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The following letter was submitted to The Courier-Mail for possible inclusion in the edition of Wednesday 9 September 2015 but it was not selected for publication.
Number crunchers in charge of education
Professor Kenneth Wiltshire wisely warns against allowing "measurers" or "number crunchers" to be in charge of any part of a school system ("In-school senior assessment still needs more examination", Sep 8).
Professor Barry McGaw, the inaugural chair of the Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority (ACARA), that developed the national curriculum, was sometimes inaccurately described by journalists as an expert on school curriculum. He would not have made that claim himself. His expertise and experience were in educational measurement.
And I suspect that Professor Wiltshire would be appalled if he had a better undertanding of the contemporary focus on data in the school system, which sometimes amounts to an obsession. Data is of course useful but a sensible balance must be maintained. There is some timely advice often attributed to Einstein (inaccurately, I believe): not everything that counts can be counted; and not everything that can be counted counts".
Garry Collins
President, Australian Association for the Teaching of English
 "Garry Collins, AATE President")
Author: Garry Collins, AATE President
| Tags: Assessment |
May Masterclass 2021THE CHALLENGE OF TEACHING ANALYSIS: DO WE NEED TO CHANGE OUR PRACTICES? Teaching the process of analysing texts in order for students to produce a spoken or written response remains amongst the most exciting and difficult challenges we face as a community of English teachers. Most recently, the high-stakes nature of unseen examinations fo... |
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JCU SpectacularJoin Dr Claire Hansen for a two-hour session on teaching Macbeth. We'll dive into an exploration of the language of Macbeth and teaching strategies to engage students with Shakespeare's Scottish play. The workshop will also explore learning activities for Macbeth created by the Shakespeare Reloaded project. This session will... |
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Grammar DayA grammar workshop will be held at Elanora State High School on Saturday 29 May 2021 to assist attendees to develop their understandings of grammar in order to fully comprehend and to effectively teach the Australia Curriculum: English (AC:E). Also highly relevant to Years 11 & 12. This will be an updated re-run of the activity ... |
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Teacher event - external assessmentThe second series of pre-external examination events will be held for teachers on Saturday 31 July as a face-to-face event and online. Recorded materials will remain available to all participants online until the examination week in October. Date Claimer giving further information is available for download ... |
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Student event - external assessmentFlexible modes of delivery will allow you and your students to engage with the materials at a time that suits you. Once again this event will be fully online to cater for all members and their students. This year the materials will come to you live in the afternoon of Wednesday 8 September and again in the morning of Saturda... |
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This is the first time I have been to an ETAQ conference and it was really sensational to get so much at all of the sessions.
ETAQ conferences always have sessions that make me excited to be a teacher.
I know that ETAQ conferences in the past have never disappointed - valuable, relevant, practical, inspiring so I came again.
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