This article is more than 2 years old

This article is more than 2 years old

A mathematics program aimed at children for whom English is a second language (ESL) in Queensland, a focus on synthetic phonics in Western Australia and mentoring for staff in literacy teaching in South Australia: education authorities are reading the tea leaves to figure out what’s working and what isn’t after new Naplan figures were released on Wednesday.

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The data - part of an updated My School website - highlights government and non-government schools which recorded above average gains in last year’s test, and usually prompts a keen interest in what those schools are doing to get ahead.

At Durack state school in Brisbane’s south-west, principal Beth Peterson said the big gains in numeracy the school saw were down to removing the barriers for students from a non-English speaking background.

English is a second language for 76% of Durack’s students and the school’s socio-economic profile is well below the national average. In addition, 11% of its students are Indigenous.



Peterson said those factors “combine to produce a challenging educational setting”.

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In response, the school developed what she called an “innovative approach” to teaching mathematics which would “specifically address the vocabulary deficit of our students and cater for their distinct learning profiles”.

“The first [and] ongoing step has been to build teacher and teacher-aide capacity,” she said.

Using funds from a Queensland state government grant, the school employed a numeracy coach whose mandate was to improve mathematics results for ESL and Indigenous students.

Through staff training aimed at “building the confidence of teachers to interrogate student data” the school was able to figure out what was holding students back.

The answer for many students was to “reduce the literacy demands” of maths by delivering lessons orally and visually.

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Last year’s Naplan results marked a decade since the testing was introduced, and revealed that the average reading and numeracy skills of Australian primary school students has improved only marginally while writing skills have deteriorated.

The testing regime has come under increased criticism in some corners because the use of the data inevitably means the test has “high stakes” for teachers and students.

But the head of the Australian Curriculum Assessment and Reporting Authority, Rob Randall, said the release of the data was “not about league tables or rankings”.

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“We know that schools are more than just their Naplan results,” he said.



“However, literacy and numeracy are the fundamental skills all our children need to be successful in and beyond school.

“The focus of My School is about enabling fair comparisons between schools and celebrating success where we see schools have achieved gain in results over time. It is not about league tables or ranking.

“By looking at what individual schools are doing at a local level to improve literacy and numeracy outcomes we can use those learnings to benefit other schools and lift our game across the board.”