Deputy Principal

Teaching and Learning at its Best

In the last week of Term 2 I had the privilege of watching the Year 11 Drama students perform their ‘Monologues’. What made it truly special for me, the economist, was not just the creativity in seeing the students perform on stage. It was in fact the design of the assessment task. Yes, this may make me a teacher ‘geek’. 

The task set for the students was to write and perform a monologue. While they had to write their own monologues, when it came to performance, they had to perform a classmate’s monologue. Monologues can be a particularly personal piece. The writer has a vision of how that piece should be performed. Having to hand over your piece to someone else and not being allowed to give them your vision is not an easy thing to do. However, the creativity, imagination, thoughtfulness, and dedication that these students gave to someone else’s piece was truly inspiring. They all put in so much effort to bring someone else’s piece of work to life.

I was inspired as a teacher myself by the task. The ability to let go and give the students ownership over the way they interpreted an assessment task is something that I think we should do more; however, I acknowledge that this level of adaptability is not possible in many courses as we are dictated by NESA guidelines.

Congratulations to all the students who performed on the night – Carl, Michael, Dylan, Gus, Thomas, Marco, Xavier, Mateusz, and Jordan. You all did so well. A special thank you to Ms. Duff for her interpretation of the assessment task. I look forward to seeing you progress onto the HSC course in Term 4.

Adrian Byrne

Deputy Principal