When 'trial' means 'development': A mathematics unit standard trial

Abstract

In 1995 various secondary schools throughout New Zealand became trial schools for the mathematics Unit Standards. This study centred on one such school. Data on the trial were collected from both staff and students. It quickly became apparent that the trials were more a development of Unit Standard assessments than the trial of newly produced resources. Involvement in such development soon threw up issues to do with work load, reassessment, sufficiency, moderation between schools, and tracking. The paper concludes with some recommendations for future improvements.