An edited version of the following letter was published in The Australian on Wednesday 24 June 2015. Underlined words were delted and bracketed ones inserted. The paper's heading was "Could do better".
NAPLAN's limitations
Kevin Donnelly is right to draw attention to NAPLAN's limitations ("NAPLAN's flaws and limitations mean it fails exam", June 23).
If the program were genuinely beneficial for school education, we could surely expect to see the results trending up and our international performance as measured by PISA (the OECD's Program for International Student Assessment) doing likewise. This is not the case. Instead, NAPLAN results are stable and PISA results are trending down.
Part of the problem is probably that NAPLAN results are invested with more meaning than they deserve. In addition, the associated national obsession with school choice fuelled by the My School website, does not adequately focus on the quality of education received by all Australian students, as opposed to a privileged minority in a small number of so-called "top" schools.
In an ACARA newsletter earlier (The Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority chief executive officer early) this year, its CEO opined that we should move on from the debate about NAPLAN. Better yet would be to move on from NAPLAN itself.
Garry Collins
President, Australian Association for the Teaching of English
Tags: Assessment |
Literature SpectacularGraham Joseph from Ryan Catholic College will present a workshop designed for teachers who are thinking about introducing Literature, delivering Literature for the first time or looking to review their Literature course in the near future. In the first part of the workshop, we will explore a framework for delivering a Literature course that c... |
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March Seminar 2021: Challenge and Change: Doing things differentlyWe are delighted to announce that we will be back with face to face professional learing events in 2021 - usual format but wtih some important changes: the March Seminar will be a full day event; the AATE-ALEA National Conference will be held in Brisbane in July and consequently there will not be a state conference. Other events for the year ... |
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Grammar at Hervey BayA grammar workshop will be held at Hervey Bay State High School 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 conducted in both 2018 and ... |
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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 DayETAQ will be conducting another of the very successful grammar days on Saturday 29 May 2021. If your school would like to host this event, please contact Admin Officer. |
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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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