Focus on Learning

Student Learning Success 

Last Wednesday I had the privilege of sharing our student learning success with Chris Smyth, our Director of Schools, as well as School Performance Leaders and other Leadership Teams from around the Diocese.  

It was a proud moment to be able to show the growth across all classrooms in the core subjects of literacy and numeracy. 

Reading Data: 

It can be seen that Kindergarten has made in their reading benchmarks this year.  All of our Kindergarten students have reached Benchmark level, with over 70% being above this level.  This level of achievement in students' foundational year of school is a great jump start to student learning.  Well done Kindy and Miss Pilgrim!

PAT Testing is just one assessment tool used to track and monitor student achievement and growth.  This is an assessment that is administered Diocese wide 1-2 times per year, and is utilised by schools across Australia.  After testing, teachers will analyse the results and data to allow for tailored lessons to target identified needs across the year.  In Year 2, we have seen that every child tested in both 2022 and 2023 has made growth in their reading score! 

Reading groups in action in our classrooms:

Mathematics Data: 

PAT Testing is also used for Mathematics.   Here is some of the growth across our 3/4 class!  This shows the growth in students who completed the testing in both 2022 and 2023. 

This morning all of our students were engaged in various maths activities.  Kindy were sharing into equal groups, 1/2 were participating in whole number warm ups, 3/4 were budgeting for gifts and 5/6 were designing pencil boxes - creating the 3D shapes and their nets.  

NAPLAN Writing Data: 

We are one of only a few schools in our Diocese who achieved 100% of our students in the  'strong' or 'exceeding' bands in both Year 3 and Year 5.  We are achieving beyond the Diocese average for NAPLAN in our writing.  This is a testament to our strong sentence work within the infants' space, InitiaLit lessons, as well as our whole-school commitment to VCOP, Big Write and conferencing within our classrooms.  Thank you to the family support of our Big Writes!  Students need the opportunity to discuss ideas and their thinking before putting pen to paper. 

Coolamon Challenge - Week 6 

Congratulations to Lottie!  She was the only student to correctly answer the Coolamon Challenge last week.  Therefore we will continue with the same challenges from Week 5 into this week.  

Nature Ninjas - our gardening club

Our Nature Ninjas have already been hard at work this term, planning an array of projects for our school garden areas.  We have been busy pulling out our older plants and planting new seedlings for our summer crop.  We have also put down mulch to help retain the moisture now that our weather is heating up. 

The Nature Ninjas have begun working on the revitalisation of the Wellness Garden.  We have pulled out some of the older plants, and have planted some strawberries and perennial flowers.  We will continue to work on reinvigorating the wellness garden over the coming weeks!    

A huge thanks to Jorja and Rosie who show amazing commitment to the gardening, and are always keen to be involved in any jobs that need doing!   

Chicken Update

Our eggs have hatched!  We have 19 healthy chicks!   

The chicks are beginning to grow feathers, as they acclimatise to the outside world.  They are spending more and more time out from under the brooder plate, exploring the pen they are in.