Where in the World are We ?

The assessments included twelve tasks investigating students’ knowledge, understandings and processes in the area of social studies called place and environment. This area focuses on developing understanding of people’s interactions with places and the environment, and the ways in which people represent and interpret place and environment. Several of the national monitoring tasks explored students’ factual knowledge of New Zealand and the Pacific.

Seven tasks were identical for both year 4 and year 8. One task had overlapping versions for year 4 and year 8 students, with some parts common to both levels. Three tasks were administered only to year 4 students, and one was administered only to year 8 students. Five are trend tasks (fully described with data for both 1997 and 2001), three are released tasks (fully described with data for 2001 only), and four are link tasks (to be used again in 2005, so only partially described here).

The tasks are presented in the three sections: trend tasks, then released tasks and finally link tasks. Within each section, tasks administered (in whole or part) to both year 4 and year 8 students are presented first, followed by tasks administered only to year 4 students and then tasks administered only to year 8 students.

Averaged across 47 task components administered to both year 4 and year 8 students, 19 percent more year 8 than year 4 students succeeded with these components. Year 8 students performed better on 46 of the 47 components.

On the trend tasks, there was little evidence of change between 1997 and 2001. Averaged across 22 trend task components attempted by year 4 students in both years, 3 percent more students succeeded in 2001 than in 1997. Gains occurred on 18 of the 22 components. At year 8 level, with 30 trend task components included, 2 percent fewer students succeeded in 2001 than in 1997. Gains occurred on 11 of the 30 components.

Working in teams, students had good success in associating photographs with their countries of origin and various activity categories. Year 4 teams also did a reasonable job of demonstrating understanding of important differences between town and country life. Students showed less understanding of the information needs of immigrants, and quite limited knowledge of New Zealand and Pacific geography.