Clarifying Info Introduction


	: Introduction

The assessments included 11 tasks that allowed students to show their skills in clarifying information needs through analysing what information was required, planning how to obtain the information, and selecting or developing appropriate questions.

Six tasks were identical for both year 4 and year 8 students, two were attempted only by year 4 students and three were attempted only by year 8 students. Three are trend tasks (fully described with data for both 2001 and 2005), three are released tasks (fully described with data for 2005 only) and five are link tasks (to be used again in 2009, so only partially described here).

The tasks are presented in the following order:

• trend tasks attempted by both year 4 and year 8 students;
• trend tasks attempted by only year 4 or year 8 students;
• released tasks attempted by both year 4 and year 8 students;
• released tasks attempted by only year 4 or year 8 students;
• link tasks attempted by both year 4 and year 8 students;
• link tasks attempted by only year 4 or year 8 students.

Year 8 students enjoyed more success than year 4 students. Averaged across 43 task components attempted by both years, 14 percent more year 8 than year 4 students succeeded well with these components. Year 8 students scored higher on 39 components and lower on four components.

Averaged across nine trend task components attempted by year 4 students in both 2001 and 2005, three percent fewer students succeeded in 2005 than in 2001. This is a small decrease. At year 8 level, again with nine components included, on average there was no change between 2001 and 2005. Both of these trend results should be interpreted cautiously because they are based on just nine components of two trend tasks.



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