More than 86,800 students across South Australia will start National Assessment Program – Literacy and Numeracy (NAPLAN) testing today.

Held in schools across Australia each year, including 718 sites in South Australia, the online testing assesses students in years 3, 5, 7 and 9.

NAPLAN can help evaluate whether young people are reaching important numeracy and literacy goals. The assessment is tailored to each year level, assessing skills in writing, reading, spelling, grammar, punctuation and numeracy.

South Australia continues to be on an overall improving trajectory, particularly in year 3 which demonstrates the focus on the early years is playing a significant role.

This year, the testing period is between Wednesday 13 March and Monday 25 March and is the second year the test will be held in term 1, after it was moved from May to March in 2023.

The move ensures NAPLAN results are made available earlier in the year to better inform teaching and learning programs, and to identify any additional supports students might need.

Salisbury Primary School Principal Shane Atkins said in the lead up to NAPLAN, we remind students and their families that it is just one part of the school program that we use to support students learning journey and all we want is for everyone to try their best.

“NAPLAN provides us with valuable insights that help us identify areas of misconception and areas where additional support may be needed to ensure every student reaches their full potential, no matter their starting point”.

“By doing NAPLAN in term 1, it provides the school, staff, and students a snapshot of individual and year level cohort understanding. These results allow us to tailor our teaching strategies for the rest of the year to better meet student individual learning needs”.

It’s through reviewing NAPLAN results over the past two years that the State Government has introduced the Mathematics Improvement Strategy in schools.

The focus on numeracy saw the inaugural Numeracy Summit and an overhaul of the curriculum, starting with mathematics. A numeracy check for students was also introduced – similar to the literacy checks introduced in 2017 which saw improvements in literacy proficiencies in students.

Preliminary results in all domains, except writing, will be provided to schools about four weeks after the test period ends.