NAPLAN testing dates have been moved to March 2023, and that means teachers in year 3 and year 5 — as well as their students — are getting ready for the week all over Australia. How are you feeling? Could you use a little injection of calm in your classroom?

NAPLAN can certainly be a nerve-racking experience for students. There’s ample research that shows test anxiety can have as much of an impact on test scores as students’ actual grasp of a particular concept, and the growing number of standardised tests kids face these days has been linked pretty directly to an increase in —you guessed it — test anxiety!

With this in mind, and knowing it’s not possible to ditch the test altogether, the teachers on the Teach Starter team have put together a little list of things you can do on test days to help your students find calm. Read on for mindfulness exercises, movement breaks, and more!

How to Make NAPLAN Test Days Less Intimidating

1. Make Testing Days a ‘Happy Teacher Outfit Day’

No matter where in the school your students will be taking the test, testing conditions will feel noticeably different for them than a typical school day. With all pictures, posters, and stimuli removed from the walls and maybe even desks moved around, there’s a certain ‘vibe’ that students will notice as soon as they enter the room.

As their teacher,  you have already built up a rapport with your students — they seek comfort in you! Maximise this by wearing something bright, playful, and happy on the test days. While this might seem superficial at first glance, tell your students that they can look at your flower crown, your smiley face emoji t-shirt, or rainbow shoes as a reminder that they are okay, that you believe in them, and that if their minds are smiling the test will feel easier!

2. Create a Positivity Walk

While it would be amazing to fill the examination room with positivity posters and growth mindset prompts, most administrators and testing coordinators will give it a thumbs down.

But there’s no reason you can’t keep positive decor in spaces outside of that testing area! Why not create a positivity walk along the space that students travel to and from the exam room?

You could use some of our motivational posters, our growth mindset resources, and other colourful decorations like paper lanterns that you can buy at a party supply shop or cheap shop. The aim of the game is to make your students feel positive and happy as they are entering (and exiting) their test space.

Tip: Include their names, photos, or an avatar of each of your students to really reinforce that this positivity walk belongs to them!

3. Help Your Students Own the Test Space

If possible, take your students into their test space prior to their first session beginning and run a short guided meditation/mindful awareness practice with them. Ask your students to take their seats (preferably their exact seat for the tests) and take them through one or more of the following points:

Finding a Mindful Brain Break Spot

• Looking around the room, what looks different from usual? How does it make you feel?
• Can you find somewhere you can look that makes you feel relaxed? Can you see a bit of the garden, a tree or the sky through one of the windows? Remember, if you are feeling stressed or worried during the test, you can look at this point and take a deep belly breath to help calm your mind and your feelings down.
• This room might look and feel a little different from usual, but this room belongs to you. In this room, you can be calm and confident, because you will always have a spot to rest your mind when you need a little break!

A Calm and Confident NAPLAN Visualisation

• Close your eyes or look down at your desk. Without speaking, imagine that the test has begun.
• You can see your NAPLAN test booklet sitting in front of you. You are holding your pencil in your hand. The room is quiet, and you can feel the concentration of all of your friends in the room, too. It’s so quiet that you might even hear the clock tick! Someone has the sniffles. Someone else taps their pencil on their desk for a little while.
• Maybe you’re feeling a little nervous. The exam room feels and sounds so different. Maybe your chest feels a little tight, or your heart feels like it’s beating a little faster than usual.
• Take a slow, deep breath. When you breathe in, make the air fill your belly right down deep. When you breathe out, feel the air as it moves out of your lungs completely. Notice the tight feeling in your chest goes away. Your heartbeat slows down. You feel calm and confident.
• Doing the real NAPLAN test might feel like a big deal. And that might make you feel nervous, or worried. But you know that you can stop at any point and calm your mind down just by using your breath. You are doing your best. If you skip a question, that’s okay. If you’re not sure you understand a question, that’s okay too.
• You try your best. You stop, close your eyes and take a deep breath when you need to. And you finish the test!
• Imagine now that the test session has finished. Your teacher dismisses you and the rest of your classmates and you all walk outside of the room. You find your friends and talk about what bits you found confusing and hear that they found some parts difficult too! But you all finished the test, you did your best, and now you can smile, you can laugh and enjoy your break together!

Explore more mindfulness resources to try in your classroom!

4. Plan Mindful Movement Breaks

Plan a few fun, physical activities that students can do before and after their NAPLAN tests across the three days. Brain science tells us that the benefits of movement are pretty clear. Physical movement makes it:

• easier for our brain to maintain focus
• helps us to integrate learning across both of our brain’s hemispheres
• helps to enter information into our memories
• reduces the chances of feeling overwhelmed or overloaded

Plan calm movement activities before the test sessions, and fun, stress-releasing activities for after!

Calm Activities for Before NAPLAN Sessions

• Kids Yoga Pose Cards
• 5 Minute Mindfulness Activities

Fun Movement Activities for After NAPLAN Sessions

• Ocean-Themed Movement Cards
• Speed Fossicking
• Brain Break Activity Cards
• Drama Game Activity Cards

5. Give a Little Gift of Confidence

Knowing just how much you believe in them can go a long way for your students when they settle into their seats and start to work on their tests. We all know that even little tokens of encouragement mean so much to our kids!

If you have time, you can write a little personalised message of encouragement for each student and pair it with something like a cute pencil or eraser, or maybe even a Freddo Frog for students to eat when they are finished!

To save you time, you might want to print these testing gift tags with empowering sayings for your students like ‘Bee-lieve you can and you will’ (with a bee, of course!), ‘You are paw-sitively amazing’ (with cute little dogs) and more.

Place them by your students’ bag racks, or somewhere you know they can see them before they begin their first exam.

Explore our complete collection of curriculum-aligned NAPLAN teaching resources.