Emojis could be here to stay on school tests.

Sample reading comprehension tests that show what NAPLAN will look when it moves online included a text message conversation with the smiley face pictures common to many chat programs.

Questions aimed at Year 9 students asked who was involved in the exchange, which messages referred to specific people and what the word “mo” – which was used near a moustache emoji – referred to.

Australia’s assessment chief Rob Randall defended the use of emojis when senators quizzed him about whether they were appropriate.

“I don’t think the emoji for young people was the distraction it maybe was for some of the older people that were making comments at the time,” the Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority head told a Senate estimates hearing on Wednesday.

“If we’d done it a few years ago, we might have put it as a comic strip with two people talking to each other.”

It was common practice for reading comprehension tests to include a picture or graphic as an extra way to engage children.

Education Minister Simon Birmingham pointed out none of the questions required any interpretation of what the emoji meant.

Mr Randall emphasised the question was part of a sample test intended to demonstrate to students, parents, and teachers how the online NAPLAN in May would work.

It hadn’t gone through the full development process with all the checks and balances that questions in the real test faced.

“If our educators and other advisers … say this is a legitimate assessment task and it works well, I wouldn’t rule out doing it again,” he said.

Labor senator Deb O’Neill had her own theory about the emoji idea.

“I just want to know if the emojis came from Senator Birmingham who was trying to curry favour with the foreign minister,” she asked officials, referring to Julie Bishop’s prodigious emoji use in texts and tweets.

– AAP