Curriculum & P-2 Mini School

A very warm welcome to both our new and returning school community families.  It’s great to be back after a refreshing break and there is a lot to look forward to regarding the curriculum at TSPS in 2018

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P-2 Staff Structure

This year at TSPS, we have broken the school up into two mini schools.  My role this year will be to oversee and lead the Prep – Two area.  Working closely alongside me will be four amazing leaders:

As a collective group, our aim in 2018 is to support and work closely alongside the appointed teaching staff within the P-2 area.  We will be spending the majority of our time coaching these staff.  Through the setting up of supportive and collaborative partnerships, we will develop teacher capacity using quality feedback to improve data and student outcomes.

This year we have six community spaces within the P-2 mini school.  The teaching staff include:

RUBY COMMUNITY – Jess Dando (Community Leader), Stacey Brady, Angela Demeca, Betty Puku

DIAMOND COMMUNITY – Alex Wren (Community Leader), Mel Walters, Georgia Flanders

SAPPHIRE COMMUNITY – Anna Zarkos (Community Leader), Jenna Lewer, Heather Marshall

GARNET COMMUNITY – Jess Fernandez (Community Leader), Ash Wilson, Shanelle Carvery, Amira Moore

OPAL COMMUNITY – Ebonie Keys (Community Leader), Jess McKinnon, Kara Gatt

ONYX COMMUNITY – Elysia Mitchell (Community Leader), Ainsley Smith

“Parents matter, buildings count, curriculum choices, materials, resources - all these things are important in a top-class education. But, in the end, it comes down to the teachers.”

             (Kimberley Quinn)

Meet And Greet Night:

A massive thank you to the families that signed up for the meet and greet session in the first week of February.  We understand that the home school partnership is very important as it bridges our students’ two most important worlds together.  When parents and teachers come together it creates a positive relationship that results in everyone working together with the child’s best interests as the priority. 

Staff thoroughly enjoyed the exchanging of information about your child’s hobbies, interests, strengths along with their social and emotional needs.  It has now allowed them to better prepare for the year ahead with the valuable information you have provided about your child.

Our next set of parent-teacher interviews will be in the final week of Term Two.

Whole School Focus

A major focus at TSPS this year will be the Writing curriculum.  Past NAPLAN and academic scores (reports) have indicated a decline in student growth from P-6.  Teaching staff spent one of the past curriculum days unpacking and exploring a teaching and learning cycle created by our Writing committee (see below).  Our aim is to have consistency in the way genres are taught across the school, knowing that this will lead to a positive impact on student outcomes throughout the year and moving forward.

Curriculum:

Throughout term one, the different cohorts across the school will be focusing on these items within these curriculum areas:

Prep Communities:

Writing – students will commence learning how to write a Recount piece.  The aim will be that they can simply retell or recount an event or an experience.

Reading – students will have opportunities to learn about concepts about print, our fix-it strategies, letter ID and phonemic awareness.

Numeracy – students will learn about the following maths concepts in term one.  These include; shape, patterns / algebra and place value.

Year One/Two Communities:

Writing – students will again be exposed on how to write an effective Recount piece.  They will retell / recount the event or an experience by describing it to others.

Reading – students will continue to be exposed to the fix-it strategies as well as focusing on literal / inferential comprehension.  We want our students to be able to process information that they have read and understand its meaning.

Numeracy – students will learn about the following maths concepts in term one.  These include; time, place value and addition / subtraction.

Year Three - Six Communities:

Writing – students will be explicitly exposed to both Narrative and Exposition text types.  The aim will be to best prepare our students for the upcoming NAPLAN written test.

Reading – students will be exposed to a variety of comprehension strategies.  Some of the strategies that teachers will explicitly unpack will include; predicting, visualising, summarising and questioning.

Numeracy – students will learn about the following maths concepts in term one.  These include; number and place value along with addition and subtraction

Joel Riddle

(Assistant Principal – Curriculum)

“Curriculum should help children make deeper and fuller understanding of their own experience.”

                                                                                  (Lilian Katz)