http://schoolreport.stuff.co.nz/index.html
Please could I explain a couple of things to help you interpret the data on the school report spreadsheet.
The letters stand for
WB = Well below the standard
B = Below the standard
At = At the standrad
A = Above the standard
Our 2011 results are...
Freeville School Reading
WB
|
B
|
At
|
A
|
| 10.0% | 10.0% | 31.0% | 49.0% |
Freeville School Writing
WB
|
B
|
At
|
A
|
| 12.0% | 28.0% | 46.0% | 14.0% |
Freeville School Mathematics
WB
|
B
|
At
|
A
|
| 8.0% | 18.0% | 55.0% | 19.0% |
As you look at these figures please understand these things about the data. The standards are not based on any standardised measure. They are an overall teacher judgement (OTJ) against a somewhat confusing set of criteria.
Take our reading data for instance. The figures above do not show you that between 40% and 50 % of our six year old children are not reading at the level we want for them. But through the amazing efforts of all our teaching staff, our reading discovery teacher, teacher aides, support staff, special needs coordinator, parents, junior tutors, volunteer parents and grandparents, aunties, uncles older siblings (you get the idea I hope that this is a team effort) and indeed by the children themselves and through a variety of different programmes like Lexia, Rainbow Reading, Reading Recovery, Raz Reading, Story Box...(etc, the list goes on) and through the efforts of classroom teachers as they develop individual supports to meet individual children's needs, and through people like Elizabeth who make our library attractive and exciting (please I hope you are getting the picture of the complexity and influence on a child's reading progress from many different people and activities) and with the integration of digital technology to help motivate children...
... that with all that input 100% of our Year 8 students leave Freeville reading at the top level we can test them against and are ready for the challenges of High School and reading for meaning and pleasure throughout their lives. The data in the table shows you a summary of the whole school it in no way describes progress.
Another issue with the data is that there is no consistency between schools about whether schools are reporting an "achieved" level or a "learning at" level. At Freeville School we have chosen to report the "learning at" level. For example... We choose to report that a child is at the national standard given a particular level ( Year 6 for example) beacuse we say that is the level the child is "learning at". Other schools might be reporting a mastery level assessment so if they looked at our same data they would report that child as being below the standard. The wording of the standards has not made it clear to schools how to make this distinction. Keep this in mind if you do decide to make comparisons between schools based on this data.
Writing is another can of worms altogether. We already know that writing lags behind reading ability anyway. Your average two year old is able to read the "M" and know that it is for McDonalds but they very possibly cannot write the word. The difference between a reading OTJ and a writing OTJ is that we have somewhat more objective testing measures available for reading than we do for writing.
Maths has other issues again related to the tests and methods used to come to an Overall Teacher Judgement.
Teachers are not upset about being accountable they are upset about misleading information being communicated. And about the complexity of children's progress being watered down to one figure that actually tells you nothing at all about the quality of the school nor about your child's individual progress. Our staff have good information about your child and can talk to you specifically about the next learning steps your child needs to take to make progress. In fact our children are also very good at knowing how they are achieving and what they need to do next. The Student Led Conferences we had just this week were a testament to this.
We also want to defend the use of Overall Teacher Judgements (OTJ). This is at least slightly better than placing overemphasis on the results of one test. The OTJ is based on the teacher's knowledge of the individual child and their performance over an extended period in a variety of situations.
Given the concerns expressed here we believe that although our Freeville data is accurate we would urge caution about any conclusions about the school being drawn from these numbers. Making valid compariosn between us and any other school would be just impossible. Come and visit, talk to staff, talk to the children and read our ERO report to get a better picture of what we are actually achieving.
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