Tests for students from first year of school announced | 3 July 2024 | RNZ

The Government has announced new assessments for students from the first year of school.
New Zealand Education Minister Erica Stanford said from 2025 phonics tests with children will begin at 20 weeks and 40 weeks of schooling.
Twice-yearly "progression monitoring" for reading, writing and maths would also be introduced for children in years three through eight.
Stanford said the assessment was intended to give parents certainty about their childrens' learning.

[@DrakeBuilders]

"Kids" is an informal word. It is not slang. English speakers, at least in America, use "kids" all the time. The word "children" is considered more formal, and it might be better for written English. 25 Mar 2015 Luxon turned Baby Goat..

[@Khuttu2]

Surely the Message is more important!

[@adsdft585]

Does the PM recall how effective national standards policy was at achieving the skills of learners? ( those people are in high school now). To measure achievements primary schools uses many types of tests to check maths and language lituracy. Much this part of assessment has continued.

[@adsdft585]

Many people in the current cabinet are carreer politicians. The National Party were critical of this fact..

[@tarlkoroban3733]

Getting rid of Intermediate schools is a must. Kid's need to have access to specialist teachers asap.

[@christiaanherzogenrath8471]

Based on your opinion or some sort of evidence?

[@nigelworters3667]

It is stated that when new education corriculums are introduced it takes a decade for the effects to be felt. All of the problems we currently have with education can be traced back to National Standards. A policy introduced by the Key National government in 2010. And here we go again with National Standards mk2. It didnt work then and it wont work now. Expect another education crisis in the mid to late 30's

[@saadiayousouf6975]

Put your teachers to teach and your students to learn. Too much assessment and no use of it is not accountability. You guys waste too much time to put good teachers to get through TER program. Look what your registered teachers have produced. Numeracy and literacy problems should not reach year 9 to be assessed, this problem should have been tackled much earlier rather in primary years.

[@rod-contracts1616]

As for exam "stress", well life is stressful. Moreover, focus on mastering things is the ONLY way to succeed. Not being born on the "right side of town" - they too fail or succeed by how they conduct themselves. Well done Erica. A breath of fresh air after decades of social engineering garbage, resulting in huge harm.

[@fraserwilliamson9507]

Social engineering has been happening in this settler colonial sh#t hole since the 1800's. It's just that it's always been European entitlement on display and now that someone else is getting a seat at the table all your Euro snobs are getting their undies in a twist. I like the new era. Nothing about this country in previous eras was better.

[@TheFalconerNZ]

I performed badly at school tests in the 60's & 70's as I would often get stress induced asthma attacks (sometimes resulting in hospitalisation) so will kids that suffer this level of stress get counseling to help them (I didn't as it went unrecognised until after I left school) & who pays? Or do they get told to grew up & get their faecal matter together?

[@rod-contracts1616]

​​@@TheFalconerNZ Me too, no rocket scientist struggled with School Cert, but in technical school by working harder I did better than most and revelled in exams, happily with mostly "B's." Later went on to do rather well including in a masters. Life is not easy or a dream, knuckle under and improve oneself even if it takes a while.

[@MissPerpul]

I was surprised they had to actually introduce 1hr each of reading, writing and math. Wth have these kids been doing at school all along!?

[@Kult365]

Correct, this was already happening and is not news at all

[@marianabezuidenhout2640]

No, they were taught socialism, sex education and vegan teachers rubbed their beliefs off on children. Under Labour 🤬.

[@Rainbow-lg8jd]

​@@Kult365you sure it's already happened in all deciles? Deciles is not a popular word nowadays though

[@Kult365]

@@Rainbow-lg8jd hey, yeah it's supposed to be around 4-5 hours a week each regardless of the Equity Index (Decile) although you'll always get some variation

[@marianabezuidenhout2640]

❤❤❤Thank you for looking out for the leaders of the future.

[@NZ_Kiwi1010]

Good, like it used to be... spelling tests, maths, and reading. Get rid of the devices in class and back to pencil and paper

[@Mexzot]

Because of all that pencil and paper in the workplace these days!? 🤦 If you don't have expertise on a topic, why do you think your opinion matters!?

[@motherofcatsnz]

Yes, great idea, that will prepare the children for work in the 1950s. After all the workers in the future don't need to use computers.

[@amandafourie4416]

It's an assessment like any other. Checking progress and understanding. It is a tool to support the teacher to pland and adjust her pedagogy and teaching strategies for individual children. Much better than leave those behind that don't stay the course. Catch them and support them much earlier. I was horrified when realising my grandson at age 8 did not know a letter has a name AND a sound. He could not decode words because he was using the letters names. Tsk! May this stop teachers from glossing over foundational work.

[@bofrac]

Good to see some sanity after so much insanity.Fully support Erica Stanford and look forward to more moves to repair a broken system

[@Itssmial_Ova]

Sounds like a good idea, If you can't measure something why bother testing? Many countries have standardised tests from the very first year.

[@cathyclark6652]

Mostly in communist countries!

[@Kult365]

This is called overtesting. New entrant and Y 1 do not need this and it will not improve outcomes. This is not evidence based in any way.

[@samansantha4195]

Great job

[@rod-contracts1616]

Well nuanced. It seems that Erica has been working closely with and not talking down to the education sector, while also gaining a deep understanding of schooling.

[@ajayusana]

Great idea. But Lol. You guys test the childcare teachers as well how they behave, how they use the language, and their ethics. They don't know how to speak a proper sentence in english 😢

[@MariaH-l5j]

Reading and writing and speaking in good English should always be central to education of our young people. Math is important too. Re no phones - I agree about none in class, but I have heard that would not apply to charter schools (?) which would be dum, big time. 4:53

[@cathyclark6652]

You're too late - you have had decades to teach children - you fail and now must be separated from said children!

[@user-di6bh2vf9o]

More National tinkering, just getting over National Standards. Mean while classes are 34 puples, still housed in prefabs, some attending school without breakfast and or lunch.

[@avpr1574]

Why the big news? Schools already do these tests, usually in the first few weeks at school and then again end of term 3 or 4. Whether schools share that info to parents, well that is a different story (it kind of is in the reports but as a parent you know they are as ambiguous as hell). I would rather see changes to the curriculum so there less emphasis on the multi strategy approach to maths and more concept work in place value, fractions, decimals and percentages. And for god sake, make sure that students from year 3 to year 6 know their tables well. Good work on the structured literacy approach and teaching of handwriting. That is a great start.

[@Tuhoeterra]

dog whistles on blast with this "policy".

[@richardpehi5442]

Rubbish, education system should be designed by academics not the government. Period

[@miekesmit7012]

No need gor tests dor kids under 10!

[@Mexzot]

Fails the "why" test...what are they going to do as a result!? Hey 5yo who came from another country, has a poor background or learning disability etc...buck up your ideas kiddo and work harder!!! They need to provide more support, not more measurements!!!! THEN they can focus that support with more measurements! FFS WHAT A CLOWN SHOW! All they are doing is making changes so it LOOKS like they are taking action!

[@kimbliss1329]

100% clown show, but that's our education system. Not easy for Ms Stanford to try and fix the mess. Don't test, don't teach the children how to be successful and God forbid that they should ever learn how to cope with a failure. By the time they get to NCEA, having never been taught how to cope with tests, and even less how to deal with failure, they'll be perfectly fine dealing with it all, surely. Or, maybe chucking them in at the deep end will totally demoralize and destroy them.

[@TheFalconerNZ]

As I said above, the testing (while denied) will be used to grade schools & hold principles & boards of directors accountable when they do get the result National is promising.The damage is done by mass media caused lack of attention spans & kids today just can't pay any real attention for more than a few minutes.

[@Mexzot]

@@TheFalconerNZ As I said above more support is what is needed, not more measurements of the kids. A KPI you can use to blame the teachers, Principals and boards is not going to help a school where there is insufficient resource to actually teach the kids. This is just what a clown middle manager would do to fix something…the WHY is to attribute blame and drive accountability…the problem is the blame is actually the resources provided by those burning even more of the limited resources on their measurement regime…so they are literally just implementing it to blame the people below them. That’s why it fails “why” test…and that’s why they are just a clown show of a govt!

[@TheFalconerNZ]

@@Mexzot 100% agree. Luxon is a manager, not a problem solver. As I heard, "The only people that can fix real problem is scientists", politicians can only fix political issues that are basically not real problems at all, just issues they made in the first place.