Assistant Principal's Report

Staff Professional Learning

As a staff we meet every fortnight for professional learning. Recently we employed a consultant from Melbourne University, Bronwyn Jones, to lead some professional learning sessions and provide an outside perspective. Our current focus has been on building expertise in assessment and data analysis, more specifically looking at formative and summative assessment practices. Formative assessment is vital in identifying what students already know and where they need to go next. This may be in the form of a pre-test, anecdotal notes, writing pieces or a performance. The idea behind setting formative assessment tasks is to provide a challenging assessment task that clearly shows what the students do not know, thereby telling the teacher the content focus for instruction. Summative assessment is used to identify what the students have learned. A teacher hopes to identify what has been most successful in a given unit of work and looks for learning gains.

Our teachers have been investigating the use of assessment and have been challenging their own ideas of how it is carried out. They have been reviewing assessment tools, identifying the qualities of a useful test and breaking down tests to identify the purpose of each question. The next stage in our professional learning will be utilising data walls and charts to inform our teaching practices. These charts and spreadsheets enable teachers to assess the content that should be taught, the content that students already know, and assists the teacher in quickly grouping students for differentiated learning tasks. Improving data literacy is a priority for our staff and has a direct impact on student learning.

Learning at Montmorency Primary School

Several classes have either attended or are about to attend an excursion to support their learning in the classroom. The Grade 3/4 students went to the Melbourne Museum to see the First Peoples ‘Bunjilaka’ exhibit, directly connected to their unit on Australian History. The Grade 5/6 students will be heading into town to attend an excursion at the Immigration Museum, supporting their inquiry into Cultural Diversity and their projects on family heritage. The Foundation students were also in town last week to see the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra. They learned about the different instrument families and the role of the conductor, all while sitting in beautiful Hamer Hall! Excursions and incursions give students the real-life experiences that create deep learning connections. The discussions and questions that come about from these experiences are truly valuable, sparking curiosity and critical thinking.

Coles Sports for Schools Vouchers

We would like to thank everyone who collected Coles Sports for Schools vouchers over the last few months. We were able to collect around 35,000 which was 10 times more than expected! Our Sports Captains now have the task of investigating the equipment that needs replenishing and what our students would love to have in our Sports Shed!

Rebekah Rentos

Assistant Principal