Girls beat boys in reading standard, ACER PIRLS test shows

Taxpayer funding of schools will be targeted to help struggling students catch up, after global testing found one in five 10-year-olds cannot read.

Girls are outperforming boys in global reading tests.

Taxpayer funding of schools will be targeted to help struggling students catch up with classmates, after global testing found one in five 10-year-old students cannot read properly.

Tests of 5500 year 4 students from 281 schools across Australia, in the 2021 Progress in International Reading Literacy Study (PIRLS), found that twice as many children floundered at the lowest level of reading, compared with the previous test in 2016.

First Nations students and children from poor families with few books were the most likely to lag in literacy.

One in three children from poor families failed to read at the basic standard, compared with 13 per cent of children from wealthy families. Rich kids were three times more likely than poor classmates to read at an advanced level.

Boys trailed well behind girls in reading, the study shows, in part because they do not enjoy reading.

Pandemic lockdowns pulled down performance in Victoria, where students had to learn from home for more than a year.

The global report, released by the Australian Council for Educational Research (ACER) on Tuesday, shows that Australia failed to lower its share of failing students, despite a 13 per cent increase in taxpayer funding per student, in real terms, over five years.

Federal, state and territory funding per student has risen in real terms from $15,960 in 2015-16 to $17,992 in 2020-21, Productivity Commission statistics show.

But the PIRLS report shows that 20 per cent of Australian students failed to meet the international benchmark for literacy – with 14 per cent ranked as “below low” and 6 per cent as “low”.

In 2016, 6 per cent of students were ranked “below low” and 13 per cent “low”. The proportion of top achievers slipped from 16 per cent to 14 per cent.

Students from Hong Kong and Singapore performed better than students from Australia in the English-language test.

Federal Education Minister Jason Clare, who has championed the use of phonics to teach reading, an overhaul of teacher training and small-group remedial tuition, said the PIRLS study showed the need to reform Australia’s education system.

The next National School Reform Agreement, which sets education targets for federal, state and territory governments, would “tie funding to those things that will help children who are falling behind to get the support they need to catch up’’, he said.

 

“The report confirms what I have been saying about the gap in reading skills between children from wealthy and poor families,’’ he said. “This is serious and shows why real reform is needed.’’

The PIRLS report shows that 29 per cent of students in the Northern Territory, where 38 per cent of students are Indigenous, failed to read at the intermediate level. In Victoria, where 1.7 per cent of students are Indigenous, 16 per cent of the year 4 students failed to meet the intermediate standard for reading.

First Nations students scored 491 points, on average, in the PIRLS test, compared with 547 points for students from other backgrounds.

Girls outperformed boys, with 84 per cent of girls and 77 per cent of boys meeting the minimum standard. Girls were more likely to state that they “like reading’’.

Across Australia, the average score of 540 points in 2021 fell slightly below the 2016 result of 544 points. Results fell by 14 points in Victoria, where students learnt from home, by 10 in Western Australia and by 11 in the Northern Territory. Students in the ACT were the best readers, with a nine-point rise to 560 last year.

ACER, which carried out the testing in Australia last year, called for extra help for students struggling to read in primary school. “Support for students who find reading challenging is essential to prevent them falling behind in other learning areas, as more of their schooling draws on their reading skills,’’ ACER senior research fellow Kylie Hillman, who managed the PIRLS test, said on Tuesday. “Every child deserves the chance to be a competent reader.’’