Measuring social development

Margaret Forster, ACER

Abstract

For the past 10 years the Australian Council for Educational research (ACER) has been exploring ways to measure the social development of young people. Projects have included designing 'student wellbeing’ for the South Australian Education Department and developing instruments to assess intrapersonal and interpersonal skills for the Western Australian system-wide monitoring program. ACER’s approach to conceptualising this work is consistent with that taken in literacy, numeracy and subject areas of the curriculum. The process begins with mapping the underlying dimension to be measured, the selecting the most appropriate assessment method for collecting evidence of achievement. Next the tasks are developed, they are trial-tested, analysed, a final form is selected to administer them, and a framework is developed against which to report student achievement. What does this look like in practice? A case study of ACER work with one school in Western Australia, John XXIII College, is outlined, from initial discussions to development of a questionnaire to the process undertaken for analysis of results.