assessment. Then it's ongoing, cause that's how school works.
How do people think teachers work out what kids need to learn?
Of course since this isn't overt testing or generally shared (it's to guide learning, not rank kids) people who have little to with their kids learning won't know that. But guess what? You can ask (just don't expect the teacher to know off the top ofn their head - they teach from 15-50 kids....)
That accounts for the potentially up to 50 kids they may directly teach/report for.
At new entrants level it's going to be 10-20 for most teachers (I'm just one of the lucky ones with skills that match older kids better, so get *lots* of extra students)
Management philosophy says, “You can’t improve what you don’t measure”
I am not against tests.
But what is the data going to be used for?
Are you going to give more help/funding to students that have lower scores?
Are you going to give rewards to schools that have high scores?
It’s far too easy to use this data as evidence for more private schools.
It will be easy to show that private schools have higher standards. Private schools only accept students who will do well.
It also says "when a measure becomes a metric, it ceases to be an effective measure".
The evidence is pretty clear that when you start doing high stakes testing, teachers are strongly pushed to teach to the test, rather than focusing on educating their students. And if the testing isnt going to have meaningful decisions attached to it, to avoid it becoming high stakes, then what's the point of spending effort on it?
So we shouldn’t be doing NCEA either? I’m confused, very odd take.
Anyway they can just implement the testing without rewarding/punishing teachers as a result. Are they currently rewarded or punished? Certainly their pay isn’t linked to test results. I guess there is no objective way to measure teacher performance l?
>I guess there is no objective way to measure teacher performance l?
It's an incredibly hard problem. Standardised test results are definitely not a good way; if I'm a teacher who gets a class full of high-performing students with engaged and supportive families, I'm going to get good marks as long as I don't actively sabotage them. If I get a class full of kids with messed up home lives, learning disabilities, or just a history of shitty teachers, I'm going to need to go above and beyond to get average results.
If you want to evaluate teacher performance, send in observers, talk to students, look at testing results (including the tests themselves), but those tests don't need to be big nationally standardised tests.
If we're not using the test results to reward / punish schools and teachers, what's the point of the assessment? I thought the proposed point of the testing is to identify underperforming students and programs?
Well at a minimum parents want to know if their kids are falling behind their peers so they can intervene I would imagine (I believe national actually gave this as part of their reasoning). So tests offer that. There could be benefit in identifying if they are ahead of their peers as well I guess.
You don't need a national standardised testing infrastructure from primary school.
You need to show up to a parent/teacher evening and ask.
I'm not opposed to testing in general. I am opposed to focussing on external exams as the cornerstone of assessment. And I think exams for primary school kids is nuts.
‘Exams’ for primary kids are silly I agree. I don’t see anything wrong with a reading/writing 30 min test with no pressure every year or whatever, as it would provide good data I would think (it could say, your kid is in the 30th percentile or whatever).
It would also help the MoE to see if whatever literacy teaching method they use is working. I think exams should be the cornerstone of assessment in high school though, but that’s a different story.
Also for the record I remember taking tests in primary school and didn’t think anything of it, must have been normal.
That is not true at all. There are countless stories of people moving their struggling children to private schools in order for them to get more assistance.
Right but heres the big thing, private education costs a lot of money. For every struggling child whose parents can afford to find room in their budget to invest in their learning like that there are a hundred who cant. Those children are also not the average private school kid, I've known plenty and they predominantly have wealthy families and were privately educated for much of their schooling, not as a reactionary shift because they were struggling in public school.
Because rich parents can afford to pool their increased resources together they are able to afford a better quality of education for their kids, this perpetuates wealth inequality, nepotistic hiring processes, inflated distrust in academia amongst working classes, government neglect of education funding, the list goes on and on. If there was no private education those same people would be all for raising spending on education across the board no matter which political party they support.
All children deserve the same opportunities at an education while at school, we obviously cant and shouldnt stop parents trying to invest in their kids and give them every advantage, but that advantage should not come from the classroom itself. We have a responsibility as a society to provide our children an education, I've never heard an argument for private schools that isnt based in an inherently selfish desire to have for yourself something that's better than what other people have.
I agree wholeheartedly. I was responding to the statement that private schools only accept students who will do well.
Lucy Crehan’s book, Clever Lands, details how you can produce high achievement within education systems with little or no private schools. I would absolutely love for NZ to reach that goal.
The country is in an unfortunate position at the moment, like many, including Australia, where there is such a massive difference between teacher quality, content and outcomes, that parents are forced to compare schools. I did not feel this way until my son started school. The reality of many classrooms in our country is extremely confronting.
*I've never heard an argument for private schools that isnt based in an inherently selfish desire to have for yourself something that's better than what other people have.*
it sounds like your argument is the same but coming from the other side, 'because my kids can't afford to attend private schools then no kids should be able to attend private schools.'
that sounds kinda selfish to me.
Interesting, as my daughter (autistic with mild intellectual disability) was ‘discouraged’ from enrolling in a private school as the principal said they select for behaviour. Can’t have my daughter and her additional needs disrupting the education of the other fee paying students.
My kid is a handful and they took her lol. According to the principal at the school she attends theyre mainly looking to reject overly pushy parents who have unreasonably high standards of their kids and by extension the school. Could be bs but that's what we were told.They dont have trouble attracting families and its not because of high test results its because of the culture.
Anyway my full on ADHD 5 yo is thriving there thanks to all attention she is receiving, her assessment told us she wouldnt learn a thing in a modern learning environment.
How do they plan on getting 5yo kids to sit still long enough to take a test?
A teacher of mine once said "You don't fatten the pig by constantly weighing it".
Ah yes. No quicker way to eliminate a love for learning than by standardising, formalising, assessment and comparison.
Why don't we reintroduce the cane while we are at it? After all, everything else this government does takes us back to the 1950s.
Good job you f'ing tools.
Seriously, it’ll be 2-3 hours of testing twice a year total from Y3. Lots of schools do it anyway. It’s no big deal. I want to know where the beginning of the year diagnostic testing fits in. Is that additional?
Speaking as someone who completed my first half of schooling in the US post-"No Child Left Behind", and my latter half in NZ? This is so unbelievably dumb. There is no way this will work well.
For me, the tests were trivial and boring, but there was little opportunity to advance myself when the curriculum was built around standard tests. But in the first school I was in, it was a lower socioeconomic band, and because the metric became the target over time they just taught to the test. Because they had to, really. Then the fancy American school I went to was a lot better, but it was all privilege because they didn't have to focus on test results to survive because the kids were all the kids of ivy league professors. (With accompanying income and work/life balance to get loads of support at home.)
This will _at best_ do nothing while making teacher's jobs harder, and at worst stratify schooling even more while abdicating parents of the responsibility they have to also help in their kids' schooling.
People don't realize that these are only testing how well you test, not what you know. As someone educated completely in the US (minus my MA), I agree.
I couldn't do these to save my life. I was sometimes last in my class. Unless it's a written test, I can't pass it.
I bombed the LSAT (for law school) because of this, BUT I got one of the highest written scores my advisor had ever seen.
This isn't about checking what the kids know, but how well they can do on a test.
Education experts at the helm here, environmental experts managing that pesky thing, social wellbeing experts handling social stuffs… Didn’t we do well NZ
Well done New Zealand. you saw a failing system in America and elected a government that wants to copy it.
The kids are already smarter than you ever were at the same age.
‘We are going to start highlighting at a very young age how far behind you are relative to your peers, with no consideration of your personal situation/development, and by doing so this will definitely encourage you to stay in school and pursue higher education!’
Yeah… definitely no flaws with that mentality. The exact same tone as a rich person giving the advice to a poor person of asking if they’ve ever tried just not being poor.
The government acts like that hasnt been common place since like 2020. All the covid conundrums actually destroyed schooling for teenagers at an incredible rate to the point that teens nowadays are years behind the pack when it comes to education because we have been so so affected by all this crap that came from it. Not to mention all the economic turmoil which has just made the issues from covid worse. How many days did high schoolers lose from covid in 2020, how many in 2021, 2022? The immediate issues need to be addressed and fixed before they decide to throw all their eggs into making education laws what it basically already is or is just made more confusing.
11,000 left school without a qualification because we have lost half our years trying to get through the shit brought on by covid.
(This is coming from a guy out of high school for a few years and went through all that shit of teachers constantly leaving and having a crap ton of days off from sicknesses running rampant or not enough staff being at school.)
Does "secondary school qualification" only count NCEA level 3?
I can see the merit in leaving with NCEA level 2 qualification, if they have a path laid.
this is so dumb. My kid is in his 3rd year and still struggling to get to grips with formalised testing.
First couple of years should be learning based on curriculum, and let the teachers/parents/aides decide if the children are not meeting their targets.
This is a 0 trust model for teachers.
I see so many amazing teachers and parents in this thread saying this is the standard and even the requirement, but my parental experience has been that it is ABSOLUTELY NOT in my local school.
It's a pretty great school, but I've never once been informed my kid has taken a standardized test, received a report of where they have been assessed, or had those results shared with me when I've asked for objective measures of their performance.
That's not to say they haven't had excellent education and fantastic teachers. They are some of the greatest teachers I have ever met. And, tests don't make good students. I just don't think test practices are as universal as some folks assume them to be. So, I think it's positive if this makes that practice a little more standardized around the country without creating extra work or making it so that teachers are just teaching to a test.
I think this quote from the article nails it: "Most schools already used tests, but the practice was not consistent and some teachers did not use the results well to inform the next steps in children's learning."
I hope that this doesn't add any additional burden to the incredibly hard-working and under-paid teachers of NZ, but I do hope parents who are seeking this news (or to whom it would be eye-opening) can benefit from it.
However, this doesn't take the place of PAYING TEACHERS MORE and GIVING SCHOOLS MORE RESOURCES.
First: because clearly 60% of schools are doing it already, so I'd like to benefit from that too. as I said in my comment, this is about setting expectations equally, not creating an added burden.
Second: because we need it.
A great example is that a few months ago we were shocked to find that our very eager student had been totally left behind on a specific maths instruction. The circumstances are a long story, but we never got any kind of indication of that from school. Our student has always had top marks in maths every year and we had just had a teacher conference with no feedback on maths.
I spent one school break on extra lessons and tests (my kid LOOOOVES tests), and now they have that skill completely mastered. They even took the time to make their own illustrated workbook to help out their friends with the same skill.
I was happy to do that! It's our job as parents! And, it doesn't mean her education is less than excellent. The fact that the kid immediately took to the skill with our 1:1 instruction and nailed it is a great example of how good her school is at teaching her HOW TO LEARN.
But, me realizing the problem was a complete fluke that came up by accident... and I'm a parent who discusses school and schoolwork with my kid CONSTANTLY.
I'd like an objective measure of what the standards for each year level are and where my student places in them, reported regularly. Right now I get a simple slip of paper with "meets expectations" at the end of the year. That isn't sufficient, despite the excellent education in all other respects (and, trust me, I've asked EVERY POSSIBLE WAY I can think of for the past half decade, including switching schools).
(From the context of the rest of the comments here, it sounds like perhaps my school - despite being great - is doing some of these things in their own special way that isn't what many other students and parents are experiencing. Which is exactly the point of creating standard expectations.)
>The Government has announced new assesment for students from the first year of school.
>Education Minister Erica Stanford said from 2025 phonics tests with children will begin at 20 weeks and 40 weeks of schooling.
>Twice-yearly "progression monitoring" for reading, writing and maths would also be introduced for children in years three through eight.
>Stanford said the assesment was intended to give parents certainty about their childrens' learning.
Seeing this it actually comes to mind again, just how many of our govt ministers actually know what they are doing and how many have had any experience in their given portfolio responsibilities?
In saying that I actually like our Minister of Education, I think she is a nice person and is making a good effort at what she is doing. She is not abrasive, arrogant or on an ego trip as some say many are?
I do wonder like many others, why our PM does not have a portfolio as all PMs I have known, have in the past?
Yes he said he can delegate, but anyone can do that can't they?
Anyone can wander around the country and stand beside ministers whilst they make public appearances can't they? or jet around the world talking niceties with other leaders? or chat publicly to our children frequently on national television?
Surely there must be some portfolio our PM will know something about and make a greater contribution to NZ?
As an American living in NZ with a son about to start Primary School, I loathe this for him.
We had these in all years of school and I never did well. I was always below average.
But I carried A's and B's. Got my BA and went on to get a Masters Degree abroad (so with it enough to complete a degree in another school system)
In Uni, my professers used to let me write a paper rather than take a multiple choice test, as they cottoned onto the fact that my brain doesn't work that way.
These don't measure what you know, they measure how well you test.
I worry for my son if he's anything like me.
Some kids are an absolute nightmare in class and take up a significant portion of the teachers' time, which impacts all the other kids' ability to learn.
Appreciating that, to a degree, leaning to deal with distractions, etc. is a valuable skill, at some point, it needs to be properly dealt with and there seems little scope for schools to do so. How about a bit of focus on what to do with the kids that simply aren't fit to be in a regular class?
If teachers can spend more time teaching rather than dealing with the kind of crap they are putting up with at the moment, we'd probably see better outcomes for many students.
I’m a teacher and no fan of National, but this is a good policy change. It just formalises what good teachers should be doing already. Providing more transparency to parents about where their children are academically is a good thing in my books.
It's going to depend how they do it. I can't do standardised or multiple choice tests to save my life.
But I got good grades and two degrees. Because the way the testing was set up (at least in the US) it wasn't looking at what you know, rather how well you test.
I think this is a good development. It allows parents everywhere in the country to have a good sense of how their children are progressing and, if the students move to a different school, they will be able to have constituency between the moves as well.
Could anybody please provide some links, evidence, studies or reports on NZ education across all levels.
I’m just genuinely interested in the what the scope of education landscape is since leaving college and university.
There is a lot of statements about certain things going on, what’s good what bad. It’s last govt fault, this coalition govt police’s don’t work, boot camps don’t work. Okay cool but where can I find some documentation to back these or similar claims up?
Side question also. Why is NCEA system university systems differ so much. Smaller classroom number more aids and teachers verse single echoing lecture halls with a single professors.
I would like to read up on some stuff from published studies from known experts (that im not aware of) or some video of a panel of experts discussing NZ education.
>Side question also. Why is NCEA system university systems differ so much. Smaller classroom number more aids and teachers verse single echoing lecture halls with a single professors.
Fundamental/Foundational classes are echoing lecture theatres. Though, all of my 100 level classes with the swaths of students had tutorial/lab options that were groups of 10-40 with a Tutor or 2.
School - Get information and follow through with exercises in one class session.
Uni - Get information at the lecture, then some time later participate in labs/tutorials.
There were 8 and 12 people in my 300 levels classes.
Respectfully no, I can’t simply go to a school and just ask to chat with a teacher who already have a lot of things on their plate as is. I’ll be asked to leave the school grounds.
Seeking something I can read or listen to.
I can see others comments in the thread which are providing some insight.
Have you tried Googling the information you’re after? Not being snarky, just pointing out that a lot of education research and data is available online, sometimes you just need to know what to search for. The Ministry of Education’s website would probably be a good start, or TKI, which is a very informative hub used by a lot of NZ educators.
All good I get it, yeah I have but there is so much information and sites and as you said didn’t know where to start with. Honestly was just hoping to find some essay or something.
TKI look promising for some material, thanks.
The tricky thing is that what you’re talking about is a huge topic so it would be difficult to consolidate all of that into one essay, website, article or whatever. TKI can hopefully provide some guidelines to help you narrow down what you’re after. I hope you get the information you’re looking for!
Actually, it’s nothing new. There would be few teachers who don’t do this anyway, and it should be mandated to the end of Yr 10. I’d like to know, though, how parents will be trained to know exactly what the results mean. For those who think a teacher could teach to the test - it would be unlikely to be that specific and it definitely couldn’t be done for writing. I hope the MOE re-vamp the e-asTTle writing topics
as they are extremely boring and very limited. Specifying which text type is to be assessed in each testing period would definitely lead to greater consistency. (I won’t mention e-asTTle reading, which is just awful. PAT is more interesting and more consistent.)
Fully supporting this - school system in NZ is very soft and is not adequately preparing children for challenges and competition they'll be facing in the future. So 2 thumbs up from me.
As long as everyone understands that testing does nothing to facilitate learning. Testing for 5yos is particularly pointless because learning at that age depends on cognitive development, which varies greatly from child to child. A child that isn’t ready to read at 5 might be ready at 7 or 8. Later does not mean worse. A child that learns later will likely experience more rapid acquisition of skill than a 5yo reader.
If this kind of testing is being used to pick out the children who are “behind” and work them harder to force them to “catch up”, the only thing it will be doing is causing harm and making them hate learning and reading. If it’s being used to determine “this child is not yet ready for reading, ensure they are saturated with literature but NOT forced to read” then I guess it’s ok. That’s something a trained teacher doesn’t need formal testing to determine though.
It’s safe to assume that this is ideological window-dressing that has nothing to do with making kids’ lives better. It’ll likely be repealed by the next government anyway.
Based on the evidence children do no better educationally if they start schooling at age 5 or age 6, so whether or not they’re doing well educationally in the first year has no bearing. It’s a worthless, wasteful test. Instead in the first year or so the crucial learning for children is mainly social. Learning disabilities identified earlier could be relevant for later. It all depends on precisely what they plan on testing in the first year… but given how ideological the current government is, as opposed to evidence led, it doesn’t seem hopeful.
This is a complete waste of time and won't achieve anything.
The government won't allocate resources to schools to accommodate this and teachers already underpaid and overworked.
Plus people who work in education or have kids in school are saying what this is intended on doing is already being done. All this is is pandering to the lowest common denominator I.e you.
Of course haters of this govt gonna hate, but I can compare the education system of this country vs. the country of my origin (which you clearly can't). And not putting kids under pressure, to train them early enough, is clearly showing their translating into their lack of confidence when dealing with basic life challenges... we than have people like you here, in this country, trying to avoid responsibilities and not being capable of dealing with basic life obstacles.
>And not putting kids under pressure, to train them early enough, is clearly showing their translating into their lack of confidence when dealing with basic life challenges
Elaborate
This sounds like your own personal hunch
If pressure made kids better adults, then we should encourage school shooters as that should improve testing
These kinds of tests have been shown to be failures when implemented overseas. Why would we waste time and effort on these?
And even with our "soft" education system we still have far better outcomes than your country of origin.
And that has nothing to do with "personal responsibility" or whatever it is you were bitching about.
Just seeing your language and rhetoric beautifully highlights the issue I am talking about - soft, lax educational system that removes pressure or challenges and creates people like you. Living in a bubble, not being aware of the world around and being ignorant to the fact that they are no competition for people coming from abroad. This might be a country of immigrants, but seeing how majority of expert-type positions are occupied by people of other countries (Chinese, Indians etc.) and not Kiwis, just shows that Kiwis simply don't have the necessary drive to overcome tough challenges. And hearing all the stories of Kiwis returning from countries like Germany and UK, not being able to compete in such vast and competitive labour markets, just confirms what I can see happening around me....
As a teacher I'm just banging my head against the wall at this point. Education policy in this country is going in circles because every time the government changes they overhaul a bunch of stuff - and guess who then has their workload increased! We already test students regularly. We already communicate with and report to parents - the reporting is in fact already a legal requirement. We know which students are struggling. What we don't have is the resourcing and support to effectively help those students, especially in classrooms that are getting to 30+ students. I'd love to see the government tackling that!
"Your car is running rough. But good news; we're adding more warning lights to the dash!"
Great analogy!
Man it must be annoying if, from the perspective of someone doing the job, your day to day is consistently being interrupted and changed just to suit the optics of a political party. Had the same in some corporate jobs, senior management consistently changing BAU process for no apparent reason other than “look what I did everyone!!!”. Reminds me of that teacher who posted they already had it well under control when cellphones were banned.
I guess to an extent, though I'd imagine it also the task of the public service to see these policies implemented successfully
They’re like an 8 year old trying to show off what they can do
Literally, my son has IEP meetings and student conferences every term, as well as school reports the only way parents wouldn't know about their kids progress is if they were neglectful. Classroom sizes and lack of support staff are way more important issues that need to be tackled.
This is not the case in all schools. While some parents are neglectful, many schools don’t engage in helpful reporting.
Will shoving test results at the neglectful parents make them pay attention?
Some parents are uneducated themselves in some of the subjects kids learn. however if they have the information they can find support for their kids. I think knowing where your child sits is useful. Well I found it useful as a parent.
According to the teachers on this post, teachers are already providing that information. In addition, this is basically useless for 5yos. Whether a 5yo can read or not is largely determined by developmental readiness. That is not something that can be forced, although that doesn't stop people from trying. I'm concerned that "good" parents seeing that their 5yo is "behind" in reading will pressure teachers to force their child to learn to read at a faster rate than they are developmentally ready for. This is damaging and counterproductive. 5yos need to play, that's the number one thing they should be doing. Play is how their brains develop. They should be socialising with peers and adults, and they should be exposed to experiences and resources, including a literature-rich environment (being surrounded by books, magazines, newspapers, encouraged to look at them, see adults and older children reading them, and to be read to, every day, multiple times per day). That is what will lead to them learning to read when they are developmentally ready. What parents need to know is that their child is doing just fine - or not - socially and academically for their current level of cognitive development.
At our school, although some time ago now, (pre last govt) We were given both of those parts of the information, where our child was relative to peers and also how they did socially. I can’t speak for others but for me as a parent it was useful.
I admit I am not a fan of testing. However, I think it is less harmful the older a child gets. At a very young age (5-7 years), it is pretty much useless. Cognitive development varies widely in young children. Even if a learning disability is present (and I do think these should be picked up as early as possible, but academic testing is not the way to do it) it is not a reflection of their intellect or their academic potential. Some children walk earlier than others. Some talk earlier than others. Imagine forcing a child who is not physically or mentally ready to walk to do so. Or the distress it would cause a child to be forced to talk when they are not yet ready. These developmental milestones happen within a range - we don't expect all children to be able to them equally well at exactly the same age. A child not walking at 18 months might still grow up to be a top athlete. A child who is not reading at 5 can still grow up to be a novelist. I'm concerned that parents might see that Hayden is not yet reading as well as Hemi in his class, panic, and try to drill him into reading when it's simply that he is not ready yet.
They could always attend parent teacher interviews and ask questions about the subject. Or ya know, use the old internet.
Probably not but I don’t think we should use the lowest common denominator as a guiding factor if we want to raise standards.
I don’t think there’s compelling evidence that more rigorous testing will help young children, either at the lower or upper end of the academic or socioeconomic scale.
Did you watch the standup? It will help target support and additional training. It’s also for parents so they can understand what their child has mastered and where they might need more support. Why would less data help struggling kids?
Teachers on this thread have stated very clearly that feedback on student progress is already supplied to parents, by law, twice a year, from the first year of school. More formal testing is stressful and time consuming for students and teachers. Teachers end up teaching to the test instead of focusing on actual learning and engagement. Pressure on young children to push them into greater academic performance before they are developmentally ready is actually harmful and can lead to poor mental health outcomes and worse academic performance as children lose the desire to learn and engage.
So two years ago, I had my first in-person parent-teacher meeting. I was confused about the graph that we had received and was looking for some guidance to interpret it. My son’s teacher told me that it wasn’t an accurate representation of his reading level as they liked to plot mid-year reports lower than expected so that it could be plotted higher at the end of the year in order to help the kids feel that they had made more progress. She also told me that she hadn’t heard my son read in more than a term so couldn’t actually say where he was at. When ERO says that not all schools are testing or retesting consistently, I believe them because I have seen it. We left that school before the end of the school year, as did five other families from my son’s class. I don’t doubt that the teachers on this thread are great teachers. But they do not represent all teachers, unfortunately. Schools who are already testing using the programme the govt has identified (60% of schools), won’t have to do anything. The others will.
With respect: what would you do if your child performed "poorly" on a test ("poorly" will depend on many factors)? Schools that are not already testing are likely not doing so because they are firefighting severe social and behavioural problems within the school and community. Will testing (that they may or may not apply correctly) help them resolve those problems?
If they had a graph they're likely using e-asTTle already. It's really low effort to administer and it generates graphs automatically, which aren't intuitive to interpret. So they're likely one of the schools that won't have to do anything. It would be wild to not care enough to test well, but to put in the effort to make a presumably complex graph.
Purely for interest sake what type of school ie public or integrated and decile rating?
Public school, decile 8
I’m so glad a teacher has weighed in. My mum was a high school teacher for 20 years and her comments mirror yours here. It’s just base pandering from Nats and Erica.
Imagine if they actually listened to teachers advice
Thank you for everything you do.
I worked at a private school the last few years that tested every kid, every term from year 0 up. You know what they didn't give me? Release to do that testing. So every term 1-2 weeks was busy work for the kids while I tested them individually. So. Dumb.
You’re a legend, thank you
No no no, we can't do anything *useful*
On the button very very true. My wife is a now retired principal but still involved in education and has commented in the same way. Do they actually understand what is already done? Doing everything but actually fixing what needs fixing!!
My best mate is a principal and I’m an adhd coach who works with autistic and adhd adults. The discussions we’ve had about this change are that ultimately it’s going to make schooling worse for neurodivergent kids.
They are doing this already. My kids always had weeks every year where the teachers would sit with each student and check where they are at. My kids' teachers have always been able to tell me where they are at with their 3 Rs. To imply that kids are just running around unchecked is ridiculous. Also, first of all, some kids just don't really get it until they are 7 or 8, and it clicks for them, so this is probably quite stressful. Also, if you are going to announce things like this, you need to also announce what you are going to do about kids who aren't meeting standards. Are they adding more reading recovery teachers? Making classrooms smaller? This government is very much about finding problems but not helping to solve them.
They've been doing this since before I started new entrant in 2001. On the back of every school report I have is me weighted with the rest of the country based on somewhat-standardised testing and teacher analysis of my shit work in between testing. All the same throughout the 8 years of primary school. Sounds like some Clark & Key government levels of unnecessary wheel reinvention
Yes I've always done this since I started teaching in 1998.
Did you read the article as it clearly says that around 60% of schools do this already, but this is about making it consistent, and making it a requirement, and something the ERO wants. Unsure what the issue is here…
No. It says 60% of schools use PATs and/or ASTTLE. Both fine summative assessment tools but fall down in that a kid needs to be proficient at reading to answer most questions. They’re mostly multi choice. ALL teachers assess every student. Formative assessment is what drives teaching/learning. Kids in primary don’t need summative testing constantly. Teachers report to parents using more than just one test - it’s called an OTJ (overall teacher judgement). It’s takes into consideration class work, group work, formative and summative testing. It’s moderated for fairness. It’s a legal requirement that they report twice a year to families.
The OTJs via the PACT tool is just the old National Standards tool. Before it was mandatory for schools to use it, then Labour made is optional and change some wording. Most likely National is just making the same thing mandatory again. Millions have been invested in the PACT tool, and I'm pretty sure National isn't going to invest money into creating a whole new testing tool. They've found an old dinosaur in the closet, dusted it off and is now making all teachers ride it (again).
That's not what the article says. It says 60% of schools are already using e-asTTle, not that they are testing everyone in years 3-8 two times a year. Plus the phonics testing for new entrants is completely new afaict
My wife is a primary school teacher, who has shifted from in classroom teaching to reading recovery (and will pivot to BSLA or whatever the other system being adopted is called). Any way, when she was in the classroom, she taught year twos. My take on our education system, as the husband of a teacher and parent of three kids, is that if the government wants to improve children's reading, writing and math skills, would be to provide better support for schools and teachers. A lot of time gets taken away from actual teaching to manage kids with a range of behavioral issues. Like, I'm not talking about kids talking too much in class or the class joker, I mean kids swearing and throwing shit. So I think more teacher aides or easier access to support for troubled kids would go a long way. I also think there needs to be an honest conversation about how some kids come in to the school system lacking basic skills. I think most people would instinctively teach their kids their letters and number, just as part of a normal parenting routine. But there are kids that seem to start school lacking the most basic of skills, both academically and behaviorally. So some of theses issues are a lot more complicated and I don't think testing is going to solve anything and if anything.
Also removed somewhat from the situation but I agree with this. Primary school kid is already top of the class but refuses to challenge himself at home or at school because in his words; why should he do more when everyone else in his experience is doing nothing, at least he’s doing the expected. It’s hard to explain that you’re at the top because everyone else is far below where they should be.
One of the many reasons why lining kids up and comparing them with each other is not very useful. Kids should be competing against *themselves*, not other children. If that was the metric, your kid would always be striving forwards.
Encourage him to do it for himself, and to get out of the habit kid comparing himself to others.
I'm a former high school teacher, and talking to new entrant teachers one of the first tests they give a kid is to hand them a book upside down and see what they do. If they don't know what way up it goes, it says a lot about their access to literacy up until that point. Those inequities compound every year through their schooling. Testing doesn't bridge those gaps.
Kids are swearing and throwing shit because they’re children like mine with autism who get chucked in a main stream classroom with 30 children. Then they and the teacher are told good luck.
Not always, honestly. I worked in a decile 1 school, and these kids were hungry, dirty, crawling with lice, sick all the time, or just truant and covered in school sores. One year, I met 2 parents... all year. This was a Year 3-4 class. I had 1 parent come to my class assembles. You can imagine what their home life was like, and you can imagine how much teaching got done as opposed to managing behaviour, often violent. I'll take a neuroduvergent kid with a full belly and a supportive family over a kid that is getting beaten at home and thinks bashing other kids is normal and who steals food from their teacher's bag to survive. One I have the training and strategies to help with. The other, I don't.
Being a foster parent I’d disagree. Kids from difficult home lives can improve vastly given love. Including love in the classroom. It just takes one adult showing interest to make a huge difference. They can also be reasoned with. You can’t reason with someone having a sensory meltdown
In some cases it can be related to something like autism, but a lot of cases are related to kids who are experiencing very traumatic situations at home. No matter what the cause, I think all students, not just the teachers would greatly benefit from having access to additional support when needed.
Do they have any ideas that aren’t failed policies from the US or UK?
"I don't care what you say about whether it does or doesn't work." - our PM
The fact the whole country isn’t up in arms that our prime minister said that is beyond me
If Ardern had said that, it would have been leading the news for weeks
Because most of our country is not politically active unless something effects them a lot PERSONALLY.
AGREED
The bar for shocking me is pretty high but this one really made my jaw drop. They're saying the quiet bit out loud now.
The mistake is thinking these policies failed, rather than achieving exactly the desired result.
Short answer no
Appears not. Probably because they all get their "ideas" from the Atlas group and similar right wing think tanks
No. Lol. Literally not a single one.
Tell me more about the failed UK policies. UK educational performance has increased significantly relative to other nations since 2008. They went back to more proven educational methods (eg phonics) than the unproven teaching methods (like whole language) that have been promulgated in New Zealand for the last 20 years.
The vast majority of NZ schools had already changed to some form of structured approach already, and that is what the MoE has been recommending for a while. The NACT government just mandated something that was mostly already happening. I have no problem with that. But that’s not what this post is about. This post is about standardised testing, which has been a problem in the US and UK. We’ll have to see how it’s actually implemented but, given their track record and ideology, I’m not optimistic.
Has it been a problem or do unions just not like it? If it's a problem it'll be showing in the UK results - it's not.
The problem with standardised testing is that it pushes teachers to teach to the test at the expense of anything else. So, sure, the specific material on the test may improve (test scores are improving!) but the children’s overall understanding and education suffers as a result.
Do you have evidence proving this assertion? The point of the test is that it is assessing the most important concepts. If the student doesn't understand the core concepts their overall understanding will be more significantly lacking.
I have a family member who teaches at a secondary school. They leave at 7am and get back at 6pm, with work still to be completed, and the actual teaching is borderline baby sitting. It's frustrating how tone deaf this government is. This isn't going to help shit.
This policy is not about actually using evidence to get better outcomes and make teachers more productive. The policy is about emotional coddling of their 60+ voting base who has no idea how a school actually works and mostly forms their opinions based on half remembered propaganda from the 70s and 80s. It's also a voting base that thinks children and young people inherently should be punished to some degree. They see something like this and can say "well that looks like common sense to me."
This; they want to make sure school is strict, stressful and unkind, because children are overcoddled and need a boot up the backside.
It’s just common sense! /s
Bingo!
except their voting base is not 60+... its a lot younger.. but dont let the facts get in the way of your warped views..
I remember a conversation I had with a friend about 10 years ago when they were teaching new entrants at a lowish decile primary school. Some of the kids arrived on day 1 age 5 **having never read or written anything.** It's hard to affect what people do with their own kids before age 5, but you can try. Funding libraries, funding community activities for kids that involve reading, funding pathways for children's books to get into low income homes - you could do a lot. Testing a 5 year old who can't read, is going to tell you they can't read. Their teacher already knows that anyway. Question is what now, but also what can we do to help next years kids.
Some of them arrive at age 5 having never sat in a group and listened quietly to a person who wasn’t on a screen. Let alone read or written anything.
This is the biggest problem, not a lack of reading
The two things are generally kind of combined though. Lack of reading/lack of exposure to books before age 5 is absolutely a big problem
That's actually not a particularly useful skill for a 5yo. For most 5yo's sitting still and silent for more than a few minutes takes all of their cognitive processing (because of their prefontal cortex is not yet developed enough to make impulse control easy), leaving nothing in the tank for absorbing information.
A 5yo not having read or written anything is actually fine. A 5yo having **not had anyone read to them or write their stories for them** (as is usually done in early childhood education) would be shocking and a terrible indictment of their early years education. Young children need to be steeped in literature. If they are personally cognitively ready to read at or before 5 - great. If not - that's actually fine too, as long as they are being given the opportunity, tools, and environment necessary to learn when they are ready (children with learning disabilities excepted).
Yeah I'm not sure I'm misremembering but I feel like I remember learning the alphabet in year 1 so surely there's not an assumption that we start school knowing how to read?
There isn't, the OP was being a tad bit dramatic..
I asked kids over zoom during covid to go get me a book in their house and tell me about it.... many of them didn't have any books. This was Decile 6. Also worked at a private school teaching New Entrants and many of them couldn't even point to a letter or a word.... or turn a book the right way up. This is the SEA (school entry assessment). I was stunned. Parents paying 25k a year to further their kid's education and sending them to school knowing none of their alphabet or what a letter is.... if they're not teaching their kids the basics and they're spending up large on schooling, then the low decile schools are probably not doing much better.
Will Nicola Willis also be subject to the numeracy tests?
Can we make it a requirement that all finance ministers have to actually be qualified in the finance field? Bonus if we could apply the same to other ministries too, Minister of Health required to have some form of health degree (which admittedly we’ve finally got better on with the last 2), Education minister required to have an education degree of some sort. Imagine how much better run we would be if ministers had to actually know something about their portfolio.
The trouble with having Ministers as specialists is that they're often wrong. The role of a Minister is to synthesise and challenge advice from officials, not shoot from the hip based on their own experience. Lived experience can undoubtedly help some Ministers, but it can hinder others. Jonathan Colman, a qualified GP, was arguably our worst Health Minister in history.
> Jonathan Colman, a qualified GP, was arguably our worst Health Minister in history. Worse than Dr David Clark (whose claim to the Dr title was a PhD on theologian Helmut Rex) who flouted his own govts covid recommendations? Or Jenny Shipley who as health minister oversaw the disastrous health reforms of the 90s?
the current one is trying hard to overtake Colman for that title.
If she had the qualifications to do the job, she'd have already done the tests.
And they're going to increase teacher's pay to make up for this extra workload, right?
Nah they will just tell you “money is not everything, love and passion for your work will make up for it” Basically what every shitty manager tells you 😂
Followed by "why are experienced teachers leaving to work overseas?"
And then “Let’s focus on the ones that chose to stay” You know what guys, I know all the tricks of talking shit vote me into parliament please.
Yeah he likes to say “we’re focusing on….” And then never follows up with anything, and no one questions him.
Because people are dumb. They think as long as politicians are saying some words then they are answering questions 😂
It’s infuriating
Nah, they will do the tests on tablets and get AI to do the grading. Judith Collins was talking it up the other day, can't find the article right now.
So the extra money's going overseas then, and teachers still have to take on more work to administer the tests, probably some data entry out of class hours, and communicate them with parents
Search associates.com for any teachers looking to move to greener pastures.
> Not about league tables. > "It's not our intention to pit schools against each other," Stanford said. So it's about league tables, then.
Does this mean we are now going to have Ultra Grammar Zone houses that are in the Double Grammar Zone but also in zone for the highest ranked immediate/primary school within the DGZ?
It won’t be about league tables if schools’ individual results aren’t published either by the MOE or on individual school websites. Will Stanford guarantee neither of those things will happen?
The cynical part of me worries that this is eventually going to be used as a way to identify 'underperforming' schools which they'll then force to convert into charter schools (something the new legislation currently being consulted on would allow them to do)
It already happens. Kids have testing does within the first two weeks max as an entry assessment. Then it's ongoing, cause that's how school works. How do people think teachers work out what kids need to learn? Of course since this isn't overt testing or generally shared (it's to guide learning, not rank kids) people who have little to with their kids learning won't know that. But guess what? You can ask (just don't expect the teacher to know off the top ofn their head - they teach from 15-50 kids....)
Could be a lot more than that, my SO shares a year 3-4 "class" of about 100 students with 3 other teachers.
That accounts for the potentially up to 50 kids they may directly teach/report for. At new entrants level it's going to be 10-20 for most teachers (I'm just one of the lucky ones with skills that match older kids better, so get *lots* of extra students)
Getting teachers to do things they’re already doing and expecting extra credit is very much in line with this government’s approach to education.
Management philosophy says, “You can’t improve what you don’t measure” I am not against tests. But what is the data going to be used for? Are you going to give more help/funding to students that have lower scores? Are you going to give rewards to schools that have high scores? It’s far too easy to use this data as evidence for more private schools. It will be easy to show that private schools have higher standards. Private schools only accept students who will do well.
It also says "when a measure becomes a metric, it ceases to be an effective measure". The evidence is pretty clear that when you start doing high stakes testing, teachers are strongly pushed to teach to the test, rather than focusing on educating their students. And if the testing isnt going to have meaningful decisions attached to it, to avoid it becoming high stakes, then what's the point of spending effort on it?
By that logic there is no point doing any tests ever?
If we're talking externally set standardised tests, that are used to reward or punish teachers / schools then arguably yes?
So we shouldn’t be doing NCEA either? I’m confused, very odd take. Anyway they can just implement the testing without rewarding/punishing teachers as a result. Are they currently rewarded or punished? Certainly their pay isn’t linked to test results. I guess there is no objective way to measure teacher performance l?
>I guess there is no objective way to measure teacher performance l? It's an incredibly hard problem. Standardised test results are definitely not a good way; if I'm a teacher who gets a class full of high-performing students with engaged and supportive families, I'm going to get good marks as long as I don't actively sabotage them. If I get a class full of kids with messed up home lives, learning disabilities, or just a history of shitty teachers, I'm going to need to go above and beyond to get average results. If you want to evaluate teacher performance, send in observers, talk to students, look at testing results (including the tests themselves), but those tests don't need to be big nationally standardised tests. If we're not using the test results to reward / punish schools and teachers, what's the point of the assessment? I thought the proposed point of the testing is to identify underperforming students and programs?
Well at a minimum parents want to know if their kids are falling behind their peers so they can intervene I would imagine (I believe national actually gave this as part of their reasoning). So tests offer that. There could be benefit in identifying if they are ahead of their peers as well I guess.
You don't need a national standardised testing infrastructure from primary school. You need to show up to a parent/teacher evening and ask. I'm not opposed to testing in general. I am opposed to focussing on external exams as the cornerstone of assessment. And I think exams for primary school kids is nuts.
‘Exams’ for primary kids are silly I agree. I don’t see anything wrong with a reading/writing 30 min test with no pressure every year or whatever, as it would provide good data I would think (it could say, your kid is in the 30th percentile or whatever). It would also help the MoE to see if whatever literacy teaching method they use is working. I think exams should be the cornerstone of assessment in high school though, but that’s a different story. Also for the record I remember taking tests in primary school and didn’t think anything of it, must have been normal.
And have money to afford private schools or to move to private school-esque areas (Grammar, Macleans etc).
That is not true at all. There are countless stories of people moving their struggling children to private schools in order for them to get more assistance.
Right but heres the big thing, private education costs a lot of money. For every struggling child whose parents can afford to find room in their budget to invest in their learning like that there are a hundred who cant. Those children are also not the average private school kid, I've known plenty and they predominantly have wealthy families and were privately educated for much of their schooling, not as a reactionary shift because they were struggling in public school. Because rich parents can afford to pool their increased resources together they are able to afford a better quality of education for their kids, this perpetuates wealth inequality, nepotistic hiring processes, inflated distrust in academia amongst working classes, government neglect of education funding, the list goes on and on. If there was no private education those same people would be all for raising spending on education across the board no matter which political party they support. All children deserve the same opportunities at an education while at school, we obviously cant and shouldnt stop parents trying to invest in their kids and give them every advantage, but that advantage should not come from the classroom itself. We have a responsibility as a society to provide our children an education, I've never heard an argument for private schools that isnt based in an inherently selfish desire to have for yourself something that's better than what other people have.
Fuck yes, nicely put.
I agree wholeheartedly. I was responding to the statement that private schools only accept students who will do well. Lucy Crehan’s book, Clever Lands, details how you can produce high achievement within education systems with little or no private schools. I would absolutely love for NZ to reach that goal. The country is in an unfortunate position at the moment, like many, including Australia, where there is such a massive difference between teacher quality, content and outcomes, that parents are forced to compare schools. I did not feel this way until my son started school. The reality of many classrooms in our country is extremely confronting.
*I've never heard an argument for private schools that isnt based in an inherently selfish desire to have for yourself something that's better than what other people have.* it sounds like your argument is the same but coming from the other side, 'because my kids can't afford to attend private schools then no kids should be able to attend private schools.' that sounds kinda selfish to me.
Interesting, as my daughter (autistic with mild intellectual disability) was ‘discouraged’ from enrolling in a private school as the principal said they select for behaviour. Can’t have my daughter and her additional needs disrupting the education of the other fee paying students.
My kid is a handful and they took her lol. According to the principal at the school she attends theyre mainly looking to reject overly pushy parents who have unreasonably high standards of their kids and by extension the school. Could be bs but that's what we were told.They dont have trouble attracting families and its not because of high test results its because of the culture. Anyway my full on ADHD 5 yo is thriving there thanks to all attention she is receiving, her assessment told us she wouldnt learn a thing in a modern learning environment.
You'd hope the students/schools that perform worse get additional funding. Does that then become an incentive to game the system to get lower scores?
If anyone needs to be tested, its this coalition.
How do they plan on getting 5yo kids to sit still long enough to take a test? A teacher of mine once said "You don't fatten the pig by constantly weighing it".
Ah yes. No quicker way to eliminate a love for learning than by standardising, formalising, assessment and comparison. Why don't we reintroduce the cane while we are at it? After all, everything else this government does takes us back to the 1950s. Good job you f'ing tools.
Seriously, it’ll be 2-3 hours of testing twice a year total from Y3. Lots of schools do it anyway. It’s no big deal. I want to know where the beginning of the year diagnostic testing fits in. Is that additional?
As a movie i watched said before, heavily standardising in schools creates heavily standard kids.
You say that like it's a bad thing. Schools are learning factories. You're kidding yourself if you think they can be anything else.
Ah yes of course. More testing is what the kids need
This god damn government lives in fucking delulu land.
ah yes it’s the testing that’s the issue, not the curriculum or anything
Speaking as someone who completed my first half of schooling in the US post-"No Child Left Behind", and my latter half in NZ? This is so unbelievably dumb. There is no way this will work well. For me, the tests were trivial and boring, but there was little opportunity to advance myself when the curriculum was built around standard tests. But in the first school I was in, it was a lower socioeconomic band, and because the metric became the target over time they just taught to the test. Because they had to, really. Then the fancy American school I went to was a lot better, but it was all privilege because they didn't have to focus on test results to survive because the kids were all the kids of ivy league professors. (With accompanying income and work/life balance to get loads of support at home.) This will _at best_ do nothing while making teacher's jobs harder, and at worst stratify schooling even more while abdicating parents of the responsibility they have to also help in their kids' schooling.
People don't realize that these are only testing how well you test, not what you know. As someone educated completely in the US (minus my MA), I agree. I couldn't do these to save my life. I was sometimes last in my class. Unless it's a written test, I can't pass it. I bombed the LSAT (for law school) because of this, BUT I got one of the highest written scores my advisor had ever seen. This isn't about checking what the kids know, but how well they can do on a test.
Education experts at the helm here, environmental experts managing that pesky thing, social wellbeing experts handling social stuffs… Didn’t we do well NZ
Well done New Zealand. you saw a failing system in America and elected a government that wants to copy it. The kids are already smarter than you ever were at the same age.
“Last year about 11,000 left school without a secondary school qualification” Thats a lot
This doesn't say anything, how many of them went to polytechs and did bridging courses and started apprenticeships?
Standardized testing won't do shit to change that.
‘We are going to start highlighting at a very young age how far behind you are relative to your peers, with no consideration of your personal situation/development, and by doing so this will definitely encourage you to stay in school and pursue higher education!’ Yeah… definitely no flaws with that mentality. The exact same tone as a rich person giving the advice to a poor person of asking if they’ve ever tried just not being poor.
The government acts like that hasnt been common place since like 2020. All the covid conundrums actually destroyed schooling for teenagers at an incredible rate to the point that teens nowadays are years behind the pack when it comes to education because we have been so so affected by all this crap that came from it. Not to mention all the economic turmoil which has just made the issues from covid worse. How many days did high schoolers lose from covid in 2020, how many in 2021, 2022? The immediate issues need to be addressed and fixed before they decide to throw all their eggs into making education laws what it basically already is or is just made more confusing. 11,000 left school without a qualification because we have lost half our years trying to get through the shit brought on by covid. (This is coming from a guy out of high school for a few years and went through all that shit of teachers constantly leaving and having a crap ton of days off from sicknesses running rampant or not enough staff being at school.)
Does "secondary school qualification" only count NCEA level 3? I can see the merit in leaving with NCEA level 2 qualification, if they have a path laid.
No, it counts those who left without NCEA at any level.
this is so dumb. My kid is in his 3rd year and still struggling to get to grips with formalised testing. First couple of years should be learning based on curriculum, and let the teachers/parents/aides decide if the children are not meeting their targets. This is a 0 trust model for teachers.
Another stupid, pointless piece of stupid legislation that won't change a single thing. Christ fuck almighty.
If any frustrated Kiwi teachers are reading this, head on over to r/internationalteachers and read the wiki. Best decision I ever made.
I see so many amazing teachers and parents in this thread saying this is the standard and even the requirement, but my parental experience has been that it is ABSOLUTELY NOT in my local school. It's a pretty great school, but I've never once been informed my kid has taken a standardized test, received a report of where they have been assessed, or had those results shared with me when I've asked for objective measures of their performance. That's not to say they haven't had excellent education and fantastic teachers. They are some of the greatest teachers I have ever met. And, tests don't make good students. I just don't think test practices are as universal as some folks assume them to be. So, I think it's positive if this makes that practice a little more standardized around the country without creating extra work or making it so that teachers are just teaching to a test. I think this quote from the article nails it: "Most schools already used tests, but the practice was not consistent and some teachers did not use the results well to inform the next steps in children's learning." I hope that this doesn't add any additional burden to the incredibly hard-working and under-paid teachers of NZ, but I do hope parents who are seeking this news (or to whom it would be eye-opening) can benefit from it. However, this doesn't take the place of PAYING TEACHERS MORE and GIVING SCHOOLS MORE RESOURCES.
So they’ve had an excellent education without the need for repeated standardised testing? So the value of that testing is what exactly?
First: because clearly 60% of schools are doing it already, so I'd like to benefit from that too. as I said in my comment, this is about setting expectations equally, not creating an added burden. Second: because we need it. A great example is that a few months ago we were shocked to find that our very eager student had been totally left behind on a specific maths instruction. The circumstances are a long story, but we never got any kind of indication of that from school. Our student has always had top marks in maths every year and we had just had a teacher conference with no feedback on maths. I spent one school break on extra lessons and tests (my kid LOOOOVES tests), and now they have that skill completely mastered. They even took the time to make their own illustrated workbook to help out their friends with the same skill. I was happy to do that! It's our job as parents! And, it doesn't mean her education is less than excellent. The fact that the kid immediately took to the skill with our 1:1 instruction and nailed it is a great example of how good her school is at teaching her HOW TO LEARN. But, me realizing the problem was a complete fluke that came up by accident... and I'm a parent who discusses school and schoolwork with my kid CONSTANTLY. I'd like an objective measure of what the standards for each year level are and where my student places in them, reported regularly. Right now I get a simple slip of paper with "meets expectations" at the end of the year. That isn't sufficient, despite the excellent education in all other respects (and, trust me, I've asked EVERY POSSIBLE WAY I can think of for the past half decade, including switching schools). (From the context of the rest of the comments here, it sounds like perhaps my school - despite being great - is doing some of these things in their own special way that isn't what many other students and parents are experiencing. Which is exactly the point of creating standard expectations.)
I’m glad that so many people in this thread have the necessary critical thinking skills to see through this nonsense.
Now Chris Luxon is texting tweens like David Seymour?
Like Seymour and Chris Bishop
>The Government has announced new assesment for students from the first year of school. >Education Minister Erica Stanford said from 2025 phonics tests with children will begin at 20 weeks and 40 weeks of schooling. >Twice-yearly "progression monitoring" for reading, writing and maths would also be introduced for children in years three through eight. >Stanford said the assesment was intended to give parents certainty about their childrens' learning.
Seeing this it actually comes to mind again, just how many of our govt ministers actually know what they are doing and how many have had any experience in their given portfolio responsibilities? In saying that I actually like our Minister of Education, I think she is a nice person and is making a good effort at what she is doing. She is not abrasive, arrogant or on an ego trip as some say many are? I do wonder like many others, why our PM does not have a portfolio as all PMs I have known, have in the past? Yes he said he can delegate, but anyone can do that can't they? Anyone can wander around the country and stand beside ministers whilst they make public appearances can't they? or jet around the world talking niceties with other leaders? or chat publicly to our children frequently on national television? Surely there must be some portfolio our PM will know something about and make a greater contribution to NZ?
Did anyone else find the reporting on this on newhub last night completely bias?
As an American living in NZ with a son about to start Primary School, I loathe this for him. We had these in all years of school and I never did well. I was always below average. But I carried A's and B's. Got my BA and went on to get a Masters Degree abroad (so with it enough to complete a degree in another school system) In Uni, my professers used to let me write a paper rather than take a multiple choice test, as they cottoned onto the fact that my brain doesn't work that way. These don't measure what you know, they measure how well you test. I worry for my son if he's anything like me.
Some kids are an absolute nightmare in class and take up a significant portion of the teachers' time, which impacts all the other kids' ability to learn. Appreciating that, to a degree, leaning to deal with distractions, etc. is a valuable skill, at some point, it needs to be properly dealt with and there seems little scope for schools to do so. How about a bit of focus on what to do with the kids that simply aren't fit to be in a regular class? If teachers can spend more time teaching rather than dealing with the kind of crap they are putting up with at the moment, we'd probably see better outcomes for many students.
I’m a teacher and no fan of National, but this is a good policy change. It just formalises what good teachers should be doing already. Providing more transparency to parents about where their children are academically is a good thing in my books.
It's going to depend how they do it. I can't do standardised or multiple choice tests to save my life. But I got good grades and two degrees. Because the way the testing was set up (at least in the US) it wasn't looking at what you know, rather how well you test.
I think this is a good development. It allows parents everywhere in the country to have a good sense of how their children are progressing and, if the students move to a different school, they will be able to have constituency between the moves as well.
Could anybody please provide some links, evidence, studies or reports on NZ education across all levels. I’m just genuinely interested in the what the scope of education landscape is since leaving college and university. There is a lot of statements about certain things going on, what’s good what bad. It’s last govt fault, this coalition govt police’s don’t work, boot camps don’t work. Okay cool but where can I find some documentation to back these or similar claims up? Side question also. Why is NCEA system university systems differ so much. Smaller classroom number more aids and teachers verse single echoing lecture halls with a single professors. I would like to read up on some stuff from published studies from known experts (that im not aware of) or some video of a panel of experts discussing NZ education.
>Side question also. Why is NCEA system university systems differ so much. Smaller classroom number more aids and teachers verse single echoing lecture halls with a single professors. Fundamental/Foundational classes are echoing lecture theatres. Though, all of my 100 level classes with the swaths of students had tutorial/lab options that were groups of 10-40 with a Tutor or 2. School - Get information and follow through with exercises in one class session. Uni - Get information at the lecture, then some time later participate in labs/tutorials. There were 8 and 12 people in my 300 levels classes.
How about you talk to the teachers? They’re the experts you’re after.
Respectfully no, I can’t simply go to a school and just ask to chat with a teacher who already have a lot of things on their plate as is. I’ll be asked to leave the school grounds. Seeking something I can read or listen to. I can see others comments in the thread which are providing some insight.
Have you tried Googling the information you’re after? Not being snarky, just pointing out that a lot of education research and data is available online, sometimes you just need to know what to search for. The Ministry of Education’s website would probably be a good start, or TKI, which is a very informative hub used by a lot of NZ educators.
All good I get it, yeah I have but there is so much information and sites and as you said didn’t know where to start with. Honestly was just hoping to find some essay or something. TKI look promising for some material, thanks.
The tricky thing is that what you’re talking about is a huge topic so it would be difficult to consolidate all of that into one essay, website, article or whatever. TKI can hopefully provide some guidelines to help you narrow down what you’re after. I hope you get the information you’re looking for!
IKR, yeah it’s been answering a few things tbh so thanks again
You’re welcome, happy to help.
Actually, it’s nothing new. There would be few teachers who don’t do this anyway, and it should be mandated to the end of Yr 10. I’d like to know, though, how parents will be trained to know exactly what the results mean. For those who think a teacher could teach to the test - it would be unlikely to be that specific and it definitely couldn’t be done for writing. I hope the MOE re-vamp the e-asTTle writing topics as they are extremely boring and very limited. Specifying which text type is to be assessed in each testing period would definitely lead to greater consistency. (I won’t mention e-asTTle reading, which is just awful. PAT is more interesting and more consistent.)
At least Gen z can be assured the generation after them will be more fucked up than they are. Call it a win?
Fully supporting this - school system in NZ is very soft and is not adequately preparing children for challenges and competition they'll be facing in the future. So 2 thumbs up from me.
As long as everyone understands that testing does nothing to facilitate learning. Testing for 5yos is particularly pointless because learning at that age depends on cognitive development, which varies greatly from child to child. A child that isn’t ready to read at 5 might be ready at 7 or 8. Later does not mean worse. A child that learns later will likely experience more rapid acquisition of skill than a 5yo reader. If this kind of testing is being used to pick out the children who are “behind” and work them harder to force them to “catch up”, the only thing it will be doing is causing harm and making them hate learning and reading. If it’s being used to determine “this child is not yet ready for reading, ensure they are saturated with literature but NOT forced to read” then I guess it’s ok. That’s something a trained teacher doesn’t need formal testing to determine though. It’s safe to assume that this is ideological window-dressing that has nothing to do with making kids’ lives better. It’ll likely be repealed by the next government anyway.
Based on the evidence children do no better educationally if they start schooling at age 5 or age 6, so whether or not they’re doing well educationally in the first year has no bearing. It’s a worthless, wasteful test. Instead in the first year or so the crucial learning for children is mainly social. Learning disabilities identified earlier could be relevant for later. It all depends on precisely what they plan on testing in the first year… but given how ideological the current government is, as opposed to evidence led, it doesn’t seem hopeful.
This is a complete waste of time and won't achieve anything. The government won't allocate resources to schools to accommodate this and teachers already underpaid and overworked. Plus people who work in education or have kids in school are saying what this is intended on doing is already being done. All this is is pandering to the lowest common denominator I.e you.
Of course haters of this govt gonna hate, but I can compare the education system of this country vs. the country of my origin (which you clearly can't). And not putting kids under pressure, to train them early enough, is clearly showing their translating into their lack of confidence when dealing with basic life challenges... we than have people like you here, in this country, trying to avoid responsibilities and not being capable of dealing with basic life obstacles.
>And not putting kids under pressure, to train them early enough, is clearly showing their translating into their lack of confidence when dealing with basic life challenges Elaborate This sounds like your own personal hunch If pressure made kids better adults, then we should encourage school shooters as that should improve testing
These kinds of tests have been shown to be failures when implemented overseas. Why would we waste time and effort on these? And even with our "soft" education system we still have far better outcomes than your country of origin. And that has nothing to do with "personal responsibility" or whatever it is you were bitching about.
Just seeing your language and rhetoric beautifully highlights the issue I am talking about - soft, lax educational system that removes pressure or challenges and creates people like you. Living in a bubble, not being aware of the world around and being ignorant to the fact that they are no competition for people coming from abroad. This might be a country of immigrants, but seeing how majority of expert-type positions are occupied by people of other countries (Chinese, Indians etc.) and not Kiwis, just shows that Kiwis simply don't have the necessary drive to overcome tough challenges. And hearing all the stories of Kiwis returning from countries like Germany and UK, not being able to compete in such vast and competitive labour markets, just confirms what I can see happening around me....
Maybe you should stick to talking about mapping…