STELLA MARIS SCHOOL

Teaching and Learning Policy

1. RATIONALE

·  To equip students with skills for life-long; teaching them how to learn.

·  To promote learning and teaching practices that will improve the quality of education for all students in our school.

·  To provide each student with a range of learning experiences which will:

o  Assist them to improve their own learning

o  Promote excellence in learning

o  Develop self-esteem, confidence and independence

·  To provide a range of personnel, services, resources and facilities to enhance teaching and learning practices.

·  To promote teaching and learning as a partnership between home and school and the local wider community.

2. SCOPE

This policy applies to the whole Stella Maris School community and will be made available to others on request.

3. POLICY AIMS

·  To promote active learning, which provides opportunities for pupils to pose their own questions, investigate issues and take increasing responsibility for what they do

·  To encourage discussion between pupils and their teachers about learning programmes, about expectations, targets, choices and decisions within them.

·  To ensure that there is continuity of learning so as to ensure progression within a class, between classes and at transition between schools.

·  To provide a variety of learning experiences using various teaching styles and appropriate assessment methods that the pupils can understand.

·  To provide working contexts which offer a range of opportunities for participation individually and co-operatively in groups of various sizes.

·  To ensure that learning programmes contain knowledge, which is relevant to each pupil’s needs, interests and abilities giving emphasis to its practical application.

·  To encourage pupils’ families and wider community involvement enabling pupils to contribute to the community and use it as a resource for learning.

·  To give opportunities for pupils to reflect upon and appraise their own work, to identify goals for further progress and to make appropriate choices.

·  To guide and counsel the pupil, involving parents wherever practicable, to help pupils to recognise and assess their particular strengths and potential.

·  To ensure that assessment and recording of attainment is an integral part of the learning process.


4. CURRICULUM OVERVIEW- VELS

Stella Maris is making a strong commitment to bring the current school curriculum in line with the new Victorian Essential Learning Standards introduced to Victorian schools in 2005. Through access to a wide range of learning experiences in the areas of Physical, Personal and Social Learning, Discipline based learning and Interdisciplinary Learning, we expect that students will develop breadth of knowledge, skills, understandings and values

Strands
Physical, Personal and Social Learning
Discipline Based Learning
Interdisciplinary Learning / Domains
Health & PE
Interpersonal Development
Personal Living
Civics & Citizenship
Religious Education
The Arts
English
Humanities
LOTE – Japanese
Mathematics Science
Science
Communication
Design, Creativity & Technology
Information & Communication
Technology
Thinking / Dimensions
Physical activity & health knowledge
Working in teams
Managing personal learning
Community engagement
Religious Knowledge and Understanding
Religious Reasoning and Responding
Personal and Communal Engagement
Creating & making
Reading, writing & speaking
Historical & geographical knowledge
Intercultural knowledge and language awareness
Number, space, measurement, chance, data, structure, working mathematically
Science at work
Listening, viewing, responding, presenting
Investigating, designing, producing, analysing, evaluating ICT for visual thinking, creating, communicating
Reasoning, processing, inquiry, creativity, reflection

Discipline Based Learning

Religious Education

The Religious Education program and lessons are based on the "Texts and Guidelines For Religious Education" of the Archdiocese of Melbourne. The Religious Education curriculum aims to complement the family in developing the total child in the life of faith.

Education in Faith happens when we are:

·  Forming Christian attitudes

·  Developing children's consciences

·  Handing on factual knowledge

·  Celebrating liturgy and worship

We share with parents the responsibility of educating children in Faith. Together we pray and support each other in the precious but awesome task.

English

In English students learn to appreciate, enjoy and use language and develop a sense of its richness and its power to evoke feelings, to form and convey ideas, to inform, to discuss, to persuade, to entertain and to argue. They study language in the variety of texts and contexts in which it is spoken, read, viewed and written. English involves students in reading, viewing, writing, comparing, researching and talking about texts. Students explore the meaning of texts and how that meaning is conveyed. They develop a critical understanding about the ways writers and speakers control language to influence their listeners, readers and viewers. Students develop an understanding of the way purpose, audience and situation influence the structures and features of language and learn to apply their knowledge in their reading, viewing, speaking and listening. They learn to control language by applying grammatical structures, spelling accurately and using punctuation effectively and by imitating good writers and speakers.

Our junior literacy program (P-2) is based on the methodology of CLaSS (Children’s Literacy Success Strategy). CLaSS strives to raise the levels of literacy attainment in young children in the early years of schooling to give them a solid foundation for success in later learning. It is based on the belief that improvements in literacy are achievable through a whole school approach, which ensures that all students make progress and achieve success in the early years.

The middle school (3-4) follows the 'Early Years Building Literacy' program which focuses on the consolidation of junior years literacy learning. This takes into account the increasing need to focus on comprehension strategies, research skills and developing a critical analysis of reading materials.

The approach to Literacy in the senior school (5-6) is based on the 'Middle Years Literacy Project'. This looks at developing students' literacy skills beyond the decoding aspect of reading, emphasising the need for students to develop self-management strategies. Instruction is based on guided reading; reciprocal teaching as the main approach.

After the preparatory year at school, children assessed by the school as ‘at risk’ at reading, participate in a Reading Recovery program as well as their class reading lessons. They receive individual, daily teaching for an average of about sixteen-twenty weeks. During this period the teacher aims to address each child’s specific confusions and raise and accelerate the child’s reading ability to the average for the class before individual teaching is discontinued.

Mathematics

Students learn to demonstrate useful mathematical and numeracy skills, solve practical problems with mathematics, see mathematical connections and be able to apply mathematical concepts, skills and processes in posing and solving mathematical problems. They develop an understanding of the role of mathematics in life.

Stella Maris follows the SINE (Success in Numeracy Education) Numeracy Initiative. Key features of this program include:

·  Daily one hour numeracy block

·  Comprehensive numeracy assessment for the numeracy benchmarks

·  Identification and intervention strategies for students at risk

Through the maths program students develop a powerful means of communication which helps to represent, explain and predict events within our world, whilst gaining an appreciation for the social and cultural significance of mathematics.

Humanities - Economics, Geography and History

Students study human societies, people and their cultures in the past and the present, learning about human behaviour. They learn to understand how and why groups of people have settled where they have, organised their societies, developed means of generating and distributing wealth, developed codes, laws and belief systems and related to other groups of people.

Economics:
Students study how different societies allocate scarce resources to satisfy the wants and needs of its members and address the requirements for human survival and sustainability. They learn how wealth is generated and distributed, enabling them to understand the importance of acting rationally and ethically when making economic and personal financial decisions, and influence others to do likewise.

History:
Students study the past in order to understand themselves and their world. They learn about cultures, ideas and values that are important to other societies as well as their own. They learn that all history, including Australian history, reflects multiple influences and connections to an array of other countries, cultures and times. Students learn about the key events in the history of the Australian nation and how it has evolved over time. They learn that Indigenous history is an integral perspective within Australian history.

Geography:
Students study physical and human environments from a spatial perspective. This provides them with the knowledge and skills to observe and describe places on the surface of the earth.

The Arts

The Arts involve Art, , and Visual Communication. Engagement in the Arts involves the inspired and passionate exploration of ideas and the resultant products and performances. Students experience learning in Visual (Art, including 2-D and 3-D, ) disciplines and forms.

Arts specialists take weekly lessons across the school. In Visual art students experiment with a variety of media including painting, drawing, construction, modelling and collage. Students from 3-6 have the opportunity to join the School Choir.

Science

Through Science, students learn to appreciate, understand, control and manage their world. They learn respect for the environment (living and non-living) and the opinions and ideas of others, honesty in collecting and presenting data and evidence and acknowledgment of the work of others. Student’s understanding is extended beyond what effects them to include what they can’t see, feel, hear or touch but can only imagine

Students explore the two Science dimensions of 'Science knowledge and understanding' and 'Science at work' through the disciplines of biological, chemical, earth, environmental, physical and space sciences.

L.O.T.E. (Language Other Than English - Japanese)

Japanese is the language studied in the L.O.T.E. program at Stella Maris.

Learning a second language at primary level is a cultural experience, exposing students to another set of beliefs, customs and lifestyles. With these experiences comes a spontaneous desire for students to learn to communicate (speak, write and read) in that language.

Learning a language other than English helps to increase the children's awareness of the multilingual and multicultural nature of Australian and world societies.

Interdisciplinary Learning

Interdisciplinary Learning focuses on ways of thinking, communicating, conceiving and realising ideas and information. It assists students to develop the capacity to design, create and evaluate processes as a way of developing creativity and innovation.

Communication

Communication helps to construct all learning and is central to the capacity to demonstrate and convey what one has learned in different contexts and to different people. This domain assists students to understand that language and discourse differ in different disciplines and that there is a need to learn the particular literacies involved in each.

Design, Creativity and Technology

Students investigate and design using appropriate planning processes and design briefs; creating and developing ideas, applying information, and seeking and testing innovative alternatives; producing, including the selection and safe use of appropriate tools, equipment, materials and/or processes to meet the requirements of design briefs; analysing and evaluating both processes and products including, where relevant, any broader environmental, social, cultural and economic factors.

Information and Communications Technology (ICT)

Students use ICT to access, process, manage and present information; model and control events; construct new understandings; and communicate with others. Students use ICT and strategies to monitor learning patterns, to process data to create solutions and information products that demonstrate understanding, and to share their work with others in ethical, legal and respectful ways.

Thinking Processes

Thinking encompasses a range of cognitive, affective and metacognitive knowledge, skills and behaviours which are essential for effective functioning in society both within and beyond school. The study of thinking enables students to acquire strategies for thinking related to inquiry, processing information, reasoning, problem solving, evaluation and reflection.

5. CURRICULUM OVERVIEW-AUSVELS

AusVELS is based on the VELS triple-helix structure of three interconnected areas of learning called strands.

The three strands are as follows:

Physical, Personal and Social Learning / Students learn about themselves and their place in society. They learn how to stay healthy and active. Students develop skills in building social relationships and working with others. They take responsibility for their learning, and learn about their rights and responsibilities as global citizens.
Discipline-based Learning / Students learn the knowledge, skills and behaviours in the arts, English, humanities, mathematics, science and other languages.
Interdisciplinary Learning / Students explore different ways of thinking, solving problems and communicating. They learn to use a range of technologies to plan, analyse, evaluate and present their work. Students learn about creativity, design principles and processes.

Domains are distinct bodies of knowledge, skills and behaviours within each strand.

The domains within AusVELS that are drawn from the Australian Curriculum learning areas (English, Mathematics, Science and History) are organised into Content Descriptions and Achievement Standards.

Content descriptions specify what teachers are expected to teach. The Achievement standards describes the quality of learning (the extent of knowledge, the depth of understanding and the sophistication of skills) that would indicate the student is well placed to commence the learning required at the next level of achievement.

Content elaborations are included for these domains. These elaborations are intended to provide additional clarity by way of illustrative examples only. They are not statements of mandatory content.

The other domains within AusVELS that are drawn from the existing Victorian Essential Learning Standards (VELS) are organised into learning focus statements and standards. The standards outline the essential knowledge, skills and behaviours students are expected to demonstrate within each domain. The learning focus statements suggest learning experiences that are based on the standards.

All the domains are written for all students. Advice is provided on how programs can be modified for students with English as an additional language or dialect here and students with special education needs here and here.

Content descriptions/Learning Focus statements and Achievement Standards/Standards for each domain are organised into dimensions. For example, the Arts is a domain organised by the Creating and making and Exploring and responding dimensions.