Australian kids go backwards again in digital literacy

Victorian students are failing to meet benchmarks for digital literacy, with a nationwide test revealing the worst results since the program began two decades ago.

More than 10,200 students in years 6 and 10 were asked last year, as part of the national assessment program, to complete tasks including editing blog posts, analysing data to troubleshoot a website and building a webpage to promote an event.

Students were also asked in the tests, run by the Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority (ACARA), to use an online map to plan journeys or search for specific locations.

In its report on the results, published on Wednesday, ACARA found “significant declines” in proficient standard attainment for Year 6 students across Australia compared to the last round of tests in 2022.

Victorian Year 6 students were among the strongest performers in Information and Communication Technology (ICT) literacy in 2022, with 60 per cent deemed proficient, but by last year that figure had dropped to 50 per cent.

For students in Year 10 around the country, just 37 per cent exceeded the proficient standard for ICT literacy, the lowest since the assessment was first conducted in 2005.

The most significant declines for Year 10 students were in Queensland, South Australia and Western Australia.

In Victoria, 41 per cent of Year 10 students achieved the proficient standard, the second-highest rate in the nation, but that also represented a decline from 2022 when 50 per cent of students here were found to be proficient, and from 2008 when 70 per cent made the grade.

La Trobe University professor and education research associate dean Therese Keane said the results showed a need to be deliberate when teaching digital literacy.

Keane was dismissive of any notion that most of today’s young people were “digital natives”.

“It’s said students are digital natives and really that’s a fallacy, it’s a total myth,” she said.

“They’re consumers of content, but they’re not creators.”

The professor said school students were able to use devices and apps easily, and although those skills did not necessarily translate to deeper understanding, the ACARA assessment results did not show young people getting worse at technology.

“Schools and society are not adequately developing high-order digital capability, and that is to evaluate that information and to critically think for themselves,” she said.

“We’ve stagnated … we’re not saying that our students are less digitally immersed or less confident with technology, rather they are, but … they’re not developing at the pace required.”

Australian Government Primary Principals Association president Pat Murphy said the number of students who completed the test was a small sample, and it wasn’t representative.

“It is such a small percentage of students who actually partake in this test at the primary school level,” he said.

He said there were parents and teachers who chose to opt out of their kids taking the test because they didn’t “see a point” to them sitting it, and principals did not want it to become mandatory.

He said the money used to carry out the test could go to other things, including school funding.

But Keane said the tests showed where improvement was needed, and what needed to be fixed across the country’s schools.

“It gives us a snapshot of where we’re going and what needs to change,” she said of the tests.

“We really need to be looking at what we need to do to be competitive in this field.”

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