Dr. Linda Bonne reflects on 30 years of the NZCER National Survey of schools, as the Tomorrow’s Schools Independent Taskforce’s review report is soon to be released.
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Read rest of post: NZCER National Survey of schools - 30 years on
Date posted: 7 November 2019
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At this time of year I’m remembering the questions we used to have in our school about the PATs - ‘Term 4 is coming up - what week shall we do the PATs in?’ ‘Have we got enough Test 3s for the Year 5s?’ ‘When’s the BOT report due - we need to have it sorted by then?’. You know those conversations I’m sure.
Read rest of post: PATs - doing what you've always done in term four?
Date posted: 5 November 2019
By Cathie Johnson
Focussed school-wide inquiry is a powerful way for school leaders to engage staff and make a difference for students’ learning outcomes.
Read rest of post: School-wide inquiry: how can leaders decide on a focus?
Date posted: 11 January 2019
At this time of year I’m remembering the questions we used to have in our school about the PATs - ‘Term 4 is coming up - what week shall we do the PATs in?’ ‘Have we got enough Test 3s for the Year 5s?’ ‘When’s the BOT report due - we need to have it sorted by then?’. You know those conversations I’m sure.
Read rest of post: PATs - doing what you've always done in term four?
Date posted: 25 September 2015
Improving learning means improving teaching - how can you use the data you gather for a teaching inquiry to improve teaching? After all, even though you may have a lot of teaching going on in your school, education is about learning and if there is no learning going on then there is no education.
Read rest of post: What improves learning?
Date posted: 10 September 2015
As Term 3 starts, you are probably getting ready to start gathering student achievement data. Not only will you want to use this data to measure the impact of the changes to teaching and learning you’ve made this year, but you may also want it to become the basis for your next focused inquiry.
Read rest of post: Using data as the basis for your focused inquiry
Date posted: 28 July 2015
When I was a principal I confess we only ever assessed using the recommended test for each year group and we measured progress by the stanine. We had no idea the tests were designed to give teachers rich, descriptive information about the level of the curriculum each student is working in, and, what their next steps should be.
Read rest of post: New, improved ways to use the PATs
Date posted: 18 November 2014
I was working with a school recently and left them feeling good about using STAR because they had found out about a whole lot of new ways to use the data. As one teacher said, ‘You don’t know what you don’t know’. They suggested I get this information out there, so here goes.
Question #1: Did you know you can choose any test for any child?
Read rest of post: Education adviser on ways to use STAR
Date posted: 6 November 2014
The PAT scale score is very useful when describing achievement and progress.
Read rest of post: More about scale scores
Date posted: 4 June 2014
You’ve tested with the PATs. You have the results. Exactly how much progress have your students made over the year and is this average, below average or accelerated for their year group?
Some questions for you:
- how well have they done since the last assessment?
- is their progress average, below average, or accelerated?
Read rest of post: Real progress from the PATS
Date posted: 29 May 2014