2020's lockdowns damaged children's achievement in writing, but had little effect on reading and maths.
An Education Ministry report says by the end of last year, writing scores for children in years five, six and seven were lower than in 2019 by the equivalent of nearly six weeks learning.
For teenagers in year ten, the gap was nearly twenty weeks - even though students lost only five to eight weeks of classroom time last year.
Here's education correspondent John Gerritsen.
