Schools literacy and numeracy tests show little improvement

LITERACY and numeracy skills among school students have remained fairly stable over the past four years, despite extra spending to try to lift standards.

LITERACY and numeracy skills among school students have remained fairly stable across the board over the past four years, despite the extra billions of dollars invested to lift standards.

The latest results from the national literacy and numeracy tests released today show little improvement in average scores, and falls in numeracy and writing.

Year 3 students this year scored higher in reading, spelling, grammar and puncutation compared to year 3 students in 2008, and the class of 2012 also scored higher on average in spelling, grammar and punctuation.

Year 5 students in 2012 also scored higher than the year 5 class four years ago, in reading, spelling, and numeracy but year 7 students only improved in grammar and punctuation while the average scores of year 9 students were about the same.

Writing scores fell compared to last year in all year levels, except year 3 where scores were stable.

The National Assessment Program - Literacy And Numeracy (NAPLAN) tests were held in May this year in reading, spelling, grammar and puncutation, and numeracy for all students in years 3, 5, 7 and 9.

School Education Minister Peter Garrett said about 92 per cent of the 1 million students who sat the tests met national minimum standards in literacy and numeracy, and the improvement in year 3 results suggested the focus on early childhood over the past few years was starting to show dividends.

“But the results also show that there is a long way to go in meeting the national goal of reaching the world's top five by 2025 in maths, reading and science and for equity in school performance,” he said.

Parents will receive their child's individual results on NAPLAN tests from Monday and the information for schools will be updated on the MySchool website early next year.

The NAPLAN summary report for 2012 is available here.