Teaching and Learning

 

As teachers, we don’t want our students to start the year in our class with a perfect score. There’s something a little bit selfish in the desire, but ultimately it comes from the goal of helping all our students to improve. One of the great joys of teaching is seeing young men and women develop over the course of their time at school, and we also enjoy our own personal and professional growth as we look to research, experiment and refine our teaching practice.

Every week, we spend an afternoon in directed Professional Learning, exploring the pastoral care and pedagogical practices that will help our students to grow. The focus in our Professional Learning Groups this term has been on creating a classroom culture that helps our students to be ‘Ready to Learn’.

Every teacher uses a range of strategies to create a classroom culture and there is an art to managing the combination of personalities in every class in such a way that a productive classroom culture is established, maintained and developed. These strategies often include consideration of physical space, including movement into and around the room, movement between activities and placement of furniture. They also include routines for reading, writing, speaking and listening. Some are overt and obvious to our students, while others are subtler and operate without breaking the flow of the delivery of academic content.

What can you do to help your young men and women in your family be ‘Ready to Learn’? Personally, I’m yet to meet a student who has convinced me that he or she genuinely doesn’t want to improve in their studies. However, I’ve met a few who become frustrated when they don’t feel that they can improve, so keeping a positive attitude about all things at school is an important starting point for both parents and teachers. Young people pick up our cues, so patience and positivity are very helpful attributes for them to observe in the adults in their lives.

Semester One Examinations

They may feel like they are a long way away for our students, but I draw your attention to the relatively early dates for our Semester One Examinations this year, due to the later date of Easter and the subsequently short duration of Term 2. These examinations fall in Week 5 of Term 2 (May 27-31) and we ask that parents avoid making commitments that may conflict with examinations during this time.

Parents of Year 9 students, please note that we have decided not to hold Semester One Examinations for the Year 9 classes this year. Given the early start to the examination week and its proximity to the group’s return from China, we feel that Year 9 students would be best served by continuing with normal classes during this week. These classes will include some extended assessment tasks, while also enabling our Year 9 students to maintain their routine. Year 9 will have Semester Two Examinations as normal later in the year.

Ralph Carolan