I think parents need to explain to their kids that exams are not something to become stressed over. They are done not to see who is the smartest but to tell the education dept what you know and what you dont so it helps them to teach the teachers how to be better and teach the kids the things they need to know.

My daughter is doing year 7 naplan. She was very anxious about. She struggles with her every day education and this was extra pressure on her and us. We brought her a naplan practice book and she really struggled to complete the questions. Our 15 year old son is completing year 9 naplan and is the opposite we have no issues with is education. But we could see he was stressed because he has other homework to complete. We also brought him a year 9 naplan practice book and he was stuck into trying to make sure he didn’t fail. I think it’s a total stress for our kids. I was at our local shopping centre and their were kids that were school aged and old enough to either complete grade 3 & 5 naplan but were obviously not doing it

My daughter is in Year 3 and completing NAPLAN this week. I don’t know why they need to tell the children that it is a test to see where they are sitting. I think they should just do them as ‘spot tests’ so the kids don’t have any time to worry about them. I think this would also give a more accurate representation of what each child can do.

We may not have had Kaplan though we did have other tests that compares us to other children in our grade across the state. It’s a good measure of where you are at and allows parents to begin seeing where the child has strengths. They can be a useful tool.

I think that Naplan testing is beneficial if you don’t pressure your kids about getting high scores.

I struggle to get my head around the whole naplan concept. Schools do everything they can to “fix” the results including keeping kids who won’t do so well at home. Surely the results they do get wouldn’t be very accurate?

Why do the young ones even need to know? Just treat it as a usual test and there shouldn’t be the issue of stress. I think naplan results are important to see how all kids are tracking, not just yours. It lets teachers know if they need to improve their teaching skills

Sorry but two years ago, unbeknown to me my oldest cried in car at school arrival she was so nervous about math naplan. And didn’t want to get out of car. I went into office. To see what to do.
I had to go to work to clean, for literally food on the table. And withdrawing my daughter, and her just having a normal school lesson day was best for us. Then I go to work. Wasn’t worth the stress in that moment. Plus another child in the car, my other daughter whom I had to walk in. Sometimes, just getting through the day is enough. I’m a single parent. It was just my decision in that moment.

to each their own, if my kid was to get anxious I can understand why they pull them out.

Good to have some sort of regular and standardised testing as long as no performance pressure is put on the kids.

You just have to do what is right for you.

Of course the government / ministry of Education likes to see all kids take part !

This year my daughter is giving NAPLAN test and she is very excited .no pressure from us as it just indicates where she stands and if she is lacking in any subject we will take care .

The theology behind NAPLAN is sound – early identification of literacy and numeracy difficulties. The problem with NAPLAN is that they don’t deliver the results in a timely way to enable teachers to actually use this information to help kids when they need it. The other problem is that it is not valid in many ways as children are taught to the test due to the public nature of the results. We will be pulling our kids from NAPLAN as I don’t think they are useful tests, they contribute to anxiety to children and stress to teachers.

My son always participated in NAPLAN however, our attitude and discussion was that the testing was not useful. I feel to the detriment of teaching our kids in the way they should be taught.

Maybe stop the stupid pointless NAPLAN testing. Teach the bloody kids how to read, write and spell and damn basic mental maths! That’s it stop all this other nonsense

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  • • mom19782016 replied
    • 28 Apr 2019 , 9:33 am

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  Couldn’t agree more than with your comment

Is this like the HSC when I did it?

My daughter will be participating this year, she hasn’t mentioned anything as yet, but we have always said that all you can do is your best, what ever that may be.

I think as long as you tell your kids its ok regardless of the result, majority of their anxiety may stem from not wanting to disappoint parents

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  • • Ellen replied
    • 11 Apr 2019 , 7:45 am

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  True ! Especially within the Asian culture, parents may have very high expectations.

It dosnt determine your kids life… parents should explain that. And not put any pressure at all for any certain result. And just be encouraging to do their best and that will do. If my kid had extreme anxiety about it. Id be dealing with the reasons behind that and not blaming a test. And try help my kid through whatever issues they were experiencing. Parents are in control of what expectations you project. You should just expect their best and if their best is below average. Thats ok. Cause we all know school is not the be all end all of being successful. I was a below average student in maths and English and now im an accounts payable manager of 15 people. And i still dont know my times tables.