Literacy

Our goal is to provide the opportunity for all students to maximise their potential, with the notion of potential being unique for each student. It follows that students’ skills in the area of Literacy will also be unique and, nurtured correctly, will allow them to pursue their interests and dreams. Literacy skills develop in each of us at a very different pace. We are very conscious of this and aim to work with each of our students and develop their skills.

We want all of our students to have a love of books and of reading, and to gain confidence in creating their own literary works. It starts with modelling of reading by the adults in our young people’s lives and is built on during their schooling. However, for some students, the development of these skills is extremely difficult and for these students, working with them to help bring their skills up to speed, as well as determining ways for them to access their learning and show their understanding, is vital. This year the College appointed Ms Imogen Gray as our Literacy Coordinator as we are committed to seeing our students grow in confidence in a range of associated areas such as reading and writing, developing their love of literature, and encouraging and helping them to express their thoughts and ideas verbally as well as in written form. Literacy is the responsibility of all teachers, not just English teachers.

Strengthening kids’ self-esteem in a digital world

I often read articles from a range of sources, including other Colleges. This is a good one and very much follows up from Anthony Peck’s last article in our newsletter. It is a quick read and it reinforces what we all know, but still worthy of a look and perhaps a discussion at home.

How do we develop and nurture our child’s self-esteem in a world where the likes, comments and followers are often seen as the social currency for popularity, confidence and self-worth?

While young people live out much of their social lives online, there are certain elements of this world that can have a negative impact on the social and emotional wellbeing of young people, particularly if that person’s self-esteem is already fragile.

The very connected, very visible and public nature of social media ensures that many of the challenges faced by young people previously are now magnified and felt more deeply when played out online. We need to give young people the confidence, skills and perspective to ensure that they can reduce the negative impacts, and instead learn to thrive both online and in real life.

What are some of the things we can do to help nurture that self-esteem and prepare them for the challenges of a very public social media?

Build their independence and resilience early

Make sure they are confident in their own abilities to problem solve themselves. Let them to do things that may result in failure but allows them to pick themselves up. Let them know that mistakes are OK, as long as we learn something from them.

Encourage activities and pursuits

Feeling part of a community can be an invaluable element to fostering self-worth. Encourage kids to have interests away from the screens, such as belonging to teams, clubs and groups where their achievements and efforts can be recognised and celebrated.

Helping others and volunteering

Giving kids the opportunity to help others, such as coaching a junior team, helping out with training or helping people less fortunate are great ways to build self-worth. Developing empathy for others helps kids to realise that the world is a much larger place than their social media feeds.

Spend time with them

It is easy to spend time with our kids when they are young. We can take them to the park, play games, read them books. As they get older and we are not so cool to hang out with, it becomes trickier. But we need to look for times to spend just being together, whether that’s watching a movie they like, playing a game, or grabbing a milkshake on the way home from sports training. Find things they like to do. Even just sitting on their bed at night and letting them know you are there can be beneficial.

Family meals and rituals

Having regular moments of connection that are part of their every day can be critical in providing stability and security. Connecting as a family with a nightly meal has been proven to be an effective way to give kids the comfort of knowing they have a place that is familiar and safe and unconditional. Or look for other rituals to provide this security.

Communicate often about what is happening online

Talk to them about the things you see online, let them know you have an understanding, learn about it and be sure to look at things from their perspective. Use teachable moments to highlight when things go wrong and be sure that you remain relevant to their world so that they know you are there should something go wrong.

While we cannot always be there to follow everywhere they go online and be up to date on every single site or app they visit, we can do a lot in terms of instilling good values, building that self-esteem and ensuring that they have a positive sense of self that transfers from the real world to wherever they find themselves online.

Author: Martine Oglethorpe

Year 10 Students

By the time you read this article our year 10 students will have completed their exams. Hopefully they will have learned a lot from the experience and will be more prepared for years 11 and 12. What we often find is that students are okay in the exams; but they are not really sure how to study. Skills of note taking, summary and how best to prepare are skills and it is important to practise these.

Good assessment programs aim to provide a balanced, fair evaluation of each student. They achieve this in two ways. First, they use a variety of strategies and tasks. This gives students multiple opportunities, in varying contexts, to demonstrate what they know and can do. It also enables teachers to be confident in the accuracy of their judgements about each student. We use a variety of assessment tools, both formative and summative. The exam is just one tool.

Saying farewell to our Year 10 students brings about many mixed emotions. Certainly they are ready to move on to new challenges. However, they have made many friends, shared a variety of wonderful experiences, learned a great deal and made many connections. It is hard to let go and say goodbye. I have enjoyed working with our current Year 10 students, first teaching a number of them in Year 7, and now teaching some of them this year. I wish them all the very best as they move on to College.

Kim Schade

Director of Teaching and Learning

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