O-net set for redesign as row rages over results
Database to be set up to help teachers draw up new test
The poor results of primary and secondary school students in the Ordinary National Education Test (O-Net) over the past eight years have prompted a debate over whether the exams are too difficult or whether Thai students are ill prepared. Educationists are adopting new test features and readjusting existing test designs as a result.
In the coming school semester, a communal database will be set up to store, evaluate and design new sets of exams, with the aim of making 50 per cent of the O-Net test moderately difficult, 25 per cent easy and 25 per cent very difficult, National Institute of Educational Testing Service (NIETS) director Samphan Phanphruek said.
Teachers with experience designing the tests will attend a seminar to discuss the framework with new teachers from primary and secondary schools. They will rely mainly on O-Net tests conducted in February – which is when sixth graders, ninth graders and twelfth graders sit the test nationwide – as guidelines on new O-Net designs, he said.
The O-Net is a basic exam evaluating students’ ability in eight key subjects: Thai language; mathematics; science; social science, religions and culture; personal hygiene and physical education; arts; skills training; and foreign languages. It is mandatory for sixth grade students before they enter lower secondary level, ninth graders entering upper secondary, and twelfth graders set to enter undergraduate studies.
The O-Net was introduced in 2001 together with the now-defunct Advanced National Education Test. The O-Net criteria were changed in 2004, and scores have dropped since.
There has been criticism by the media, students and parents that the O-Net is too difficult, contains confusing and ambiguous questions and fails to evaluate Thai students properly. But Samphan said the tests were in accordance with the curriculum and follow test-design standards.
Teachers selected as test designers had no connection with private tutorial schools and were regarded as highly ethical in their work and having high professional standards, Samphan said.
Well-known educationist Saksith Rojsaranrom said the Education Ministry had set a goal of boosting O-Net scores by 3 per cent, but the poor grades suggested the goal was some way off. The drop, he said, was likely to be the result of varying academic standards and teacher performance at schools across the country.
Also, the outdated doctrine of students memorising textbooks rather than being armed with analytic or critical-thinking and decision-making skills was still widely practised. This was despite a ministry campaign calling for it to be scrapped many years ago.
Saksith echoed Samphan’s statement that the O-Net is not too difficult for students accustomed to analytic thinking and decision-making. The O-Net is based on criteria mandated by a new ministry doctrine aimed at modernising Thai education by various methods including student-centred teaching, as well as abolishing the old-school rote learning.
An adviser to the Quality Learning Foundation, Amornwit Nakhonthab, said the low O-Net scores mainly reflected the persistence of the outdated doctrine, which should have been improved and corrected until all key criteria under the education reform were met. He said the NIETS-regulated new test designs should take another three to five years to accurately evaluate Thai students, from the next school semester.
“The poor O-Net scores reflect many things, whether it be teachers’ poor performances, tests whose degree of difficulty exceeds what students have been taught, or both. But Thailand still needs the O-Net to develop the entire educational system, Amornwit said.
Making the O-Net test easier simply to help students pass would not improve education in Thailand or long-term development of human resources, he said.
“The Education Ministry must stand its ground against criticism. Making the O-Net easy just for students to pass will hurt the country and its education system.
“Since the [new] O-Net was introduced eight years ago, education budgets have increased along with teachers’ salaries. What do the low O-Net scores tell us? That the government’s efforts to improve education are not yet sufficient,” he said.
