Around 1.1million students in years 3, 5, 7 and 9 across Australia will start the annual National Assessment Program Literacy and Numeracy (NAPLAN) tests on Tuesday and finish on Thursday.

Principal of St Therese’s Primary School New Lambton Duilio Rufo said his school saw the tests as a ‘‘point in time’’ measure of student ability.

‘‘There’s much more to children’s education than one set of questions,’’ he said.

‘‘But it allows us to have a look at how the kids are trending and if we have a recurring pattern that crops up every year, we can look at specific areas.’’

Mr Rufo said completing the test online could cut the time between when students sit the test and when they receive their results, which could help schools act faster on feedback.

While his school doesn’t teach to Naplan, it  explains to students how the papers will be formatted and allows them to sit practice tests.

At St Therese’s, 90 year 3 students and 90 year 5 students will sit for papers in language conventions and writing on Tuesday, reading on Wednesday and numeracy on Thursday.

Mr Rufo said the majority of his pupils ‘‘take it in their stride’’, while only a few become ‘‘extremely anxious’’.

Year 5 students Abbey Anderson, Ellen Hughes and Oliver Allen all said sitting the tests in year 3 helped them feel prepared for the coming week.

Abbey said she was feeling confident about the tests and how much work she had done in class.

‘‘My parents told me not to worry and just do my best,’’ she said.

‘‘I’ll be going to bed earlier on Monday night and waking early on Tuesday to go over things.’’

Ellen said she was feeling ‘‘all right’’ about the tests.

‘‘Our teacher says it’s just one test on one day,’’ she said.

‘‘By the time it [the results] comes back we have learned things we didn’t know at the start.’’

Oliver said he was a little nervous about possibly not having enough time to finish the papers.

‘‘But I feel good about expositions, which is when we try and persuade the reader about something,’’ he said.

‘‘We’ve been doing those since the start of the year and try and do it in 30 minutes.’’

 Results will be sent to schools between mid-August and mid-September and uploaded on to the  MySchool website.

■ 48,169 students across the Hunter and Central Coast will sit the NAPLAN tests next week including: 

Year 3: 12,796

Year 5: 12,037

Year 7: 11,528

Year 9: 11,808