Initial teacher education programme and paper assessments need to encompass university degree requirements and attest to student mastery of teacher professional competencies. This article reports one aspect of an investigation of the nature and principles employed in the design of assessments for a three-year Bachelor of Teaching (Primary) programme. The assessment tasks included in the 2022 academic papers were mapped and paper leaders interviewed; practicum and placement papers were not included because these were being redeveloped at the time. Findings are consistent with assessment design principles associated with authenticity and equity of access to the demonstration of understanding through tasks that double as a learning experience. Paper leaders responsible for curriculum learning areas deliberately designed linked dependent sequences of tasks to scaffold student engagement with teaching as inquiry. Our analysis highlighted the temporal dimension of assessment design; recognition that tasks in and across papers and the programme have a history that reflects shifts in external requirements, leader and team composition, research, and student task performance and feedback. Findings indicate that there is value in alerting initial teacher education programme and paper leaders to the complexity and interaction of factors that may underpin assessment design decisions.