Learning & Teaching News

Remote Learning at St. Peter’s College

Our recent focus has been not only to continue the excellent education of your children but in the spirit of life long learning, develop the skill of remote teaching in the event of a need to move to remote learning.  This week, teachers from both campuses have been developing their skills in Zoom webinar and trialling it in various classes with your children.  It is important to note that the use of webinars are only one way in which our teachers will ensure we will be able to support your child’s continued education. 

In the event of a remote learning the vision is to continue schooling of our students through online attendance according to the normal timetable.  In this scenario, students would be required to log in on their fully operational laptop and participate in online lessons at the usual times.  Attendance would be logged by teachers and parents notified if students are not participating in that online class.  Our learning management system SPACE is well suited to the delivery of class remotely and the decision to subscribe all teachers and students to Zoom will further enhance this capability.

We ask parents to emphasise the importance of continuing to engage with the learning that will be occurring online.  If students are choosing not to engage with class at home, then we ask you to challenge your child to do so. Failure to participate in remote learning, will see students significantly disadvantaged when classes at school resume. 

Online learning will also be important for students, who may otherwise feel the effects of social isolation, to continue to experience an important sense of belonging to a caring school community.

While remote learning remains a likely scenario at some stage, parents and students need to be confident that we as a school are fully prepared and able to cope with whatever is thrown our way.  We will keep you fully informed of any further responses if students are required to work from home for a period of time as this will affect student assessments - particularly SACs, examinations and the General Achievement Test mid-year.

It is important that students remain focussed in this time of uncertainty and continue to take their schooling seriously.  This is especially the case for our senior students.  These testing and extraordinary times will favour the more resilient and committed students and we want those students to be St. Peter’s College students who will be not afraid.

Building Collective Efficacy with Pre-Service Teachers

Supporting the learning needs of students at St. Peter’s College is paramount in what we do each and every day as teachers. We are always looking for new and innovative ways to engage, teach and challenge our students to reach new heights, which in itself is not an easy feat.

St. Peter’s College prides itself on strong partnerships with the finest universities to support pre-service teachers across all subject areas. In partnering with these universities, it allows us to challenge our teaching strategies and philosophies to build connections, allows our St Peter’s College students to benefit from extra programs and accelerated study options, and reflect on our own practice as teachers by supporting others. The role of the pre-service teacher is to support the learning goals of your children at St. Peter’s College with the latest teaching strategies to work with our students to help them work towards becoming 21st century global-learners. Pre-service teachers enable our existing staff to reflect on their own teaching practices and work collectively to acquire new skills and teaching strategies to implement in a range of subject areas.

It is the role of the mentor teacher to guide our pre-service teachers in getting to know the students within their classes, their individual learning needs, planning lessons, understanding the policies and procedures of the school and experiencing the life of a teacher. The pre-service teacher program awards some outstanding opportunities through attending camps, excursions, retreats, teaching a range of classes outside their method areas and works collectively with all staff (support, teaching and non-teaching) to give them a taste of their future employment. We appreciate the support of all staff, students and parents in making the pre-service teachers feel welcome during their placement. At St. Peter’s College, we hope our College community feel the benefit of helping others to grow and as a community, we relish the opportunity to learn from the next generation of teachers.

Ms. Sarah Slykerman

Pedagogical Coach – Clyde North Campus

& Mr David Hansen

Deputy Principal - Learning and Teaching