Short assessments
Online sets of 5 to 10 items on a reading stimulus, language conventions or numeracy skills, for Stages 1 to 5.
Assessment link
Short assessments and a Quick Reference Guide (QRG) are accessed via the Short assessments dashboard. The dashboard allows teachers to search for assessments by area, stage, outcome, focus, and assessment name.
See the Running the assessment section for further information on administering the assessments and technical support.
Purpose of the assessment
Short assessments are designed to assess targeted outcomes and progressions in literacy and numeracy. They may be implemented at any point in time throughout the teaching and learning cycle to gauge student understanding around particular concepts or skills. Short assessments complement other assessment practices and support explicit teaching.
They are designed to:
- identify student misconceptions
- support planning and programming
- provide immediate results and feedback to students and teachers
- complement other assessments
- provide links to teaching strategies.
Data provided
Short assessments provide specific actionable data related to key skills and concepts.
Focus areas
Short assessments align to strategically selected English and mathematics syllabus outcomes and literacy and numeracy progressions in the areas of:
- Reading: comprehension, reading processes and vocabulary
- Language conventions: grammar, punctuation and spelling
- Numeracy: number and algebraic thinking.
Results and feedback
Both students and teachers receive immediate results and feedback at time of completion:
- overall score and marked answers provided to students and teachers
- answer feedback provided to students with explanations of reasons for errors or possible misconceptions (immediate/delayed)
- samples of students’ working out collected in the numeracy assessment (optional).
These sources can form part of data triangulation practice.
Informing next steps
Short assessments can be used effectively at multiple levels.
Evidence assists with:
- identifying students’ understanding of some of the big ideas in literacy and numeracy
- selecting differentiation strategies based on student need.
Evidence assists with:
- identifying students who require targeted instruction
- identifying areas of focus for the class and opportunities to re-teach skills or content.
Running the assessment
Short assessments and a Quick Reference Guide (QRG) are accessed via the Short assessments dashboard. The dashboard provides links to:
- The assessments, administered online as Microsoft Forms. Teachers can choose to provide students with immediate feedback or turn it off in Settings and provide feedback another way.
- The QRG, provided for technical support, including instructions on how to create an offline PDF version of the assessments.
Support
For additional support, email online.assessments@det.nsw.edu.au