Teaching & Learning

Making our way through Remote Learning

It certainly has been a strange start to Term 2, one that has presented many challenges but also one that has presented many opportunities. As a school we have opted for a staged approach to the implementation of Remote Learning. We feel this approach will support students, parents and staff to acquire the technical skills that will be the basis for their learning as we proceed through this period of change.

As a reminder, here is our plan for the coming months.

Expectations for Students, Parents and Staff

This period of transition is a learning opportunity for all of us, it is important to outline the expectations for all who are involved in delivering a Remote Learning Plan.

Note: Nine of our teachers have children of primary age or younger at home. These teachers will have carer responsibilities and will also be supporting their own children with their education. As such these teachers will have a reduced capacity to be online and engage with your child. They will do their best, but won’t be able to conference or communicate as much as those without carer responsibilities. In these situations video conference sessions will most often be small group rather than individual and may be of shorter duration.

Clear Communication and Feedback Processes

During the week ahead we will be assisting students to learn the skills that will help them submit work, communicate with teachers and receive feedback. As we approach Stage 3 of our plan, there will be an expectation that students submit work that has been completed so they can receive feedback on their progress. We know this is going to look very different across the school depending on the developmental needs of the students. Therefore we will work on the following 4 consistent strategies that will allow the feedback loop to be completed.

The 4 strategies we will be teaching the students are:

1. Submitting work via the Learning Tasks.
2. Receiving teacher responses/assessments from Learning Tasks.
3. Using the Conversation function in Learning Task to ask questions.
4. Responding to polling questions during a Webex meeting.

We hope that by having a consistent approach to having a feedback loop, it will assist teachers to plan effective learning opportunities and for students to gauge their learning progress.

Remote Learning in Focus

As we make our way through the second week of remote learning, who better to ask about how it is going than the students. This week we asked the senior students about the experience so far and how they are making the most of the opportunity.