Highton school's maths overhaul leads to record NAPLAN success

A Geelong primary school has ditched grouping students by ability, and “flipped” how it teaches maths. And the principal says it's the secret to outstanding 2025 NAPLAN results.

Montpellier Principal Dianne Stainsby with grade five students Baxter, left, Otis, Estelle, Aisha and Harry celebrating improved Naplan scores. Picture: Alison Wynd

A Geelong primary school’s NAPLAN results have seen a massive improvement after it ditched ability streaming for group projects.

Highton’s Montpellier Primary School’s grade 5 mathematics NAPLAN results jumped from 65 per cent last year to 90 per cent of students “exceeding” proficiency level this year.

Principal Dianne Stainsby said the students had exceeded expectations.

“The initial reaction was one of being ecstatic actually,” she said.

“Our maths was just amazing.

“And that’s what we’ve been working really hard on.”

The Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority (ACARA) released the 2025 NAPLAN National Results on Wednesday.

The results provide nationally comparable data on the 2025 national and state and territory results for each test domain and year level assessed, by gender, Indigenous status and language background other than English.

Nationally, Victorian students achieved the strongest results across Australia, with students ranking first or second in 18 of 20 measures and significantly improving on our 2024 results.

Five years ago, Montpellier Primary School began implementing a new instructional model for mathematics, ditching ability streaming and typical mathematics worksheets in favour of “creative” problem solving, group activities and interactive learning.

Montpellier Principal Dianne Stainsby with grade five students solving maths problems. Picture: Alison Wynd

Ms Stainsby said teachers were retrained in the new program and told to teach children to feel comfortable making mistakes.

“(It was) an absolute flip on how they taught previously,” Ms Stainsby said.

“So there was a fair bit of work that went into making sure teachers felt very supported with this new approach.”

Year 5 Montpellier student Harry said he was learning to focus on problem solving, rather than getting the right answer.

“When I make a mistake, instead of being down about it, I have a laugh and do it how I’m supposed to,” he said.

“We focus not just on our answers, but how we did it.

“And collaboration. We used to do lots of work by ourselves. Now, for most of our lesson, we collaborate.”

Education Minister Ben Carroll said Victoria achieved its highest NAPLAN participation rate since 2008, with 96.6 per cent of students completing at least one assessment in 2025.

ACARA chief executive officer Stephen Gniel said NAPLAN was a key tool in the Australian education landscape.

School performance data will be released later in the year.

Originally published as Highton school's maths overhaul leads to record NAPLAN success