It has been taught at this school for a number of years 33 Students have indicated they would like to learn it 32 There are Ministry resources to support the teaching and learning of this language 32 The same language is offered at a local secondary school 22 Someone in our school community is able to teach it 21 Funding is available from the Ministry to support it 17 This language represents the culture of many of our students 15 Our school community has asked for it to be taught 7 Other factors (not listed) were mentioned by 23 percent of principals. Almost half of these factors related to Asian languages, e.g. having a sister school in Japan, an association with the Confucius Institute, or support from the Korean Ministry of Education. As well as existing staff members’ international language teaching abilities being a factor in deciding which language to offer, the ability to teach an international language was reportedly considered by a majority of principals during appointment processes for classroom teachers, with 5 percent saying they ‘always’ considered this, 51 percent saying they ‘sometimes’ did, and 44 percent saying that it was ‘not a consideration’. Principals’ reports of which international languages were offered to Year 8 students in 2016 are shown in Figure 3.20. French and Spanish were the two most commonly offered languages, followed by Japanese and Mandarin. Other international languages specified by principals included Cook Island Māori, Tokelauan, Tongan, Cantonese, Hindi, Italian, Norwegian, Croatian and Dutch. Figure 3.20 Percentage frequency of principals’ responses to which international languages were offered to Year 8 students in 2016 International language programme delivery at the school level Just over half (56 percent) of the principals indicated the international language programme in their school is delivered over the whole year. Smaller proportions responded that their programme was delivered over one school term (20 percent), over part of a school term (12 percent), or over two terms (10 percent). Fifty-eight percent of principals said their school had a co-ordinated programme for teaching an international language across the different year levels. Principals’ ratings of their school’s provision of opportunities for Year 8 students to learn an international language are shown in Figure 3.21. Thirty-nine percent of principals rated their school’s provision as ‘very good’ or Figure 3.21 Percentage frequency of principals’ ratings of their school’s provision of opportunities for Year 8 students to learn an international language
6 Achievement in Te Teo Māori for Priority Learner Groups This chapter reports on achievement for priority learners: Māori students, Pasifika students and students with special education needs – groups of students who have been identified as historically not experiencing success in New Zealand’s education system. Achievement patterns for each group are examined separately. The final section of the chapter presents summary statistics for the students in each group who scored above the national average at Year 4 and Year 8. As for the previous chapter, any reported differences between groups are statistically significant unless stated otherwise. Achievement patterns for Māori students Māori students participating in the study Table 6.1 provides the number of Māori students who were administered the TRM assessment at each year level by gender and school decile band. At each year level, Māori students represented about 25 percent of the national sample. Table 6.1 Composition of the Māori samples for the 2016 NMSSA TRM assessment Number of Māori students Year 4 N = 564 Year 8 N = 511 Gender Girls 268 229 Boys 296 282 School decile Low 203 192 Mid 247 231 High 114 88