Danish fourth graders fell back a number of places in the new 2016 Progress in International Reading Literacy Study (PIRLS), which is published every five years and which was released today.
The Danish students (ages 10-11) scored 547 points in the study, which was not only seven points less than the last PIRLS study in 2011, but resulted in them being confirmed as the worst performing Nordic country, behind Finland (566 points), Norway (559) and Sweden (555).
Russia topped the list with a score of 581, followed by Singapore (576), Hong Kong (569), Ireland (567) and Finland, while Poland (565), Northern Ireland (565) Norway, Chinese Taipei (559) and England (559) completed the top 10.
READ MORE: Danes show improving PISA results
South African woe
Other nations, such as Latvia, Bulgaria, Hungary, the US, Lithuania and Italy also finished ahead of the Danes, who could at least boast they had finished ahead of the likes of Canada, Australia, Germany and France. Denmark was one of only ten nations to score worse than they did five years ago.
At the wrong end of the spectrum, South Africa scored the lowest, followed by Egypt, Morocco, Kuwait and Oman.
Other interesting results were that girls scored higher than boys in 48 out of 50 nations. In Denmark girls, scored an average of 554, while boys scored an average of 541.
