PPTA has heard that some members are worried that the changes to external moderation announced by the Minister at PPTA Conference and by NZQA in SecQual 2011/055 will increase rather than reduce teachers’ work.
PPTA is confident that this will not be the case.
Random sample of 500 students will replace the current process
The random sample of 500 students nationally across the three levels of NCEA, all of whose work will be collected for moderation, will replace the current process whereby each school has to randomly sample eight students for a range of standards across all subjects, and then all subjects have to collect some of this work.
Schools will be told at the beginning of the year which of their students, if any, are part of the sample of 500, and teachers of those students will then simply collect all of their assessed work, with a copy of the assessment task and schedule, and provide it to their principal’s nominee.
There are approximately 400 secondary schools, it is likely that for each year, some schools may not have any students in the random sample, and most schools would have one or possibly two students. This is the sample that will generate a national agreement rate.
Targeted sample process will be used to assist teachers in their assessment practice
The other sample is a targeted sample and most schools and departments will have far less work to collect. Where there have been problems in the past, some schools or departments may have to collect more student work, and sometimes a particular standard that has proved problematic will be targeted for the whole country. This targeted sample is to help teachers get their assessment right, not to generate an agreement rate.
Internal moderation using Optional Teacher Selected Evidence
PPTA’s NCEA Workload Taskforce also initiated the idea that sending in Optional Teacher Selected Evidence could be used as part of internal moderation, announced in the same circular. This will mean that an isolated teacher such as the only teacher of a subject in a school or a teacher in a rural school will not have to cross-check assessment with a colleague in another school, but instead will be able to send the work to NZQA. This will save them a lot of time.
PPTA Collective News December 2011
