This was posted today be Penny Wright, Greens Senator: NAPLAN? New plan please.. I must admit to being a bit – well more than a bit – disappointed.
It gives a bit of a summary of the things that are problematic about the current arrangements but it doesnt do much else. I expected more – a considered and comprehensive policy perhaps?
What would you include in this?
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It is such a pity that a political party describes the NAPLAN control of schooling using only measurement terms, without carefully examining and commenting upon its origins and whether the introduction of this fear-based testing machine was given any serious examination in teaching and learning terms before it was launched, its effects now on the whole curriculum, its effects on teacher morale and – most important of all – whether it treats children as human beings, subject to stresses and worries. It is now being noted as a form of child abuse. Who cares? As a measurement stick, it is pretty useless. It needs to be banished. Certainly no political party that I know of, will dare to say that it will do something for kids. Some years ago, I felt that the Greens would champion the intellectual development of our kids cognitive powers and have ‘Ban NAPLAN’ as a major platform.. No luck. Shame, kids. We remain quite indifferent to your welfare and progress..
Phil, good to see your comments. I heard you talk years ago, probably in the late 70s or early 80s when I was a young teacher and you were a (the?) senior administrator. You railed even then against over-testing, specifically the then surviving practice of weekly pencil & paper tests. I can’t give your exact words, but you spoke of your realisation as a classroom teacher that if you had to give so many tests you didn’t know your children as well as you should have.