Irish students’ ability to read computer based text such as emails and websites is significantly above the average of 19 OECD countries, according to a new OECD report.
The students in Irish schools ranked 8th out of the 19 countries that participated in the OECD’s Digital Literacy test. Just four countries, Korea, New Zealand, Australia and Japan, had significantly higher scores than Ireland.
The above-average results of Irish students on these digital literacy tests contrasts with their poor performance in the 2009 round of the traditional pencil-and-paper PISA literacy tests.
The 2009 pencil-and-paper tests showed a marked decline in reading scores in Ireland with Irish students falling from above average to the average level in the OECD. There was some surprise at the results achieved by Irish students on the traditional reading test, as they had scored well above the OECD average in previous tests in 2000, 2003 and 2006.
These latest results seem to suggest that the reading standards of Irish 15-year olds may be better than the results achieved on the traditional pencil-and-paper test in 2009 but not at the levels scored by Irish students in 2000. Ireland’s average score on the digital reading assessment, at 509 points, is 13 points higher than its average score of 496 points on the traditional pencil-and-paper PISA test in 2009.
The performance of Irish students on the digital literacy test still lags behind the Irish performance on print reading in PISA 2000 when students here scored an average of 527 points.
Welcoming the latest OECD report, the Minister for Education and Skills, Ruairí Quinn T.D., commented, “While it is reassuring to see that Irish students compare very well with their OECD counterparts in this study, there is clearly no room for complacency about reading standards in our schools.”
“The results of this digital literacy test and the PISA 2009 tests published last year seem to confirm that a decline has occurred in reading standards in Ireland over the last decade,” said Minister Quinn. “I will be bringing proposals to Government very shortly to ensure that the literacy and numeracy of our students in the future compare with the very best in the world. The proposals include specific improvements to teacher education and curriculum content that will build upon progress to date in the area of digital literacy.”
The OECD report, Students on Line is part of the OECD’s Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) study. The forty-minute test of digital literacy was completed by students on computers and laptops in the test schools in 2009. A total of 65 countries participated in the conventional pencil-and-paper PISA tests in 2009. An optional digital reading assessment was offered as part of the 2009 survey and Ireland was one of 19 countries (16 OECD, 3 non OECD) that participated in this computer-based assessment of reading literacy.
The improvement in the Irish scores on the digital literacy test compared to the conventional pencil-and-paper test appears to be attributable mainly to better performance by lower achieving students. Fewer students in Ireland (12%) than on average across OECD countries (17%) performed at or below Level 1 on the PISA digital reading proficiency scale. The percentage of students scoring at or above Level 5 in digital reading (8%) was the same as the corresponding OECD average (8%).
As in the conventional literacy test, better achievement in the digital literacy test was associated with higher levels of engagement in reading. Students in Ireland who reported that they did not engage in any print reading for enjoyment (42% of 15 year olds) achieved significantly lower scores on both print reading and digital reading than students who read for up to 30 minutes a day or longer (26%). Girls performed better in digital literacy than boys in all countries except Colombia.
Experts at the Educational Research Centre (ERC) are studying the results to try to better understand why students performed better on the digital test than the pencil-and-paper test.
“It may have to do with the fact that some students found the digital context more familiar and more interesting than the printed test,” said Dr Peter Archer, Director of the ERC.
“The results of this test show that the performance on digital literacy in 2009 (509 points) still lags behind performance on print reading in PISA 2000 (527). This suggests that Ireland’s actual level of performance on reading literacy lies somewhere between the high score achieved in PISA 2000 and the lower score achieved in PISA 2009. PISA 2012 should provide a clearer picture of the situation with respect to print reading,” he concluded.