The Department of Education is set to expand the use of a new student assessment tool designed during the COVID-19 pandemic after receiving overwhelmingly positive feedback from the Year Five and Year Nine assessments.
The Department said the new reading and numeracy assessment helped schools identify a student’s current abilities as well as what they could do to improve teaching and learning to ensure no student was left behind during the pandemic.
Minister for Education, Sarah Mitchell said the new ‘check-in’ assessment package, which was an optional online reading and numeracy assessment for students in Years Five and Nine, is to be expanded to Year Three.
“The response from schools to the check-in package has been fantastic, with more than 1,290 schools registering so far, which is why we are expanding it to capture Year Three students,” Ms Mitchell said.
“This assessment package allows schools to assess student learning following the period of learning from home due to COVID-19,” she said.
“Feedback from the assessment tool will contribute to the NSW Government’s Curriculum overhaul, which will see a renewed focus on literacy and numeracy.”
Ms Mitchell said the check-in assessments could supplement existing school practices to identify how students were performing in reading and numeracy and help teachers tailor their teaching more specifically to student needs.
“The assessment package will be supported with resources and professional learning to assist schools to administer the assessments, analyse assessment feedback and plan for teaching,” she said.
“The online assessment delivers results in two days and is accompanied by links to teaching strategies that will enable teachers to focus on ‘where to’ next for students.”
She said the check-in assessment was ‘on demand’, giving schools the flexibility to schedule the assessment to best suit their school and student’s needs.