Source: Radio New Zealand
Remuera Intermediate principal Kyle Brewerton. RNZ / Yiting Lin
An Auckland principal says the government’s new report cards will help children who change schools.
Fulfilling an election campaign promise, Education Minister Erica Stanford unveiled the new approach to report cards for reading, writing and mathematics on Monday.
The reports will include:
- A standardised approach across New Zealand
- A percentage mark out of 100
- Five grades of progress: Emerging, Developing, Consolidating, Proficient, Exceeding
- Previous ratings, to enable tracking of progress over time
- Attendance data
These would be backed by:
- Twice-yearly testing for years 3-8 to gauge progress against the curriculum for each year level
- An AI tool to help teachers write reports and carry out the tests
The new approach to testing and reports would be mandatory for children from new entrants – Year 0 – right up to Year 8, the final year of intermediate school, and optional for secondary schools for Years 9 and 10.
Students would be marked on their progress throughout the year, so would likely start on the lower end and get higher gradings as the year went on – then start again the following year with that year’s curriculum.
Education Minister Erica Stanford unveils the new approach to report cards for reading, writing and mathematics. Marika Khabazi / RNZ
Remuera Intermediate principal Kyle Brewerton previously headed the Auckland Primary Principals Association, and said the standardised reporting would make a difference for children who moved school.
“At the moment when we look at school reports, if you were to take a sample of school reports from primary schools across or New Zealand you would be looking at probably as many different examples of the school report – there’s not a great deal of consistency.
“If you’re moving from one school to another, and the report looks completely different, it can be challenging for a parent to make sense of … ‘in my old school, they said they’re ‘developing’ and now over here they said they ‘need to work on it’ – Is that the same thing? Is it different?’
“Hopefully it will start to solve some of those problems.”
Brewerton said the language of emerging to exceeding may take some time to get used to, but the changes would be unlikely to add much to schools’ workloads.
“The average teacher that’s in school, you won’t see a great departure from what they’re currently doing. It’s really just the actual reporting that’s been sent home … it’ll be some work to do for sure, but it’s not particularly onerous.
“Schools are all using their own version of the same thing, whether they’re using a three-point, a four-point or a five-point scale. They’ve all got variations on a theme and generally that is ‘this young person needs some extra support, they’re not quite there yet; these young people are where they need to be; these ones are showing progress beyond what we would expect.”
He said it was unclear, however, if the parents of the most vulnerable students would pay attention or not.
“We know success happens when the families are heavily engaged with the schools, and the schools are heavily engaged with families. Often those young people who perhaps their attendance is particularly low, or that partnership is not particularly strong, are our young people that aren’t achieving.
“Whether we change the language on a report is going to change that or not remains to be seen.”
He said learning relied on a collective effort between the school, the parents, and the child themselves – and assessing children’s progress would always depend on teachers’ subjective views.
That was where having a clear curriculum could help, he said – but parents should also understand that the twice-yearly testing was only a snapshot picture of how the child was doing on that particular day.
“Whilst we have these formal assessments, really it’s those conversations day in and day out and the teacher’s knowledge of the curriculum that give a really clear sense of what that young person is capable of and what their next steps are.
“Over time, it will give us a picture of how that young person is progressing. But it’s equally important that we pay attention to what those teachers are telling us … we’ve got to be careful we don’t put all our eggs into that formal testing bucket.”
Most schools also used some kind of New Zealand-based assessment tool anyway – some going back to the 1980s – and again would not take much adjustment.
“And it’s free – one of them we have to pay for at the moment, so if it’s great and it’s free and it’s aligning with our curriculum, then that sounds like a good thing to us.”
Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero, a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.
– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand
