STAFF WRITERS
THE annual NAPLAN assessments commenced last week (March 12), and saw almost 1.3 million students take the tests in more than 9400 schools and campuses across Australia.
NAPLAN is the only national assessment that helps teachers, parents, and carers see how students in Years 3, 5, 7 and 9 are progressing in literacy and numeracy over time.
This year, students in Years 5, 7 and 9 will complete a second NAPLAN cycle since the annual test changed from being held in March instead of May and the introduction of the new proficiency levels. While proficiency levels become more demanding as students move through the NAPLAN years, this new data will give the opportunity to see how this cohort of students has progressed between 2023 and 2025.
Schools and education authorities will again receive preliminary school and student results from the assessments early in Term 2, around four weeks after the test period ends this Monday (March 24). This means teachers will have more time to review the results to inform their teaching and learning programs in the current school year.
“This year, you will be able to compare how the same cohort of students have progressed in their NAPLAN assessment results since 2023 when the annual test changed from being held in March instead of May and set against the new proficiency levels,” Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority (ACARA) Chief Executive, Stephen Gniel said.
“This will help education authorities, schools, parents, and carers to see how Australian children are reaching important literacy and numeracy goals and are progressing against national standards.
“NAPLAN is just one aspect of a school’s assessment and does not replace ongoing assessments made by teachers about student performance, but it can provide important additional information about a student’s educational progress.”
Mr Gniel explained that NAPLAN is a large-scale operation, with more than 4.4 million tests expected to be taken this year. ACARA has developed more than 2500 different test questions, which will assess how Australian students are performing in reading, writing, grammar and punctuation, spelling, and numeracy.
ACARA has been working closely with the Queensland Curriculum and Assessment Authority (QCAA) and the NSW Education Standards Authority (NESA) over the past week to support schools impacted by ex-Tropical Cyclone Alfred in Queensland and northern NSW. The safety and wellbeing of students, teachers and school staff is the highest priority.
ACARA says it has tried and tested procedures in place to manage disruptions.
An expert from Australian Catholic University in standardised assessment has called for calm during NAPLAN.
Speaking before the tests were taken, Associate Professor Steven Lewis urged school leaders, teachers, families, and students to take a collective breath amid the start of the nationwide testing window.
Associate Professor Lewis, of ACU’s Institute for Learning Sciences and Teacher Education, said while NAPLAN was a worthwhile test for about 1.3 million students in Years 3, 5, 7, and 9 to do, the focus should ultimately be on what was done with the results.
Associate Professor Lewis also welcomed plans announced by ACARA to release results to schools and parents faster, allowing timely NAPLAN data to more readily inform student learning in the classroom.
“NAPLAN is a snapshot of where students are tracking at a given point in time. It is not definitive of all that they are or what they will achieve in life,” Associate Professor Lewis said.
“The most important thing for everyone involved is to treat it as what it is supposed to be – a measure of student achievement to inform educators about where children are at and, more importantly, what learning and supports are needed to fill any gaps as well as where teachers need to focus to ensure students continue to advance their learning.
“Getting those results into the hands of educators and parents faster is a good move to allow for early teaching and learning interventions and targeted support.”
Associate Professor Lewis said stressing about the tests – which will assess numeracy, reading, spelling, writing, grammar, and punctuation – and trying to teach to the tests would not help to improve real outcomes.
“Teaching to any test is never going to work to create long-lasting, rich learning among students,” he said.
“Evidence-based practices addressing the needs of each student are always the way to go.
“And we need to focus on the end-game – how are school systems and policy makers using results to not only identify areas of need and disadvantage, but also to act upon this with real measures to level the playing field for primary and secondary school students wherever they are and whatever their background is?”
Preliminary results will be provided to schools in all domains except writing, which takes longer to mark. Schools will receive their full results, including writing, from June 2025, after which parents and carers receive their child’s Individual Student Report at the start of Term 3. ACARA is expecting to publish the National Results in late July/early August 2025.
For more information about NAPLAN, visit the website.
