AS 92024 Annotated exemplars

This annotated exemplar is intended for teacher use only. Annotated exemplars consist of student evidence, with commentary, to explain key parts of a standard. These help teachers make assessment judgements at the grade boundaries.

Download all exemplars and commentary [PDF, 3.6 MB]

Level 1 History assessment resources (external link) - NCEA.education

For Achieved, the student is required to engage with a variety of primary sources in a historical context.

This involves selecting different types of primary sources for a focus question, identifying the relevance of the evidence to the question through source annotation, and identifying strengths or limitations of the sources (where appropriate).

This student has selected five primary sources – two photographs, a newspaper article, a physical feature (the fountain), and a video clip with a Napier Earthquake survivor. An annotation has been provided that establishes how each source addresses the focus question, ‘What were the impacts of the Napier Earthquake on NZ History?’. The annotations make specific reference to the evidence in the source.

The student has made a basic, but specific and relevant comment for most of the sources, assessing their value.

The identified strengths have mostly focused on reliability, but in some instances comments have been made regarding the unique insight of the source. For example, how the newspaper article offered evidence pertaining to the impact on people, and not just the physical damage caused.
The evidence contains an emerging understanding of source limitations. For example, a valid limitation has been identified for the ‘Spirit of Napier’ fountain.

For Merit, the standard requires the main ideas of the evidence to be identified. For example, the physical, economic, personal, and cultural cost of the earthquake to Napier could have been more clearly elicited, and identified with further depth.

The Merit criteria also require an explanation of strengths and limitations within the collection of sources. Greater depth, range, clarity, and specificity of the comments made could allow for a Merit judgement. For example, when discussing the limitations of the photographs, greater depth could be shown by explaining how these only show a snapshot of Napier, without evidence of how widespread the damage was or how the people of Napier were affected.

For Merit, the student is required to interpret a variety of primary sources in a historical context.

This involves selecting different sources that are appropriate to the chosen focus question, annotating these sources to identify the main ideas in the evidence, and explaining the strengths and limitations within the collection of sources (where appropriate).

A variety of sources have been selected (3 photographs, a newspaper article, and a personal letter written at the time of the Hawkes Bay Earthquake). A specific and clear annotation that explains the relevance of the evidence to the focus question is provided. The annotations, in addition to the table provided in the final slide, identify some basic main ideas from the evidence.

The strength of the main ideas has been somewhat restricted by the nature of the sources selected, and that the historical context chosen is a natural disaster. This narrows the discussion of main ideas to mostly physical impacts.
There are sufficient instances within the collection of sources where the strengths and limitations of the evidence or source type have been explained. For example, the strength of source 4 and the limitations of source 1 clearly go beyond ‘identifying’, and meet the requirement to provide an explanation.

For Excellence, connections are required to be made between the sources with reference to the main ideas. In the final slide, the student offers some basic discussion of the shared ideas, but these need further development for Excellence.

The Excellence criteria also require reflection on the strengths and limitations across the collection of sources. For example, the extent to which the collection of sources provides sufficient evidence to answer the focus question, what gaps there are in the evidence provided, or whether a greater range of personal perspectives and experiences of the earthquake could have been beneficial.

For Excellence, the student needs to examine a variety of sources in a historical context.

This involves selecting different sources appropriate to the focus question and then annotating these to establish their relevance and make connections between the main ideas identified. In addition, Excellence requires reflection on the strengths and limitations of the collection of sources.

This student has selected a range of primary sources and clearly and specifically detailed how they are useful in answering the extent to which the Birmingham Campaign provoked violence.

The main ideas are clearly identified (state sanctioned violence, physical violence, white backlash, segregation, different experiences/attitudes between the Northern and Southern states), and (as required for Excellence) connections are made between them. For example, the student cross references ideas between sources 3 and 1, and sources 4 and 5.

In the final paragraph, the student provides a summative reflection of some of the strengths and limitations of the collected sources. For example, the way in which the sources work together to address the focus question, and the missing perspectives or experiences of those who were injured which are not captured by any of the selected sources.

However, this aspect of the Excellence criteria was also met though the annotations. For example, when the student identifies limitations of a source (source 4) and references a different selected source (source 5), to show how together they are useful in providing a more complete answer to the focusing question.

In other instances, the student cross-references between two sources to show how the evidence corroborates, counters, or expands on an idea. This is the type of comment that shows a reflection of the strengths and limitations across the collection of sources.