High Expectations: Achieving Excellence at Level 3 in Health Education

1. High Expectations: Achieving Excellence at Level 3 in Health Education Jenny Robertson

2. Aims • To provide an overview of the requirements for achieving excellence in Health Education at NCEA Level 3

3. 1. H&PE in the NZC @ L8 • Dominant verb ‘critically analyse’ What does this mean....? • Is the ‘critical’ about the learning process (ie ‘critical thinking’) or the critical (essential, important) knowledge produced? • What is the ‘analysis’ of? • See additional notes on L8 AO verbs

4. Where’s the ‘critical’ • Every learning area uses and develops student capacity for critical thinking (as a key competency). • It is an essential part of new learning and for making meaning – but in health education at NCEA level we do not assess critical thinking as an outcome in itself. • What we assess is the new (and critical) knowledge produced as a consequence of critical thinking (and other related learning processes).

5. 2. H&PE underlying concepts • These are all important – they provide the ‘lens’ through which to look at a health education context and carry out a NZC L8 ‘critical analysis’. • However, the use of these concepts needs to step up from NZC L7 (NCEA L2). • It is the underlying concepts that ‘level’ health education.

6. The ‘bigger picture’ of health education at NZC L8 / NCEA L3 • Level 3 NCEA deals more with broader societal issues that affect whole communities or populations. • It also encourages students to look beyond their own known situations and consider health situations form different perspectives. • Refer to the additional notes on NZC L6-8 progressions .

7. So what we’re saying is .... • ‘Critical’ understandings in health education come from applying the underlying concepts to health-related contexts in ever more detailed and purposeful ways. • By NZC L8/NCEA L3 ‘critical’ knowledge is that which is produced by applying the concepts to a context and backing this up with the most important (most influential, most dominant, most convincing) and real evidence.

8. 3. What’s an issue? • For most L3 assessments (and therefore the learning that contributes to these) students need to be quite clear what the ‘issue’ is – what is it about a context that gives cause for public concern - what is the data that says it’s an issue. It is more than just a topic of interest. • By implication an issue is something that has already had consequences for people’s well-being.

9. 4. Data and evidence to justify claims • At L3, an analysis or evaluation is giving an account of an issue as it really exists. • To present a convincing case or argument requires the use of evidence – quality evidence that supports claims being made (eg why it is an issue, what is influencing the issue). • At L3 avoid ‘fringe’ and very localised evidence – stick to the big important ideas that relate to most of the people.

10. ‘Data’ or ‘evidence’? • Data are summaries that result from the collection of information through systematic measurement or observation or analysis, about some phenomenon of interest, using quantitative and/or qualitative methods. Earl and Katz (2002)

11. So evidence is .... • ...the data we select – the relevant information that we notice from the external research work and from our own practice – and the interpretations we make from that data. The process of interpretation is one of sense-making: asking questions about the data to create new and useful knowledge. (KiTe Aoturoa, MoE, 2008, p84)

12. 5. Coherence and connections • A L3 assessment needs to have all sections connected. Think of an assessment task (internal or external) as being a bit like a scaffolded essay – if the questions were removed it would still read as an overall coherent and connected account of the issue – each idea in each section relates and flows onto the next.

13. 6. Adapting to the assessment structure • To honour the integrity of an ‘analysis’ or an ‘evaluation’ in external assessments, students can expect to have to rework some of their ideas and reorganise them to suit the structure of the assessment – NCEA assessments are not a learn and regurgitate exercise!

14. 7. Literacy • To state the obvious – to carry out a critical analysis or evaluation requires good literacy skills. • Ensure the teaching and learning programme includes activities that continue to develop student’s use of health language – oral language, reading AND writing. • Teach students how to write a concise analysis – more is not necessarily better!

15. Cautions – (1) keep the focus on ‘well-being’ • After all – that’s the purpose of the learning area. Avoid getting lost in scientific (biological, medical) aspects of the topic or the social studies-type treatment of issues. They may get mentioned but the whole point of the learning is the focus on people’s well-being.

16. Cautions – (2) ‘research’ • ‘Research’ means many things and there are many examples of this in secondary teaching. If ‘research’ simply means finding out information and to organise it into a report or essay the point of health education will be missed. • ‘Researched’ information only provides data and evidence for an analysis or evaluation – for health educaiton, it is not the end point in itself.

17. Cautions (3) – marking • Use the assessment schedule as a guide. Assess directly against the standard if it helps. • ‘Remove’ all the questions and mark the student work as whole (particularly once the alignment reduces all standards to a single broadly focused outcome). • Be confident in your own knowledge of the underlying concepts.

18. Alignment – developments and implications (for 2013) • Overall not much! • All stds will be a single outcome much as L1 and L2 • Subtle shift to emphasise ‘people and society’ rather than the personal-interpersonal-societal approach used for L2 • 3.4 (ethical dilemmas moves to being internal)

19. ... Cont • The use of the term ‘critical’ will appear in the EN only as the language gets clumsy trying to include it across the AME criteria – this is saying that a critical analysis is required for Achieved in accordance with the AO s at L8

20. So achieving excellence @ L3 requires .... • Knowledge of the underlying concepts • Knowledge of the broader societal determinants of health • Access to and selection of quality data and evidence to explain the issue and the influencing factors • Knowledge of the types of health promoting strategies needed for improving the well-being of populations

21. ...Cont. • Knowledge of strategies that reflect the values of social justice (and knowledge of ‘social justice’) • Skills to apply the concepts as lenses to the issue to carry out an analysis or evaluation • Literacy skills to produce a coherent and well connected account of the issue

22. And that excellence is about • The overall quality of the analysis or evaluation – it’s not a factor of how much is written. • And let’s be realistic – in almost all cases, a student must complete an assessment to be on track for excellence – while some internal tasks might provide a bit of ‘wriggle room’, external assessments do not – the marker has to be able to base their judgement on something!