Teaching & Learning
This year will be a dynamic one for Learning and Teaching. As I write this article, we have just had our 2024 High Achievers Assembly. Our current students are preparing for STRIVE week for Years 7, 8, 10, 11, and 12, while the Year 9s are packing for their trip to Canberra. All students will be asked to step out of their comfort zones and work on their resiliency, which will help them achieve their academic goals for the year. Our teaching staff have also been stretching themselves as they prepare for the 2025 school year and beyond.
First and foremost, our staff are reinvigorating and updating all units of work to align with the new Victorian Curriculum 2.0 for Years 7-10. This curriculum update allows us to reimagine the ways that we approach our classroom practice, keeping in mind our focus on the precepts of the Universal Learning Programme: character, passion, mastery and collaboration. We also have worked with and are continuing to work with leaders in educational practice, including Simon Breakspeare, Leon Furze, Dr Tim O’Leary, and others to support our continued focus of pedagogical best practice in the classroom.
Dr Tim O’Leary’s work on using data to inform best practice supports and enhances our teachers’ previous work on data-informed delivery of curriculum. We will continue to work with Tim this year on data analysis. Simon Breakspeare worked closely with Catholic schools last year to develop plans for implementing the new ‘Vision for Instruction’. This new vision is refocusing our classroom approaches to support every student’s learning. Leon Furze will be presenting to staff on AI in education. As most people would recognise, AI will become a greater part of our lives, and our staff and students must be equipped to deal with this new technology. Leon will help us encounter this brave new world in a positive way.
This column sounds quite teacher-focused, but what teachers do behind the scenes bears fruit in the classroom through rigorous, knowledge-rich, skills-focused lessons that allow students to develop mastery over and a passion for their learning.
Elisa Litvin
Curriculum Documentation & Reporting Leader