From the Principal

This week, I have been reading a book on motivation and learning. I wanted to share a section that I found particularly insightful:

Today’s children are expected to learn things that took humankind millennia of accumulated endeavour to understand. Not only is the stuff we teach in school inherently effortful to learn but its value is not always obvious or immediate. Left to our own devices, few of us would find ourselves with the motivation required to learn such things in full. (McCrea, 2020. Emphasis added.)

We are all different. Some people find learning academic concepts easier than others, at least in certain areas. There are a small few who seem to learn new things with relative ease across many different domains. I think it helpful for many of us to be reminded of the complexity of the knowledge, skills and understanding introduced at school.

The skill of a teacher is to break down big ideas into manageable chunks that students can grasp, to present information in ways that are engaging and memorable and provide reinforcement of new learning so that it sticks. Teachers put huge amounts of time and effort into planning and presenting learning so that students can experience success. From this success comes confidence and motivation to keep learning.

A prominent educator, Dylan Williams, once stated, ‘Good teachers have the ability to get pupils to care about stuff they didn’t care about when they walked into the classroom.’

I want to take an opportunity to recognise our many skilled and dedicated educators who are committed to the success of each student, understanding that this helps them to persist in learning complex ideas.

Focus on Compassion

As part of our focus on Compassion, we have welcomed some visitors this week. Terry from Samaritan’s Purse came to speak to us about the annual shoebox appeal. He shared examples of the joy that children who have very little experience when they open their shoebox.

We also had Ruth from SIM come to speak to our student Bible study group about her experience as a missionary in Thailand. Ruth shared aspects of her work in teaching disadvantaged children and community outreach in central Thailand. Ruth explained that one of the greatest challenges for the local community was the level of family dysfunction. She shared that often people within the community will not raise conflict with others. They don’t talk about things that have upset them. Instead, they will remove the person from their lives.

Ruth talked to the students about how this experience has emphasised for her the importance of having forgiveness as part of our culture. She unpacked with students how our Christian heritage has shaped some of our cultural assumptions and some of the differences she has found working in a culture that is largely influenced by Buddhism.

Parent Survey

Included in the newsletter is information regarding an online survey from Christian Schools Australia. The survey asks for feedback from parents on a number of aspects of school life. The information provided in the survey helps us to better understand your and your child/children’s experience at the school and how that compares to other Christian schools. I would like to encourage one parent from each family to take some time to complete the survey over the next few weeks.

Jodie Bennett

Principal