From the Director of Pedagogy and Innovation
It’s Their Education
This week we held the first two days of our Year7 Orientation program and it was refreshing to see the openness and enthusiasm with which the students arrived. Too often do in school, sometimes we rush students so we can do the organisational tasks that must be done, and their eagerness and enjoyment is lost. This year during Orientation we spent time preparing for the Odyssey program, exploring the School’s History and setting up tents in preparation for camp in February next year. It was great to see students leaving Blue Mountains Grammar School after two days more excited than ever to begin their Senior School journey.
On Monday night a number of staff met with parents, and in preparing for this I was reminded afresh that the work my team and I do is much more than organising curriculum content. Indeed, we are moving away from what some educationalists are describing as “victims of curriculum.” This is when we see students as we saw workers from the Industrial era; they needed to be taught to assemble items in an expediated and efficient manner, and only in the way they had been trained. This model sees the need to “do education to students” rather than education with or for students. As we met with parents and families on Monday we were able to talk about the ways in which we need to focus on thinking and adapting, rather than copying and reproducing.
One analogy is that we move very quickly through prescribed content, not unlike a fast-paced bus trip. The teacher takes their rightful seat as the driver of the bus, the students get on and whether they are seated or just standing in the aisle, the bus tears away at significant pace. There are some students that deal with the speed, the delivery of curriculum as a top-down model and with high-stakes testing. They are able to manage the relationships, technology, logistics and pace of the school and are comfortable with the status quo. However, there are many students that are not.
Some alarming statistics have come out recently from a Parliamentary Inquiry looking into the causes and effects of school refusal*. While there are many factors often play into this, a very notable influence is a lack of engagement and lack of connection. Indeed, the pace of the bus, to extend the metaphor is too much for some and they simply get left behind.
Next year, Year 7 will be completing projects that tie in outcomes and content from all different subjects and challenge them to solve problems that Chat GTP and other software cannot do for them. In February they begin an investigation into ‘Why is school important?’ This investigation will look at schooling around the world (Geography), how Blue Mountains Grammar School and Australian schooling has changed (History), create an advertising campaign that has multiple deliverables (Music, Drama, Art, English) and present a showcase evening to parents, students and staff that including a learning passport and portfolio of thinking and learning.
We are keen to see how a new cohort respond to this model and the new-found ownership of their education. Afterall, it is their education, not ours. As adults, we have had our turn and now it is up to the next generation to have their go.
For more information on the Odyssey program check out https://www.bluemountainsgrammarschool.au/year-7
Mr Chris Sanders
Director of Pedagogy and Innovation