All students in Years 3, 5, 7 and 9 of Australian schools will soon sit The National Assessment Program - Literacy and Numeracy (NAPLAN), which assesses them using national tests in Reading, Writing, Language Conventions (Spelling, Grammar and Punctuation) and Numeracy. It is possible to see how much progress in literacy and numeracy a student has made as they advance through schooling, by the introduction of ten achievement bands from Year 3 to Year 9.
Governments always feel the demand from the electorate for information on which to base decisions and schools are no different. They have taken the tests a step further - using the results to publish a website ranking schools against those of a similar nature. There is talk of expanding the service to hospitals and child care centres. The issue is whether the indicators tested in NAPLAN are the right ones on which to base judgment?
Many object to using NAPLAN tests and the consequent league tables based upon them to judge the performance of a school. Critics argue that the input of schools into a student 's life cannot be measured as a result of a short test on one day of the year. The essential problem is that much of what schools do - pastoral care,
…show more content…
In some nations, school students are expected to reach strict government targets and teachers of schools do not possess time to explain some concepts to some children, who are not in a position to understand the concepts when teaching for the first time. Therefore, parents of these children are forced to opt for private tuitions and particularly for subjects like chemistry, physics, mathematics and English many children are looking for some sort of additional coaching and parents are not in a position to offer the right kind of coaching they require and so they are opting for private tuition