Deputy Principal of Achievement Mr Stephen Tisch Deputy Principal
Ōtūmoetai College is pleased to announce it has secured centrally funded professional learning in the area of practices and outcomes for assessment at the Year 9 and 10 level. The goal is to build an assessment capable system where the use of the evidence we choose to gather is relevant to student needs and is driven by the decisions we want to make to improve teaching and learning. We’ll be working with an Education Adviser in assessment from the New Zealand Council of Educational Research (NZCER) - the home of the Progressive Assessment Test (PAT) and research-based thinking about effective assessment practice. This year we acted on advice from NZCER and administered the PATs later in Term 1 so that students were more settled into school routines. We also tailored the choice of test for each student to better reflect student achievement levels. Pleasingly, on average, both Year 9 and Year 10 cohorts at Ōtūmoetai College achieved above the National Reference Group. Further analysis of subgroups has identified opportunities for improvement and we welcome working with NZCER to develop an assessment capable system and improve student achievement outcomes. Use of the Writing Framework is being led by our Social Studies staff. Analysis of the students writing samples identifies strengths and opportunities. Reassuringly, 89% of our junior writers can effectively plan a piece of writing. Moreover, they have no problem generating prose under time pressure and in separating their ideas into individual sentences. 95% of our junior students were able to communicate their ideas in a paragraph of at least four complete sentences; 77% wrote at least 120 words in fifteen minutes. Evidently then, we need to focus on improving the quality of the abundant words and sentences we know our junior students can produce. As has been the case up and down the country, COVID-19 has significantly disrupted students’
progress with NCEA. From field trips not happening, to lack of devices and less than optimal distance learning arrangements to name a few. Both NZQA and Ōtūmoetai College have made adjustments in response which will help students to still be able to achieve their achievement goals this year. Our Academic Support Mentor, Mrs Stacey Shefferd, along with other supporting staff, has facilitated two workshops targeting students who were identified as being at risk of not achieving their NCEA based on credits predictions. These students were offered additional learning opportunities to help them increase their credit totals. As more students are identified, more workshops will be offered. NCEA and external NZQA examinations are new to most of the Year 11 students. To help them prepare, our Specialist Classroom Teacher, Mrs Carolyn Dwight, has been sharing How to Study for Exams (see included in this edition of Reflections) during a series of presentations at school. Our school senior examinations are planned to start on Friday September 11th and go till Friday 18th September. These will be important on a number of fronts: (1) simulating the external NZQA examinations, (2) generating evidence for external standards if necessary and (3) giving an indication of current achievement levels. We wish our NCEA students all the best as, together, we make the most of an eventful year.
11
17
