Data interpretation

As a school leader, a key consideration when implementing a new approach, or evaluating existing practices, is the effective use of data. A new support resource outlines 7 steps to guide school leaders in using data for monitoring and evaluation. Find out more in today’s article.

The winners of the 2023 Teacher Awards have been announced. In this article, we speak with the winner of the Improving Student Learning and Progress Award, Catherine Young from Newman College in Western Australia, about how she uses data to monitor student progress and evaluate the effectiveness of teaching.

In his second article on data-driven school improvement, Patrick Sanders from Brighton Grammar School shares examples of how staff have used data to influence decision-making and improve the teaching, learning and wellbeing of the school community.

In the first of two articles on data-driven school improvement, Patrick Sanders (Associate Head of the Crowther Centre, Curriculum and Assessment at Brighton Grammar School) shares the steps that have been taken to capture better quality, and more actionable, data to inform decision-making.

Findings from an action research project in three West Australian schools suggest the use of quality mentor texts when explicitly teaching how to write narratives can improve students’ storytelling ability. Ron Gorman and Dr Sandy Heldsinger share more details about the teaching and assessment strategies used, and samples of student writing.

In this Q&A we speak with Dr Katie Richardson about looking at student assessment data from different angles, identifying patterns in data, and why working collaboratively to interpret assessment data is a useful technique.

Our connections with others have an influence on our own behaviour. Social networks form in lots of different contexts, including at school and in the workplace. Social Network Analysis (SNA) is now offering insights into these important, but often invisible relationships.

Scotland has implemented a new approach to assessing children’s progress with the launch of an online national assessment tool that places teacher professional judgement at the centre. We find out what this means for educators in this episode of Global Education.

In today’s article, we find out how leaders and teachers at a Canberra primary school are using a range of data to identify and meet the needs of children from preschool – to great effect.

In the first of two articles exploring how educators are using local early years data to inform practice, Teacher finds out how one Adelaide primary school is bolstering students and their families as they transition to school.