Editor
There is nothing quite like leaving home to polish the lens Teaching professionals in New Zealand have long complained through which you view your own country. In June, I attended that our curriculum, under the standardised system, was the EduTECH conference in Sydney (see page 21 for full eroding. As the focus on high stakes performance measures coverage). There were some excellent international speakers and gathered momentum, teachers were shelving pursuit of children’s several from Australia. Presenters, assuming the audience would individual strengths to concentrate on increasing the number be dominated by Australians, tailored of children reaching a set standard. their presentations accordingly. They Our planet faces major As Yong Zhao would say we were were addressing school leaders and in pursuit of the average, not the teachers locked into a standardised challenges environmentally, excellent. system called NAPLAN – the culturally, demographically, We now have a chance to return National Assessment Programme – to the curriculum and use it to build Literacy and Numeracy. the individual strengths of our young politically, ethically, financially NAPLAN carries all the objections people. We can pursue inquiry that our own national standards and socially. learning which experts tell us is exactly s y s te m c ar r i e d, on ly wors e. the approach needed to encourage Assessments are national tests. Like national standards, the problem solving, critical thinking, collaboration and learner results of every school are made public and schools can be agency. Never before has the notion of life long learning been compared on their results. Two Ministers spoke at the conference. more relevant as we enter a world of artificial intelligence and Each time the word NAPLAN was mentioned it was echoed by robotic engineering. As automation transforms the world of work a doleful groan from the sizeable audience. It reminded me of our young people will be asked to continually learn new skills similar reactions to Education Ministers across the last decade and be creative in their responses to new inventions. here in NZ. Feelings of oppression, powerlessness and low morale Our planet faces major challenges environmentally, culturally, attended every new announcement that further entrenched the demographically, politically, ethically, financially and socially. system that was slowly eroding the curriculum and wearying These are all problems which our young people will inherit. the profession. Aspirations to average will not help them find answers. It will It already seems an age since New Zealand left behind the take the application of multiple talents, creative thinking and shackles of its own standardised system and the EduTECH collaborative action to solve these problems. Providing a broad conference hosted many speakers condemning standardised range of curriculum options from which our young people can approaches to learning and assessment. The rationale for the develop their own questioning and thinking skills is one thing approach has inevitably centred on lifting achievement for teachers can do to give them a platform for success. disadvantaged students. It is claimed that by applying a test, or Many schools in New Zealand are doing this already. Learning standard it is possible to generate data which identifies in which is ubiquitous in many schools, it is democratic and schools are areas students are in ‘deficit’. Once the deficit is recognised, it developing self-managed learners. Now, without the distractions seems teachers can then ‘fix’ it. of obsessive data collection and analysis, schools can train all of Opponents of the system claim this is exactly the wrong their attention on these very worthwhile pursuits. By discarding way forward. Learning, they say, is about building on existing deficit thinking, children too will be freed from their own strengths, not weaknesses. It is not about ‘fixing’ the reading weaknesses and able to focus on those areas they are passionate problems for the dyslexic but seeking out their strengths which about, whether that be science, arts or culture, performing arts may be found in the creative arts or some other curriculum or sport. They are all necessary in a happy, balanced world. subject. Professor Yong Zhao colourfully pointed out that left in It’s good to be home again and to know we are right now faced his home (rural) village in China, he would have been an abject with unbridled opportunity to shape a future for education that failure. The benchmark for success, his NAPLAN, as he expressed can truly develop the unique talents of our young people. If we it, was being able to competently ride a buffalo, a skill for which build a system to keep our young people engaged and empowered he was singularly untalented. ‘That’s how I became a professor,’ they are sure to build the best future possible for our nation and he said, ‘because I failed at home!’ our world.