Numeracy & Literacy CAAs (co-requisites)

Since 2022, Christchurch parents have been trusting us to help high-schoolers crush the Numeracy & Literacy CAAs.

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About the CAAs

The Common Assessment Activities (CAAs), sometimes called the 'co-requisites', are three tests usually sat by Year 10 or Year 11 students in New Zealand:

Numeracy CAA:
Literacy (Writing) CAA:
Literacy (Reading) CAA.

There are two testing rounds in 2026: May (Term 2) and September (Term 3).

Why does my child need to pass the 3 CAAs?

All 3 CAAs need to be passed by students in order to gain an NCEA qualification at any level.

In other words, you cannot gain NCEA Level 1, 2 or 3, without achieving all 3 CAAs (there are some exceptions to this).

Will my child get NCEA credits for passing?

Yes, they will get:
- 10 credits for passing the Numeracy CAA.
- 5 credits for passing the Literacy (Writing) CAA.
- 5 credits for passing the Literacy (Reading) CAA.

Because these 3 CAAs are all 'Unit Standards', the best that students can get on them is Achieved (you can't get Merit or Excellence credits from them).

What are the test conditions?

Students will complete the tests on a computer. They will not have access to the internet/AI/notes/etc.
The tests will be completed on separate days.
For the Numeracy CAA, students get full use of a calculator.
If a student is entitled to Special Assessment Conditions (for example if they have Dyslexia), they will also have access to a reader-writer.

What is covered in the tests?

Numeracy CAA:
- The Numeracy test requires students to master the Mathematics & Statistics skills at Level 4 of the New Zealand curriculum.
- Namely, these are Number, Geometry & Space, Location & Navigation, Measurement, Statistics & Data, and Probability.

Writing CAA:
- Q1: Essay-style question (usually a letter or email, usually 150-250 words).
- Q2: Essay-style question (usually an article, newsletter, or opinion pieces, usually 250 - 350 words).
- Q3: Multi-choice questions (spelling, grammar, punctuation, and syntax).

Reading CAA:
- Approx. 6 questions. Each question requires you to read a text and answer 5 - 6 multi-choice questions about the text.

How long will students be given to complete the tests?

Each test is designed to be completed in 60 minutes, however, students are allowed as much time as they need (so long as each test is completed in one session).

What happens if students don't pass the one (or more) of the tests?

If you're a student who came up short, don't beat yourself up. It's a tough test and nearly half of students fail the first time around.
Students get to re-attempt the CAAs as many times as they like, but they will need to wait until the next testing round to get another go. There are two testing rounds per year: one in May (Term 2) and one in September (Term 3).

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How we teach these assessments...

At Trajectory, we've been guiding Year 10, 11, and 12 students to success in the Numeracy and Literacy (Reading and Writing) CAAs since their introduction. Our tutors are specifically trained in the structure, content, and demands of the assessments.

We know the format inside and out, and we've developed a approach that gets results for students.

Our tutoring

Numeracy

For Numeracy, we focus on:

plenty of exposure to real exam questions from previous years. Many students struggle not with the math itself, but with interpreting what the question is asking. Getting better at spotting keywords, thinking critically, and reading carefully, helps students build self-confidence in a test context;

identifying knowledge gaps and targeting them directly. If a student's class moves on to another topic before the student has properly grasped a concept, this opens up 'knowledge gaps' which are difficult to fill. We start from square one, making no assumptions about what students already know, and build up from there.

Read our recommended resources for Numeracy self-study.

Literacy (Reading & Writing)

For Literacy, our method is again based on exposure to past exam problems to build familiarity with the type of questions they can expect, and instilling in students the best approach to solving them.

The Reading assessment requires students to think critically about what they're reading. Critical thinking is a skill which students develop at different paces depending on their familiarity with written text. This is a central focus of our tutoring, as well as methodically breaking down the questions to deduce their meaning.

The Writing assessment requires students to create two pieces of writing (usually in the form of a letters, emails, or articles) and complete a set of multi-choice questions on spelling and grammar. The most common areas that students fall short are:

structure - using text conventions which are appropriate to the text (for example, signing off an email with 'Kind regards');
spelling/grammar - students need to produce writing which is relatively free from grammar/spelling errors. They have access to a spellchecker for this assessment, but it's the punctuation/grammar which usually trips students up (for example, capitalising place names);
topic - a super common misstep is straying too far from the essay topic, or not including details which are relevant to the topic.

For Writing, it is essential students read and familiarise themselves with the marking criteria. Before working through practice questions, we take our students through the marking criteria thoroughly to help them understand exactly what it is that the examiners expect of them.