Kambala Institute of 

Teaching Excellence

Teaching for Learning that Matters

As our Kambala Community would know, we are fortunate to host an Academic in Residence program at Kambala through KITE. 

Since the start of 2023, Professor Ron Ritchhart (Harvard Graduate School of Education) has worked alongside us to guide our teachers’ thinking and professional development. Professor Ritchhart’s recent research and writing centres around mindsets that underpin a teacher’s ability to create a culture of thinking. 

A key ‘mindset’ that we have placed focus on has been: 

We can’t teach dispositions, we must enculturate them.

If we consistently model, promote, live, reference, honour, and demand the dispositions of a learner and thinker;

then students will develop the intellectual character that supports a lifetime of learning and thinking.

(Ritchhart, 2023)

Last week our staff gathered for a set of professional learning workshops that centred on the disposition of ‘Global Mindedness’. Stuart Coppin (Deputy Principal - Head of Junior School), Phillip Bird (Head of IB) and Lauren Walsh (Head of Curriculum Innovations) led these sessions. 

Mr Coppin invited two special guest speakers, Araminta Dusseldorp (Year 6) and Hannah Guo (Year 3) to remind us of the potential of the young people we have in front of us each day, and the opportunity they have to contribute as global citizens and change makers. 

Ms Samantha Gooch

Executive Director of KITE