Learning & Teaching News

Beginning of Year

One of the privileges I have as the Learning & Teaching Deputy Principal is to visit many different classes.  These are great learning experiences for me, not just because of the interesting content being taught but also in observing some excellent teaching.  This past week, I have sought out lessons with our new teachers and new students in Year 7. 

Some of the highlights this week I observed on the Clyde North campus included:

• Ms Carolyn Ellul helping her Year 7 Religion class develop a sense of belonging to the College as they prepared their personal shield
• Mr Jake Charman working with his Year 7 English students reading their novels
• Ms Gabby O’Connell running a Reading Detective class with a Year 7 English class
• Mr James Duffy teaching a Year 12 Further Maths class
• Ms Madeleine Tabacchiera guiding Year 8 Music students with keyboard compositions.
• Ms Despina Angelidis, our newest staff member, who was supervising a Food Technology class
• Ms Krystelle Martin helping Year English students connect their book “The Outsiders” with other texts.  Ms Martin is a former student from the Cranbourne Campus who has also taken on the cross-campus role of Literacy Coach.

Of course, I was also able to see some of our teachers who are not so new, such as Mr Aidan Stewart who was enjoying teaching a Year 8 Maths class about conjectures and was developing their deep-thinking skills.

Though I have not been able to visit the Cranbourne teachers yet, I did join with the new staff at the Cranbourne Campus for a breakfast meeting where we discussed their transition into the College.  It was pleasing to hear how welcome they felt and their unanimous observation about how ready and eager your children were to learn.  I look forward to visiting classes at Cranbourne later this week.

Progressive Achievement Testing – Year 7 students

This week we have begun testing our Year 7 students in Reading, Vocabulary, Mathematics and Critical Reasoning.  These are important tests that establish for us the knowledge and skills that our students have as they begin at St. Peter’s College.  It enables us, as teachers, to better target our teaching of students because we know what they are ready to learn.  This assists us in the personalising of learning. It also allows us to measure student growth throughout Year 7 when we do a second test in November.  This information is invaluable for us teachers in determining what teaching strategies are most effective in accelerating learning growth of our students. This is one of the key goals in our School Improvement Plan.

Please assure your child that these tests provide important information for teachers to help us to do the best we can do.  It is not something for students to be worried or anxious about.

Academic Assembly

Next week, we will live stream our Academic Assembly to staff, students and parents owing to COVID restrictions.  We will still mark the beginning of the academic year by celebrating the success of our amazing Year 12 students who despite the extraordinary challenges of the past 2 years achieved some wonderful results.  We hope that you can watch the event or alternatively read the names of these students and their achievements in the next newsletter. 

David Hansen

Deputy Principal – Learning & Teaching