PRINCIPAL'S NEWS
Welcome to Murputja Staff Bulletin Number 7
Site Improvement Plan Progress
It is hard to believe that the term is very quickly coming to a close with approximately 2.5 weeks until the end of term. It certainly has been an unpredictable term, but one which has seen an enormous amount of progress towards our Site Improvement Agenda. During this week's staff meeting time will committed to collaboratively reviewing the progress we have made towards our 100 Day Action Plan which is aligned to our Site Improvement Plan. I am very confident that we are well and truly 'on track' with the vast majority of our planned actions. This discussion will allow us to monitor how we are travelling in regards to our planned actions and will also enable us to make any necessary adjustments to our planned actions.
Attached below is our 100 Day Action Plan. Staff will be asked to consider how we are proceeding with our actions and whether there are additional actions which we would like to plan for term 3.
PDP Plans
I would like to thank staff for their active involvement in the recent PDP discussions. I realise that for many of you PDP discussions have not occurred for a significant period of time. It was also very pleasing to see the high degree of alignment between individual PDP goals and the revised Site Improvement Plan priorities, particularly in the area of Reading. Moving forward, it is important that staff make regular small steps towards meeting their PDP goals. At the whole site level, this is the 100 Day Plan which outlines the small steps towards improvement.
Walk Throughs and Feedback
As you are aware, I love spending as much time as possible in the classrooms and as an instructional leader a vital component of my role is working alongside teachers in the classroom observing, supporting and providing feedback. I have structured my timetable to enable me to spend as much time as I can in the classrooms either observing or supporting with instruction and reading intervention.
Walk-throughs are an observation and feedback process which I will perform on a regular basis to monitor the teaching and learning occurring in classrooms. My intention is to provide written feedback to teachers on a weekly basis with the feedback largely focussed on your planning and teaching in the SIP priority areas of reading and numeracy.
Classroom Timetables
It is important that, as professionals, we actively plan for and document intentional teaching and learning. A structured and carefully considered timetable which provides the 1600 minutes of mandated instruction is an important component of this planning. At this week's staff meeting we will collaboratively review and revise our classroom timetables to ensure consistency and to ensure our time is focused on supporting students with literacy and numeracy.
The main outcomes that I hope to achieve include:
- the establishment of a whole-school daily literacy block with the implementation of an 'all hands-on-deck' time each morning during the literacy block
- the provision of one-on-one reading intervention to students (in addition to the daily literacy block)
- opportunities for teachers to collaboratively plan for student learning
Collaborative Planning T3
Also during this week's staff meeting we will consider options for a whole-school 'themed unit of work' where all classes engage in learning around a common theme. This is an opportunity for us to provide cross-age tutoring whilst also increasing both student and community engagement.
Running Records Training
Thank you to Shelly for conducting the Running Records training during last week's staff meeting. It is important that we are all able to conduct a Running Records assessment in order to ensure that our reading instruction is aimed at an appropriate level based on the students' needs and abilities. As we have discussed, we will soon shift to a 'case management' model where teachers will conduct an 'entry assessment' (a series of diagnostic assessments) of students when they enroll so that teaching can be more closely aligned to student's learning needs. Running Records will be one of these assessments.
Cadbury Awards
As discussed at last week's staff meeting, this week's staff meeting will see the introduction of a weekly Cadbury Award. Staff are asked to nominate a staff member in recognition of their efforts in going 'above and beyond'! To nominate a staff member simply record their name on the back of the attached nomination slip with a brief description of why they deserve to be nominated. It would be great if you could nominate each staff member for at least one reason each week!