Professor Brian Caldwell, a former dean of education at the University of Melbourne, is the latest epert to criticise the NAPLAN testing. Speaking to a Senate inquiry into National Assessment Program – Literacy and Numeracy (NAPLAN), he said that the program, and website, should be phased out.
“Essentially, I propose a sunset on current approaches to NAPLAN and My School and adoption of benchmark practice.”
Professor Caldwell proposed that a survey based on a sample of students would be enough to yield national information, rather than testing all students.
As a teacher, I believe that while it is important to monitor schools against a set of national benchmarks, the NAPLAN tests works against the natural instincts of the standard harworking teacher. Principals instruct their teachers, not to teach for learnings sake, but rather to teach the skills and content covered in the tests. So even though I taught a unit on persuasive writing in Term 2, my school wants me to cover it again in Term 4 because they heard it was the writing genre selected for the NAPLAN.
Shouldn’t the NAPLAN promte real teaching instead of depriving teachers from going about their jobs the way they should?
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