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The following discussion will focus on analysing the effectiveness of the rationale and

marking criteria in a Year 11 Standard English Contemporary Possibilities, ICT Social Issues

Sample Assessment Task (Appendix 1: NESA, n.d.). The Year 11 ICT Social Issues Sample

Assessment Task (Appendix 1: NESA, n.d.) asks students to create an ICT multimodal

presentation to represent a “real or imagined local or global social issue” (Appendix 1:

NESA, n.d.). The concept of the Year 11 ICT Social Issues Sample Assessment Task

(Appendix 1: NESA, n.d.) connects well and assesses most of the syllabus content it suggests

that it will. Furthermore, the assessment also connects well to the premise of the unit as the

task gets students to explore technology and contemporary issues. The assessment outlines

the purpose of the reflection component well; therefore, students feel well equipped and

encouraged to participate and be empowered by self-reflection. The assessment connects well

will the assessed syllabus outcomes and unit outline; however, the assessment needs to

provide more detail and clarity to ensure that the purpose and work expectations are clear to

all students.

The Year 11 ICT Social Issues Sample Assessment Task (Appendix 1: NESA, n.d.) needs to

use metalanguage and provide clearer instruction in the rationale. The students are asked to

create a text representing a social issue; however, the purpose of their text is never outlined.

The assessment should state whether the text is to create awareness of the topic, persuade an

audience to take action or entertain an audience. The assessment needs to explicitly state the

purpose of the text so that all students have a clear vision of how to communicate their

meaning. Furthermore, the assessment rationale does not explain the ICT component

thoroughly enough for students, as there is no metalanguage used to demonstrate how their

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presentation should be assembled. Cloonan (2011) emphasises that there is not enough

metalanguage created and used in classrooms to allow students to fully understand ICT texts

and how they convey a message. This assessment task does not provide students enough

detail about what elements are expected in a multimodal presentation. Furthermore, the

rationale creates confusion as it interchanges ICT text and multimodal digital texts. Students

could create an ICT text without using different modes as they could only use video/moving

images to create an online game. Students need to know specifically what they have to create

or else their response could be different than predicted. Consistent wording throughout the

rational and marking rubric would provide clarity for students and ensure that there is no

confusion or submissions that do not conform to the expectations of the assessment.

The Year 11 ICT Social Issues Sample Assessment Task (Appendix 1: NESA, n.d.) could be

improved by giving students more choice in the types of multimodal presentations. Choice

provides students of all abilities the opportunity to participate in the assessment with

confidence in a text type that they feel more comfortable exploring (O’Neill, 2017).

Therefore, assessments with choice allow students with different talents and knowledge to

demonstrate their understanding through their own language and increase student’s

motivation to complete the task (Lee and Hannafin, 2016). Though the assessment does give

students three options they are all ICT presentations, however, multimodal texts extends to

picture books, graphic novels and comics. Furthermore, students could also be offered to do a

TED talk or slideshow presentation. The assessment does not provide enough variety to allow

all students an equal option at demonstrating their understanding, especially because this

assessment is for a Standard English course therefore, the class would have a larger variety of

student abilities. The assessment limits students’ textual choices to only three types of texts

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