NAPLAN

NAPLAN 2025: What's Changed and How to Help Your Child Prepare

NAPLAN moved to an adaptive online format in 2023. Understanding how the test now works — and how it adapts to your child's responses — is the first step to helping them perform at their best.

4 min read

Two students studying together at a desk with open books

NAPLAN has changed substantially since it began. The most significant shift for families is the move from paper to an online adaptive format, which changes not only how the test is delivered but how it measures a student's ability.

What adaptive testing actually means

In a traditional paper test, every student answers the same questions in the same order. In an adaptive test, the questions a student receives depend on how they have answered so far. A student answering correctly moves toward harder questions; a student struggling moves toward easier ones.

The purpose is precision. By targeting questions near a student's actual level, the test establishes their ability more accurately and with fewer questions than a fixed paper could.

Because questions adapt, a student finding the test difficult partway through is often a sign they are answering well — the test has moved them into a harder band.

What this changes for parents

Two practical consequences follow. First, students cannot meaningfully compare their experience with a classmate's afterwards, because they did not sit the same questions. It is worth explaining this beforehand, as the comparison otherwise causes unnecessary worry.

Second, guessing strategically matters less than it did. Since the next question depends on the current answer, working carefully through each question serves a student better than rushing to attempt everything.

Helping without over-preparing

Familiarity with the online format matters more than content drilling — a student comfortable with the interface is not spending attention on it.
Typing fluency affects the writing task, and is worth practising if your child rarely writes at a keyboard.
Reading widely remains the single most useful long-term preparation for the literacy components.
Treat the result as diagnostic information rather than a verdict.

Reading the results

NAPLAN results place students in proficiency levels rather than ranking them against classmates. The useful question is not which level a child reached, but which specific skills the report identifies as developing. That is the information a teacher or tutor can act on.