: Introduction
Loading Images
Place
Overview: Students at year 4 had substantial difficulty in locating New Zealand places on a map and in finding countries such as the United States and the United Kingdom on a map. They did not fare much better in discussing international issues. The positive here is that growth is seen in these tasks from year 4 to year 8. There is still clearly room to grow, but year 8 students performed substantially better than year 4 students. Between 2005 and 2009, there was a very small decline in performance at both year levels.
The assessments included eight tasks investigating students’ knowledge, understandings and processes in the area of 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 world.

Identifying locations within New Zealand or around the world proved particularly difficult for year 4 students, as was discussing issues or providing explanations of concepts of place and environment. Students had great difficulty in identifying photos of New Zealand places and locating them on a map (Spot the Dot, p28). They also had great difficulty in finding other countries on a map (World Wide, p27). Only one quarter of year 4 students could locate the United States, and only 20% could find the UK. The good news here is that moderately strong growth is seen from year 4 to year 8, particularly with regard to finding New Zealand locations. Discussing international issues such as refugees was also hard for the year 4 students, and substantial growth was seen from year 4 to year 8 (Refugees, p26).

Seven tasks were identical for both year 4 and year 8. One task was administered only to year 8 students. Three are trend tasks (fully described with data for both 2005 and 2009), and five are link tasks only partially described here so that they might be used in a later administration.

The tasks are presented in two sections: trend tasks, then link tasks. Within each section, tasks administered to both year 4 and year 8 students are presented first, followed by tasks administered only to year 8 students.

Place and environment tasks showed a moderate gain from year 4 to year 8. Averaged across 67 task components administered to both year 4 and year 8 students, 13% more year 8 than year 4 students succeeded with these components.

On the trend tasks, there was a small decline at both year 4 and year 8 between 2005 and 2009. Averaged across 34 trend task components attempted by year 4 students in both years, 2% fewer students succeeded in 2009 than in 2005. At year 8, also with 34 trend task components included, again a 2% average decline was seen from 2005 to 2009.
  
Loading Images