Queensland’s NAPLAN results show concerning declines

Queensland children are falling behind in the classroom, with new NAPLAN results revealing concerning declines in key areas. SEARCH THE TABLES

• Qld’s worst behaved primary schools

Queensland children are falling behind in the classroom, with new NAPLAN results revealing concerning declines in spelling and reading skills across all year levels.

New data from the Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority shows the state’s Year 3 cohort went backwards in every key metric including spelling, reading, writing, grammar and numeracy.

All Queensland students in the test grades of 3, 5, 7 and 9 received lower results in reading and spelling in the 2024 NAPLAN test than the year before.

The figures show more than half of Queensland’s students who took NAPLAN need additional assistance in writing, with 56.3 per cent below the standard they should be for their year level.

In the writing category, almost nine per cent of year three kids need additional support, meaning they struggle to write simple sentences, have minimal correct punctuation and can only correctly spell some simple words.

Queensland’s Year 3 cohort as a whole received the second worst reading score in the country behind Northern Territory.

The national results were labelled as “stable” and “an important achievement” by the Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority CEO Stephen Gniel.

Queensland Association of State School Principals president Pat Murphy said there was concerns for any student who fell below the standards and said it was “absolutely critical” schools were being adequately funded.

“It’s about ensuring that our current kids who are falling behind in standards, are provided with the resources to ensure that those gaps are being addressed,” he said.

Mr Murphy said it should be “no surprise” to the nation Queensland’s students in certain areas have not progressed.

“If you don’t service a car, you can’t expect that that car will function fully every time you drive it,” he said.

Mr Murphy recognised NAPLAN should not be looked at as a full measure of a student’s academic progress or success.

Other key trends showed Queensland’s Year 9 cohort had the highest rate of withdrawals in the country for spelling, reading, writing, grammar and punctuation and numeracy.

NAPLAN defines ‘withdrawal’ from the test as “students may be withdrawn from the testing program by their parent/carer for reasons such as religious beliefs or philosophical objections to testing”.

The Year 9 cohort in Queensland also had the third highest rate of absences across a range of testing metrics.

Queensland Teachers Union President Cresta Richardson said absences and withdrawals in Queensland are the second highest in Australia, behind only the Northern Territory, because teachers, school leaders and parents know that NAPLAN has outlived its usefulness.

“The everyday teaching and learning of the Australian Curriculum is the best way to monitor student outcomes,” she said.

Ms Richardson said state schools were chronically underfunded and had been for more than a decade and that we “need to do things differently”.

“Teachers and school leaders urgently need a fully funded state school system that is agile and adequately resourced,” she said.

Australian Catholic University Institute for Learning Sciences and Teacher Education Associate Professor Steven Lewis said the results indicated schools were struggling to meet the diverse needs of young people.

“I just think it’s that the needs of our students are becoming more complicated, more diverse, more extensive, and we need additional support to help teachers do that,” he said.

“I think I’d be inclined to suggest as well, in terms of a potential explanation of why student learning and student performance might be down, is that Queensland is one of many states in Australia that isn’t currently funding state schools to the minimum SRS (School Resources Standard).

“It is not surprising to see that because those schools and therefore those students are being underfunded, they’re also the ones who are most likely to not perform to minimum standard on NAPLAN.”

Australian Education Union Federal President Correna Haythorpe said as a nation, we could not leave the most vulnerable students without the resources and support they need to fulfil their potential.

Queensland Teachers' Union president Cresta Richardson

“The results show that the current funding system is leaving the students with the highest levels of need without the support they need to thrive, which is completely unacceptable,” she said.

“Teachers and education support personnel work very hard to cater for all of their students’ needs but they must be backed by governments with full funding.”

Queensland Education Minister Di Farmer said NAPLAN was simply a point in time measure of student progress.

“Our teachers, teacher aides and school leaders work every day to support every student to achieve their best,” she said.

Ms Farmer encouraged all parents and carers to review their child’s NAPLAN results in conjunction with their report cards and teacher feedback, and work with their school to explore extra support available where needed.

“The NAPLAN results help us to make sure we are investing in the right areas to support students with developing or additional needs.”

The 2024 results are the first comparable tests since changes were implemented in 2023.

Changes to the test included moving it from May to March and the introduction of a new measurement scale to gauge student progress against national benchmarks.

The new results rank students on four performance levels – needs additional support, developing, strong and exceeding.