Director Learning and Teaching

This term I have had the opportunity to work with students in our Edge and Excel extension and enrichment programs at the Senior School. It has been a wonderful chance for me to get to know students across a range of different year levels and has been fantastic to see how engaged students have been in the sessions being offered. These programs continue our extension program from the Junior School, moving to multi-age sessions, providing a range of different opportunities and experiences. 

Students have had a range of sessions including explorations of mathematical puzzles, philosophical thinking, and leadership and communication. Students have also been invited to work on a written submission for the Whitlam Institute’s ‘What Matters’ writing competition.  This competition challenges students to write about issues that matters to them within a concise 600-word limit. Now in its 20th year, the competition was inspired by Gough Whitlam’s lifelong commitment to involving young people in shaping Australia’s future. I am looking forward to reading some of the drafts as we continue to work on these submissions early next term. 

This week we began exploring the Tournament of the Minds problem solving competition with our Edge students. Tournament's aim is to enhance the potential of our youth by developing diverse skills, enterprise, time management, and the discipline to work collaboratively within a challenging and competitive environment.

The Tournament aims to:

• promote the stimulation of real, open-ended challenges;
• develop creative problem-solving approaches and techniques;
• foster cooperative learning and teamwork;
• promote knowledge and appreciation of self and others;
• encourage experimentation and risk taking;
• expand and reward creative and divergent thinking;
• stimulate a spirit of inquiry and a love of learning;
• develop enterprise; and 
• celebrate excellence.

They are required to solve demanding, open-ended challenges from one of the following disciplines:

• The Arts
• STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics)
• Language Literature
• Social Sciences

We began our exploration through a series of short challenges similar to the ones they will experience on competition day, making catapults out of a set of simple equipment and preparing a creative story-telling response to a picture prompt. Our Edge students demonstrated persistence, teamwork and great creative energy and I am very excited to see what they are able to achieve as they progress with the Tournament this year.