From 2025, usage of the English Online Interview (EOI) is optional for all schools. The EOI will be decommissioned at the end of the 2025 school year. Reports and the online assessment tool will no longer be accessible beyond that date.
Schools may still wish to assess the literacy knowledge (including phonics) of Foundation and Grade 1 students in 2025 through the enhanced EOI.
Use of the DATE is optional and provides further data on student ability to assist teachers to differentiate teaching according to student need. The DATE will be decommissioned at the end of the 2025 school year. Reports and the online assessment tool will no longer be accessible beyond that date.
Some implementation supports and resources for the EOI will remain accessible in 2025. This includes casual relief teacher funding support. Further details are provided below.
Assessing Grade 1 students
Schools may wish to complete the EOI assessment with Grade 1 students in Victorian government schools in 2025. It is recommended to complete the EOI in Term 1 to ensure maximum benefit for teacher planning purposes. Module 2 has been developed to be conducted at this time and maps to the beginning of the Grade 1 Victorian Curriculum. Please note that, while Module 2 is generally recommended for the start of Grade 1, teachers have the flexibility to choose the most appropriate module for individual students.
As with Module 1 for Foundation students, Module 2 is designed to be used by classroom teachers as an individual assessment with each Grade 1 student, supported by an EOI kit and the relevant resources for the module.
Assessing phonics knowledge and skills and the use of non-words
In 2023, additional phonics items were added to each of the 4 EOI modules to complement the existing phonics items in the tool.
Reading and Viewing, Writing, Speaking and Listening are closely connected and interdependent aspects of literacy. The EOI is designed to assess student ability across all areas of literacy, including phonics. As such, it is not possible to only complete the additional phonics items. If completing an EOI module, all tasks in an EOI module must be completed and then submitted for the Insight Assessment Platform to generate instant reports and data to inform teaching and learning. In order to generate this data, teachers must click on the ‘submit’ button after completing the EOI with each student.
The additional phonics items in the enhanced EOI include a mix of real English words and non-words to assess whether students are using phonics knowledge and skills to 'read' the word. As non-words are not real English words, students need to use their phonic knowledge and skills to 'sound out' or decode the word. Assessing students’ reading of non-words allows teachers to check which combinations of letter-sounds in English students have learned, to inform their teaching practice. Teaching phonics involves explicit teaching of letter-sound patterns until they are recognised automatically by students.
The real English words and non-words are intentionally ordered following psychometric testing. Please follow the script and instructions on the left pane of the EOI in the Insight Assessment Platform during the assessment. These instructions include a link to the phonics word list to be used with each module.
Guidance materials are available in the Learning Library within the Insight Assessment Platform to provide teachers with detailed advice on how to score the non-words and undertake error analysis to inform areas for explicit teaching.
Support for the Grade 1 EOI
There are implementation supports for the enhanced EOI as detailed below. These include on-demand videos, casual relief teacher funding and general guidance such as the EOI guide.
On-demand videos to support understanding and use of EOI reports
Videos have been developed to build knowledge of commonly used EOI reports and how to navigate to them in the Insight Assessment Platform. These videos include school level reports to support school leadership to understand the EOI results for the student cohort. The videos also cover reports for teachers to plan for their class and/or individual students.
To watch the on-demand videos, visit English Online Interview Reports.
For more information on EOI reports see the new ‘Insight Assessment Platform Reporting Guide’.
Casual relief teacher (CRT) funding
While use of the EOI will be optional in 2025, schools will still receive the equivalent of 2 days of CRT funding per Grade 1 teacher, in line with the 2024 process.
This funding will be provided in January 2025 as part of the Student Resource Package. The CRT funding is based on the approach to professional practice days and is informed by student enrolments.
The funding line can be identified in the Student Resource Package quarterly cash grant as 'Literacy – Grade 1 EOI.'
Updates to Literacy Teaching Toolkit
The Literacy Teaching Toolkit (Toolkit) is currently being revised with improved literacy resources, guidance and practical strategies that will be available on Arc Learning.
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