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Multimodal literacy and large-scale literacy tests: Curriculum relevance and responsibility

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Abstract

An educational chasm divides the Australian National Curriculum, which is permeated with detailed requirements for students to develop multimodal literacy, and the very substantially mono-modal literacy of the reading tests of the Australian National Assessment Program in Literacy and Numeracy (NAPLAN). This paper proposes that mandated centralised largescale testing approaches to literacy assessment, such as NAPLAN, need to be re-thought and reformed to be consistent with curriculum requirements in relation to multimodal literacy and with the multimodal nature of international tests such as Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS) and the Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) and, most importantly, to influence and support teachers in ensuring that students acquire essential multimodal literacy competencies in the twenty-first century.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute for Learning Sciences and Teacher Education, Australian Catholic University, Australia

    Len Unsworth, Jen Cope & Liz Nicholls

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  1. Len Unsworth
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  2. Jen Cope
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  3. Liz Nicholls
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Unsworth, L., Cope, J. & Nicholls, L. Multimodal literacy and large-scale literacy tests: Curriculum relevance and responsibility. AJLL 42, 128–139 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF03652032

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