Reading literacy: middle primary Publications
Publication Details
In 2020, 71 percent of ākonga Year 5 in New Zealand demonstrated they had reasonably sound reading comprehension appropriate for their schooling level.
Author(s): Educational Measurement and Assessment, Ministry of Education
Date Published: February 2024
Summary
Indicator Description
Reading literacy of ākonga Year 5 as measured by the Progress in International Reading Literacy Study, PIRLS.
PIRLS focuses on two overarching purposes that account for most of the reading undertaken by children who are middle primary schooling: reading for literary experience and reading to acquire and use information.
PIRLS 2021 defines reading literacy as:
"Reading literacy is the ability to understand and use those written language forms required by society and/or valued by the individual. Readers can construct meaning from texts in a variety of forms. They read to learn, to participate in communities of readers in school and everyday life, and for enjoyment." [Mullis & Martin, 2019]
Why this is important
Reading and understanding written text forms is fundamental to learning and to effective participation in society and the workforce. Ākonga can learn to think critically and creatively through reading and responding to texts. Ākonga with strong reading literacy will have more opportunities to progress their learning and have more confidence in and out of school.
This reading literacy achievement indicator reflects the extent to which students have developed an early foundation in reading from both their school and out-of-school experiences, reading both literary material and information sourced from articles and websites.
When is PIRLS implemented?
Starting in 2001, PIRLS assesses middle primary school students in about 60 countries or jurisdictions every five years. Apart from 2001 when New Zealand implemented after Northern Hemisphere countries, New Zealand and other Southern Hemisphere countries implement about four months before Northern Hemisphere countries. All countries implement around the end of the school year.
This indicator uses the year PIRLS was implemented in New Zealand rather than the international naming convention.
COVID-19 and reading literacy achievement
PIRLS 2021 ran during the COVID-19 pandemic. Despite the disruptions to schooling around the world, the PIRLS 2021 data collection was successful, including New Zealand. PIRLS 2021 cannot provide data on how students would have performed without COVID-19, as every country and its citizens were impacted. An analysis of New Zealand’s end-of-year achievement data from e–asTTLe found no evidence of moderate or large reductions in English-medium ākonga Year 5 reading progress. For students in the Auckland region where there had been multiple lockdowns, there was a very small drop in progress at Year 5 from 2019 to 2020.1
How are we going?
Ākonga Year 5 generally achieve above the PIRLS International Scale Centrepoint (or average) but while there was little change in their average performance over 20 years, New Zealand’s relativity with other countries has weakened. There are also fewer very strong readers among our ākonga Year 5 than in 2001 or 2005. While there was a small but significant decline in average achievement from 2010 to 2015, there was no change from 2015 to 2020 despite the disruptions of COVID-19. Furthermore, there was no change in achievement associated with either type of reading that was assessed–literary or informational reading–from 2015 to 2020.2
Figure 1. Mean reading literacy scores for ākonga Year 5, 2001–2020
Note: in keeping with national and international reporting, the trend line from 2015 to 2020 is shown with a broken line because there is some uncertainty around the true impact of the COVID-19 on country statistics.3
Benchmarks and reading literacy
PIRLS is designed to assess children’s reading comprehension skills. It can discriminate between those students who demonstrate very well-developed comprehension for their age and those who have weaker comprehension. The comprehension skills and strategies in PIRLS are assessed through articles, etasks, and stories, which may or may not be familiar to students in style, format, and length.
To illustrate what well-developed or weaker comprehension looks like, PIRLS uses four benchmarks on the achievement scale to show what children could do when reading the PIRLS texts and answering the assessment questions.
- Advanced International Benchmark – corresponding to a score of 625
- High International Benchmark – corresponding to a score of 550
- Intermediate International Benchmark – corresponding to a score of 475
- Low International Benchmark – corresponding to a score of 400.
For the reader:
The benchmarks are ‘cumulative’, with students who demonstrate the skills and strategies at a given benchmark also demonstrating those associated with the lower benchmarks. The benchmarks are fixed over time, so that comparisons can be made with student cohorts in previous cycles. For a full description, refer to Chamberlain & Forkert, 2023 p.25.
The Intermediate International Benchmark is the point to consider how well ākonga are progressing in their reading comprehension development, nationally and internationally, as the skills and comprehension processes at this level align with expectations of the New Zealand Curriculum (NZC) English language learning area Level 3 objectives, processes and strategies.
Ninety percent of ākonga Year 5 reached the Low International Benchmark in 2020 (Figure 2). Ākonga who did not reach this level typically had difficulty with locating and reproducing explicitly stated information and making simple inferences even when presented with stories or articles that were graded as easy for their year level.4
Figure 2. Percentage of ākonga Year 5 reaching the PIRLS reading benchmarks in 2020
Note: Standard errors (measure of variability) appear in parentheses
Eleven percent of ākonga Year 5 demonstrated advanced reading comprehension skills, achieving at or above the Advanced International Benchmark. Those who reached this level can read difficult texts and could for example, make inferences about complex information across different webpages while recognising redundant information.
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PIRLS
For queries about the Progress in International Reading Literacy Study (PIRLS) please email the: EMA Mailbox