If the kid is interested in reading books, the test would not be so difficult IMO.

It's also up to the parents to encourage enjoyment from reading, however, I can empathise with how difficult that might be these days considering the available options for home entertainment.

Personally, I think I would have breezed the test at that age, for no other reason than Enid Blyton books being put in front of me.
The faraway tree series, The wishing chair, The famous five series, The secret seven...Enid Blyton was an absolute genius.
To be fair, I probably didn't get right into the more complex ones until aged 9 or 10.

Aussie wrote on Apr 29^th, 2013 at 8:28pm:



if we put all these year 3 kids in a race would they all finish at the same time? I doubt it and we accept that......yet we put a book in front of them and expect them all to read it at the same rate...pathetic..

all kids have different levels of concentration....just the same as they all have different levels of comprehension..

thats what make education so tricky...

it isnt like a conveyor belt rolling off cars to be sprayed..each one the same as the last...


and remember this is all about the schools.. bugger the kids.

cods wrote on Apr 29^th, 2013 at 9:45pm:



take a good look at me cods - This cynical, jaded attitude is the end result of an education spent with human boat anchors wasting my time.  For a long time, I thought it was great that I didn't need to put in any effort throughout my schooling.  All these people stressing about exams, assignments, homework - I never stressed because it was always easy.  Easy isn't even the word - It was often intuitive.  Good marks, zero effort - cool, right?  Wrong. The mind still needs to be exercised or it will decay.   
I wonder how many other young minds have been set on cruise-control by the education system.  I wonder whether ignorance, indiffernce and idiocy are really what we should be cultivating in our schools.  With HBO, MTV, twitter etc if there's one demographic that's amply catered for in our society, it's the braindead.  Can't we let education be for the intelligent?

If you don't want more people turning out like me, perhaps it would pay to stimulate young minds, instead of turning them all into a bland, homogeneous mush.

Yes, they are given their results and their place within the school and among all the kids in the country who sat the test.
You can also see the Naplan results for almost every school in the country at the Myschool website.

Amadd wrote on Apr 29^th, 2013 at 10:30pm:



That's what I'm saying.  But people lose interest for different reasons.  Some because it's too hard, some because it's too easy, some for other reasons entirely.  But they are all crammed in together, taught uniformly and expected to all reach their potential?

Amadd wrote on Apr 29^th, 2013 at 10:40pm:



I'd go further - I'd say the education system isn't worth the paper it's written on.  The test in itself I'm indifferent to. It's just a measure to tell us what we already know - some people are smart, some people aren't.

I believe in the three R's as a necessary base. Beyond that, I think that personal interest is more equipped to extract the best out of a person.

No I don't think it's right to have a kid labelled as a dummy because of various reasons.