FROM THE PRINCIPAL

A message from the Principal

Global Learning

On Sunday, Bu Rumble and I will travel to Indonesia for an exciting trip where we hope to learn a huge amount. Today, we are attending a Global Learning and Engagement Symposium, hosted by the International Education Division of the education department. 

The focus of today's symposium has been fantastic with a wide range of government schools sharing their practice in teaching, promoting and fostering global understanding, cultural awareness and citizenship. It has been invigorating to be amongst other principals and teachers who value and recognise the critical importance  of developing these skills and attitudes for children. 

We know that, despite the rhetoric of some, borders will only continue to soften and migration patterns will only continue to see a huge spread of people around the world. Children today will be part of this - if they have the skills to understand, communicate and collaborate with a vast array of people from a range of cultures and backgrounds then this will only benefit them. Recognising the opportunities available to students to be part of this: working overseas, learning about new cultures, travelling and being exposed to new ideas ... I feel it is our obligation as educators in this day and age to create the conditions for our students to thrive in those conditions. 

One of the factors that attracted me to RNPS, and I'm sure a number of parents, too, was the commitment to educating the whole child and the vision to develop active, global citizens. For a long time we have been using our learning through Challenge Based Learning in conjunction with our language program and Sister School relationship to help try to achieve this. Recently, we have used the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals to help us organise our learning and another level of depth to how we learn about and understand other countries. It is my hope that in the near future we will be in a position to provide even more opportunities for students to interact with and learn from and about children in other countries. 

I am also privileged to have been able to work with a number of schools in Indonesia as part of the work we are doing next week: Gerakan Sekolah Menyenangkan. This project is a grassroots movement from parents in Indonesia to change the education system to more closely reflect the values represented in Victorian schools when trying to educate the whole child and open up a world of opportunities. Many schools in Indonesia's education system are caught in the unpleasant perpetual-exam cycle of teaching where students grind through from one test to the next, rewarded for high scores, and disadvantaged for anything else. Students are angry, frustrated, sad and bored. Bu Rumble and I will be working with principals and teachers to share our experiences in schools to work through this. 2 teachers from Clayton North PS will accompany us to work with approximately 130 teachers over 5 days. Recently, the Deputy Premier and Minister for Education, James Merlino, visited a number of the GSM schools to see how things have changed over the years we have been working with them. The movement has now spread to several thousand schools across the country and is evolving into a rich, collaborative network of schools between Indonesia and Australia.

Following that, Bu Rumble and I will take an overnight train across to Bandung where our sister school is located. I am thrilled to visit Tunas Unggul and meet with the school leaders to see what further opportunities we can explore together to build shared understanding. 

It will be a big trip but one that I hope will be fruitful and beneficial. We will, of course, share some of what we see, learn and do while we are there but Bu Rumble was insistent I share this photo from last year. I look forward to another bowl of Bakso soon! 

Bu Rumble and I look forward to seeing you all soon upon our return. 

Best Regards

Ken Chatterton