Placements at Doncaster Primary School

CURRICULUM 

DPS CURRICULUM 

CURRICULUM 

Doncaster Primary follows the Victorian Curriculum F–10 which sets out what every student should learn during their first eleven years of schooling. The curriculum is the common set of knowledge and skills required by students for life-long learning, social development and active and informed citizenship: http://victoriancurriculum.vcaa.vic.edu.au/

PHILOSOPHY OF TEACHING AND LEARNING 

At Doncaster Primary School we:

  1. Embrace the belief that all students can learn and we Empower students to take  responsibility for their learning 
  2. Implement consistent whole school teaching and learning practices through agreed systems, processes and through our Whole School Instructional Model
  3. Provide an engaging, stimulating and challenging learning environment with a focus on explicit and targeted teaching in Literacy, Numeracy and  through a  ‘MAPPEN’ approach to curriculum development in Humanities and Science, Health, Technologies, The Capabilities, Literacy and Numeracy 
  4. Provide explicit instruction with clear learning intentions, success criteria and high  expectations of all students in all areas of the curriculum
  5. Achieve individual success and growth through differentiated teaching and learning opportunities, understanding a student’s Zone of Proximal Development, individual learning goals, reflection and feedback and ongoing assessment to monitor and inform teaching and learning  
  6. Use a variety of tools and ‘High Impact Teaching Strategies’ during learning experiences 
  7. Value our role as educators and provide targeted professional development  to ensure continuous improvement 
  8. Respect all cultures and relationships. Embrace individuality and foster inclusiveness in a safe environment. 
  9. Use the FISO Improvement Model to evaluate our impact on learning outcomes and wellbeing outcomes for our students

NON-NEGOTIABLES AT DPS

Every class must do spelling, tables, handwriting and reading aloud for every child every day. 

 

INSTRUCTIONAL MODEL

READER'S WORKSHOP MODEL 

DPS Reading Workshop model of instruction that focuses on the work of the reader. Teachers model and directly teach the skills and strategies that proficient readers use. Students engage in a mini- lesson, independent reading, small-group instruction, and conferring with their teacher. 

 

NUMERACY OVERVIEW 

Developmentally-sequenced hands-on mathematics units which enable and extend our students during maths lessons. 

 

SPELLING PROGRAM 

Prep - Sound Waves is a systematic synthetic phonics and word-study program designed to develop reading, spelling and writing skills

Grade 1-6 - Smart Spelling program incorporates both the systematic teaching of spelling each week and also personal words. We teach in patterns as much as possible, so teachers choose a range of words (from simple to complex) from a suggested list in the manual. Students are then guided to choose from that list, to meet different needs.