If you have kids, you might have already heard of NAPLAN (the National Assessment Program – Literacy and Numeracy). If your kids haven't reached the appropriate age yet, though, you mightn't have the faintest idea of what NAPLAN is. Don't worry if that's the case, because we can explain, even if it does seem to be more complicated than it needs to be.
To put it as simply as possible, NAPLAN is a series of standardised tests that are taken in years 3, 5, 7 and 9 to replace locally-administered tests with a national plan, but there's more to it than that.
To try and clear things up a bit, we'll look at why NAPLAN exists, how it came to be, where it applies, the subjects involved in NAPLAN, the pros and cons of it, and how you can go about getting past papers for NAPLAN.
Why does Australia do NAPLAN?
Before NAPLAN, different jurisdictions would be in charge of testing literacy and numeracy in schools so NAPLAN was introduced to standardise the standardised tests further so that it could be seen how certain years, cohorts, and individual students were performing.
For the government, this was also a way to ensure that Australia could be more competitive internationally as the lack of national standardised testing would make it harder to keep track of the population's literacy and numeracy as a whole and against other countries' levels.
For individual students, it also makes it easier to gauge their numeracy and literacy in comparison to their peers across the country and identify the students who may need help with literacy and numeracy.
Is NAPLAN only in Australia?
As you now know, the “N” in NAPLAN stands for “national” and nothing beyond that. While the tests certainly do help to compare across Australia and provide a better idea of how Australian pupils are performing in terms of numeracy and literacy, the tests are only in Australia.
Do You Have to do NAPLAN in Australia?
For students in years 3, 5, 7 and 9, participation is fairly automatic, but parents and carers can withdraw students from testing.
Some students may also be exempt from NAPLAN, especially if they have any kind of condition or disability that would severely limit their ability to participate, though they are encouraged to participate if they can.
Students with a non-English background who've been attending school for less than a year may also be exempted from NAPLAN, but they are also encouraged to participate as much as they can as the literacy part could be particularly useful just to see exactly where they are in terms of English.
Is NAPLAN aligned with the Australian Curriculum?
With standardised testing, it's quite natural for the testing to be aligned with the curriculum as students are being tested on their academic performance and what they're supposed to learn in school.
While NAPLAN does have a focus on numeracy and literacy, since 2016, tests have been more closely developed to correspond to the Australian Curriculum: English and the Australian Curriculum: Mathematics to ensure students are being tested on what they should know and what they're being taught in school.
The History of NAPLAN
The groundwork for NAPLAN began towards the end of the Millennium with plans for Australia's education going forwards, but the introduction of NAPLAN wasn't immediate.
When Did NAPLAN Start in Australia?
Though plans for this kind of nationwide numeracy and literacy testing had been floating around since 1999, the first NAPLAN tests were introduced in 2008.
NAPLAN subjects
As NAPLAN is for numeracy and literacy, its main subjects are reading, writing, language conventions, and numeracy.
Most of the NAPLAN domains, as they're officially known, are fairly self-explanatory, but the “conventions of language” is basically a test of spelling, grammar and punctuation.
Is NAPLAN an IQ Test?
NAPLAN is not an IQ test. It only tests your child's abilities in the specific domains being tested for and doesn't include a broad enough range of questions and topics to broadly test intelligence.
It's a gauge of a child's literacy and numeracy in a very specific set of conditions. Don't forget that some learners will naturally perform better on tests because they're better at taking tests. This doesn't mean that students who perform poorly on their NAPLAN tests are even bad at maths or English, it might just mean that they're not very good at taking tests or these particular types of tests.
In the event a child performs poorly, however, it's worthwhile checking whether or not this poor performance is unique to the NAPLAN tests or is indicative of a broader issue with numeracy and literacy.
Is NAPLAN Stressful?
NAPLAN can be stressful, but the point of the testing is to see where pupils sit relative to their peers across the country.
Students studying for NAPLAN shouldn't really study too much for the tests. However, that doesn't mean that they shouldn't do anything in preparation for it.
NAPLAN isn't particularly important career-wise so students should just make sure that they know what to expect and not worry too much about the results of their tests.
Can you prepare for NAPLAN?
ACARA recommends that students familiarise themselves with NAPLAN, but it doesn't recommend drilling or excessive practice. That said, this hasn't stopped an entire market of study aids from popping up to help students get the best possible results.
What is a good score for NAPLAN?
NAPLAN is divided into bands and the system differs for each year to indicate a pupil's overall level across the 4 different years that they'll take NAPLAN tests rather than having the same grades during each year.
For example, students in year 3 can be placed into bands numbered 1 to 6. Band 1 is the lowest and Band 6 is the highest. In year 3, Band 2 is the national minimum standard so students and teachers can quickly understand whether they are above or below the national average.
For year 5, the bands are from Band 3 to Band 8 with Band 4 being the national minimum standard.
In year 7, the bands are numbered from 4 to 9 with Band 5 representing the national minimum standard.
Finally, in year 9, students are allocated bands between 5 and 10. As with the other years, the second lowest band (Band 6) is the national minimum standard.
What happens if you fail NAPLAN?
Fortunately for students, you can't pass or fail NAPLAN, at least that's what the official wording has to say on the matter. If students perform poorly, their school and teachers will likely take notice and look for ways to better help them perform better in the future.
In practice, students will want to avoid being placed in a lower band but since the bands are representative of where students sit relative to national averages and standards, some pupils will technically have to be put into these bands.
Again, the tests are supposedly designed just to gauge where students are in terms of their numeracy and literacy and all a lower band allocation should mean is that action should be taken to help the child improve.
That's it!
The Advantages and Disadvantages of NAPLAN
As with every kind of testing, there are pros and cons. NAPLAN is no exception and it's hardly a perfect system.
One of the advantages of NAPLAN is that students can see if there are any weaknesses or poor academic performance in terms of numeracy and literacy that might require more attention.
It's also useful because it can help governments to see which schools are performing well, whether or not certain policies are working, and the areas where they made need to work more on numeracy and literacy.
It also works as a way for the different states and territories to compare themselves and see which areas of numeracy and literacy need improving.
Basically, NAPLAN is a system for comparing all the pupils across the country to keep track of literacy and numeracy education in Australia, rather than being particularly useful for students.
That said, it's not completely useless for individual students, but it's certainly not really something losing too much sleep over and it's not meant to be, either.
NAPLAN Past Papers
For any student that's worried about NAPLAN tests or would like to make sure that their results are as representative as they can be, they can always look to past papers to familiarise themselves with the format and what the questions might be like on the tests that they'll take.
On the ACARA website, students can find test papers dating all the way back to 2008. The most recent tests available at the time of writing are from 2016, but they are still useful to get a better idea of what the tests are like.
As even ACARA says, the tests are about improving numeracy and literacy education in the country and there's no need to drill or excessively practice for NAPLAN tests: just see what's on them and it'll be fine!
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