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Education ministers around the country are meeting today to discuss a proposal to bring back pen and paper writing tests for NAPLAN. The tests for years 5, 7 and 9 was first computerised in 2018, with recent results showing a national decline in writing skills. The New South Wales government wants to see the tests return to handwritten papers from 2028. Education expert Adam Voigt says the change could bolster students learning skills.

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00:02I think what we know about learning is that kids learn to read and write more effectively
00:06when they take their time.
00:08And pen and paper kind of makes you do that.
00:10It kind of forces you to slow down, to think about your editing.
00:12You don't get, like Microsoft Word, a little red line under it when you make a mistake.
00:16So you've got to think more deeply about it, which is a good thing.
00:19I think what I'd like to make sure we do, though, is we don't obsess about just making
00:22sure that kids aren't cheating or getting the best possible score.
00:25This is about actually stopping and saying, what do we really want our kids to build
00:29as skills and young people, and then making sure that the school's set up to make sure
00:34that we allow our teachers to focus on that.
00:36So we know that kids effectively are spending too much time on screens, and schools can be
00:41a place where we can say, you know what, let's give them six or seven hours a day where that
00:44doesn't matter so much.
00:45And the phone ban, for instance, and the social media ban are all kind of little shavings off
00:49on that problem, which is a good thing.
00:52The bit we've got to just be a little careful around is that technology's got an upside.
00:55And so what we know is that it provides a really great opportunity for kids who are
00:59neurodivergent, who are having sort of learning challenges to access learning and school
01:03education, where otherwise they wouldn't.
01:05So provided we don't go in with blanket bans and try to make it popular, and actually stop
01:11and do the sophisticated thinking about what are we really trying to do with our education
01:15system, there's potential in this.
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