LEARNING DIVERSITY
Welcome to 2025! I am excited to be working once more with your children to facilitate growth and progress in their learning journey. Our team of 15 staff members will be working across the school in various ways to enhance your child’s experience and provide intervention and support when needed. Our Learning Support Officers will be working in the following ways:
- Classroom support
- Year 7 and 8 Sounds Writes Intervention classes (Flourish)
- After school tutoring Monday to Thursday, from 3:30 to 4:30pm (except in times of staff meetings)
- Lunchtime social community space supervision.
Support for students is balanced across classes and students, with various factors including level of support, subject type, behaviour, and academic rigour considered in the development of the Learning Support Officer Timetable.
The National Consistent Collection of Data (NCCD) for students with disabilities census is completed in August and is a survey of the support given retrospectively to students across the school between August 2024 and August 2025. This survey then guides the additional funding given to our college to provide ongoing support to students who benefit from adjustments and intervention in their learning program. More information about the NCCD can be found below.
Flourish Support classes at Year 8 commenced from the beginning of the year by withdrawing students from Italian and splitting them into three small groups to continue their literacy and learning intervention work. At Year 7, general testing will occur in the first few weeks of school to determine invitations for students to the Flourish Program. Parents will be contacted once testing and results are evaluated to discuss this intervention class. As with Year 8, students will be withdrawn from Italian classes and split into level-appropriate groups to complete targeted literacy intervention.
Students in Years 9 through 12 who wish to seek extra support and tutoring with their classwork are encouraged to attend after-school tutoring. Our team are available to work with students in a general capacity or one-on-on. If you would like to organise this, please contact me, or ask your child to speak with the Learning Support Officer in their classroom.
As usual Program Support Group Meetings will occur between Weeks 4 to 7 of Term 1. Invitations will be sent via PAM. A digital signature accompanies the invitation to acknowledge personal learning plans and minutes. If you are unable to attend the allocated time, please email me to organise an alternative. When parents are unavailable, myself and Ms Teagan Saleta will meet with students to check in with them about the start to the year and their learning goals. Minutes will be sent home through PAM as letters. Teachers will be writing goals into Personal Learning Plans (PLPs) during the first three weeks of Term as they get to know your children. Once these are completed, they will be released to parents in PAM. This occurs usually in Week 5. Existing families will notice a change to the goal setting structure for 2025.
NAPLAN occurs in March in Term 1. There are a range of options to provide more accessible assessment experiences for students including extra time, separate spaces and rest breaks. Please discuss this with me if you would like to know more about NAPLAN adjustment options.
ACADEMIC ASSESSMENT FOR DIAGNOSIS
Throughout the year we conduct Academic Assessments with students who are not demonstrating the expected growth in their learning program. These assessments range from considering a student’s focus and attention, through to literacy, numeracy and memory skills. These assessments can give a good indication of the barriers impacting a student’s learning capacity and can guide teachers towards more targeted support. Please contact myself or Teagan Saleta to consider this process.
Ms Melanie Saleta
Head of Learning Diversity