Apollo
Students are set to take another Flight.
Apollo is Killara High School’s cross curriculum problem based learning course. It is an opportunity for all students studying the course to find solutions for a series of real work challenges. Each challenge is designed to allow students to pursue their own interests set in a broader context, to lead their own learning whilst being supported by their teacher and to develop and practice applying essential skills in a variety of contexts.
The skills we assess in Apollo are outlined in The Learning Continuum, that has been designed and implemented by the teaching team using currently available evidence from educational readings. Each of the skills outlined in the learning continuum are autonomy, collaboration, communication, research, ethics and critical and creative thinking.
What are our students currently working on?
Challenge Statements and Driving Questions help shape the student experience in this course as part of a broader Flight (like a unit of work). The current Flight students are engaging with involves a response to the COVID-19 pandemic.
A challenge statement provides broader context for the Flight (challenge) and the driving question provides focus so that they can devise a solution to an identified aspect of the Flight. Students are able to decide on their own driving questions as well.
The challenge statement and potential driving questions for the current Flight are found below:
Challenge statement
There is a proverb in a foreign language, which can be loosely translated to ‘May you live in interesting times’, and it is usually thrown as a curse rather than a wish. It seems that it applies to all of us now, living through the COVID-19 pandemic.
As we observe and experience the events of the COVID-19 pandemic unfolding, we have a unique opportunity to analyse many, multilayered aspects of the pandemic. Its impacts on the health of individuals and entire nations is indiscriminate.
There are many issues and questions associated with the pandemic and some of them are:
a) the reason for the outbreak,
b) how governments and international organisations such as The World Health Organisation
(WHO) responded to the pandemic
c) the impacts it has on all aspects of our lives.
d) how we interact socially - and into the future
e) the way policies are developed, and businesses are conducted
f) how science, medicine, and economies have been impacted
g) how our individual wellbeing and the wellbeing of our planet have been impacted
In Apollo, we want you to use this global event as an opportunity to learn by choosing an aspect of the issue to focus on and explore further.
Your teachers will accompany you on that journey.
Potential driving questions
Mental Health How can individual experiences and behaviours during the COVID-19 pandemic shape positive mental health into the post-pandemic climate?
Due to their heightened risk, the elderly have been more isolated than ever before during this pandemic. What can individuals and communities do to strengthen and re-build relationships with our older community members?
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Environment How can we learn to live more sustainably in the future given the positive impacts COVID-19 has had on our environment?
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Politics How can governments prepare more timely, effective and coordinated responses to future pandemics?
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Economy How can we harness existing workplaces or create new job opportunities for individuals to retain employment during global pandemics?
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Personal health As students return to school, it can be observed that not everyone is following the guidelines of physical distancing and personal hygiene that have been outlined by the government to keep us all safe. How can we encourage young people to be more active and responsible in managing their personal health during these phases of relaxing restrictions?
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Why are our students studying Apollo?
NESA is in the process of implementing significant changes to a number of the senior syllabuses, both in terms of content and assessment practice. Additionally, we want our students to be better prepared to meet the demands of an everchanging workplace.
Apollo repositions the learner so that they are personally accountable for everything they do, and our teachers facilitate this process. We provide the educational opportunity for students to reflect on their learning and demonstrate the development of their skills so that they can better prepare themselves for senior years of schooling and beyond.
It allows our students to unleash their potential and to showcase their work within our learning community.
Who studies Apollo?
Each year our Year 10 cohort is enrolled in the Apollo course. It is a compulsory part of the curriculum at Killara High School.