Erica Stanford: Education Minister on the new data revealing a significant portion of Year 8 students are behind in writing

The Minister of Education says much more needs to be done, as more Kiwi kids fall behind in school.

New data shows just 24 percent of Year 8 students have achieved the curriculum level in writing.

The Government's hoping to turn that around with a writing action plan, which includes tools for handwriting, literacy and reading for teachers and students.

Erica Stanford says the Government's new English curriculum aims to 'plug the gap' among Kiwi students.

"This is for those children that are in Years 6 to 8, who will not have all of the benefits of those things coming through primary."

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:03):
Much. It's right. Standard techs fees number is nine two
ninety two. Had it very so on that later on
more bad news unfortunately for you. On the kids writing skills,
a new study out today shows that one quarter of
year eights, so year eight is what is that the
last year of intermediate. One quarter of the kids in
the last year of intermediate can write at the level
that's expected by the government. One quarter. The stats show

(00:25):
that writing skills decline the older that kids get, so
forty one percent of kids in year three are at
the expected level, thirty three percent in year six, and
then by the time they're in year eight it's less
than a quarter of them. The Education Minister's answer to
that is a new make it Right action plan and
ERICA stand for the education ministers with us, Hey, Erica, Hello,
how are you? I'm well? Thank you?

Speaker 2 (00:45):
You know what?

Speaker 1 (00:45):
It blows my mind that we've tolerated this consistent decline
in our standards for so long. How has this happened?

Speaker 2 (00:52):
Well, the first thing to say is no longer, because
we have been looking at these dot points on the
decline graph for decades and doing nothing about it. These
this study was done in twenty twenty four. So I've
asked for baselines, baselines against the new curriculum expectations. So
to be fair, this is against the expectations we now

(01:12):
have against the new curriculum where we want children and
know they need to be benchmarked against the rest of
the world. And so it has dropped slightly from you know,
like thirty thirty percent under the old measure against the
old curriculum which was you know, britt wafflely and vague,
and when we are more specific and have higher expectations
compared to the rest of the world, you know, we're
down around twenty four. So that's the first thing to say.

(01:33):
It is against the expectations of the new curriculum, but
it was done last year before we introduced all of
our reforms this year. So I've got these now baselines.
So when we go out at the end of this
year and assess again, we will now be able to
plot each year against the before shot, and the before
shot is grim.

Speaker 1 (01:50):
You will be able when you're at the improvements. Yeah,
your plan make it right? Well, how does that work?
What's what's the basics of this?

Speaker 2 (01:57):
Well, essentially it's plugging a gap in writing. So we
already have the new English Curriculum Structured Literacy mandate at
all of the intervention teachers, the professional learning and development.
This is for those children that are in year six
to eight who will not have all of the benefits
of those things coming through primary that they've already missed

(02:17):
it there at sex six to eight, and their parents
are looking at this decline in maths and literacy and thinking, well,
they're about to go to high school. And we always
said we will wrap around these children. So the Writing
Acceleration Tool is based on one hundred and twenty thousand
children at intermediate school getting additional supports through a digital
tool which helps them to practice and reinforce their writing

(02:40):
alongside the teacher doing their explicit teaching. There's a new
handwriting guide out for our primary school kids which is
handwriting is absolutely crucial to reading and developing literacy. And
we're also and this is a real shame we have
to do this, but we do. We have to train
a teacher in every single intermediate and high school in
structured literal, which is essentially teaching kids to read. And

(03:03):
it's a it's a not a great place to say
that we have to do that. Because that, but that
shows you the level of decline of our students at
secondary schools are saying we need to teach kids to read,
so we'll be providing that to secondary schools as well.

Speaker 1 (03:16):
Erica, how do you feel about what I considered to
be reasonably unfair accusations that you that you are some
sort of a racist for taking set all Mai words
out of these early learning reading books.

Speaker 2 (03:27):
Oh look, it's you know what happens when you're a politician, right,
you know there are experts on one side that say
one thing, experts on the other that say another. I
think we tried to find a pragmatic way through. There
was never really going to please some people, and you
saw that last week. But essentially these books are to
teach children the it's called graphemes and phonemes, which are

(03:48):
essentially the letter by letter, sound by sound, how you
sound out words. There's seventy five books, twenty six of
them have Marti words and them nothing's changing. Yeah, we
just have to write another eighteen and we're going to
make sure we use Mary words.

Speaker 1 (04:00):
I think that's how you feel about it, because because look,
I was reading the Sunday papers and Tracy Watkins, who
I actually have a lot of respect for, has basically
had to crack at you for it, which I was
very disappointed in because I thought your argument stacks up.
You are, you are almost like annoyingly woke to me,
and so I don't think that you deserved it at all.
And I just wonder if sometimes we're too quick to

(04:22):
jump to must be a racist.

Speaker 2 (04:24):
Well, I think I mean, to be honest with you,
when I made these decisions, I thought the opposite was
going to happen, because we created an entire series in
Today a Marti to teach kids how to read in
the Marrii language. We've also from next year going to
have in the English curriculum how to pronounce the Mary
letter sounds and vowel sounds. So when kids do come
across a Mari word, which we do in everyday life,

(04:46):
and you and I might see the word fun out
and know how to say it, but they don't. So
now they'll be able to decode in both languages. But
you know, no one picks up on the good news,
They just go straight to the hey. In the new
books you're on, including Marty names and place names, well
actually that's a lot more than the existing books because most,
in fact, threequarters they're almost three quarters of the existing

(05:08):
books or maybe two thirds don't have any Marty words
at all. So I've tried to find a really pragmatic
way through.

Speaker 1 (05:14):
But not being rewarded for it, unfortunately.

Speaker 2 (05:17):
I think the frustrating thing is, if I'm gonna be
honest with you, is that I just want kids to
learn to read. That's what I care about. I'm not
interested in a culture war. I want kids to learn
to read, and we have been failing miserably, and we've
got to turn it around. Now.

Speaker 1 (05:32):
If you carry on being like this, you realize that
the rumors about you being a future leader is just
going to ramp up.

Speaker 2 (05:38):
Ay, Well, yes, what was that keeps writing that? Yes?

Speaker 1 (05:47):
What I see you sounded like that was awkward.

Speaker 2 (05:50):
Well it was because you're the one that keeps writing
about it. I'm just trying to do my job being
a great master of education.

Speaker 1 (05:55):
It's not me. It was Andrey of Vance. Anyway, Listen,
thank you so much. And when I say Andrew Vance,
and Andrew Vance, Oliver Hartwitch and all of these people, Erica,
thanks so much. Go well, Erica, Stanford Education Minister. There's
more on that, by the way, because Luxon will just
be like, oh, can you please stop talking about it,
but everybody continues to talk about it, so we'll give
you the next installment on it. For more from Heather
Duplessy Allen Drive, Listen live to news Talks. It'd be

(06:18):
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