School Background Page
The intent of this page is to illustrate the cultural, academic, and school ethos that is relevant to my final teaching practicum. For the purposes of privacy, a fictional pudendum will be given to the school: Catholic Primary School.
Catholic Primary School is a small school located in the metropolitan area of Kensington, Melbourne. With approximately 240 children, Catholic Primary School is an intimate community which is able to provide a strong culture of care and belonging, while delivering a challenging, purposeful and engaging curriculum.
The School’s main mission is to provide students with a well-rounded education that teaches the individual, focusing strongly on social skills and religious education. Although a Catholic primary school, it comprises of families from a wide range of religious and national backgrounds.
The school’s curriculum is based on the VELS standards (Victorian Essential Learning Standards (VELS) and Principles of Learning and Teaching (PoLT). Planning for each level is completed at weekly level meetings, regulated by the Principal. Planning is often dictated by assessment data, recorded in the School’s learning and assessment continuum.
School is largely supported by the wider community, with active involvement from the Parish Priest, families of students and community friends of the School. Parents are always eager to assist with the School’s events such as working bees, the School’s annual art show and interest groups (for instance a Gardening and Arts club) during lunchtime. Parents contribute to the School in the following ways:
- Parents helping in classrooms and the library
- Excursions
- Sporting Activities
- School Concert
- Education Board
- Working committees for specific tasks, such as grant writing, fundraising and social events
- Working Bees
- Attending assemblies and liturgies
- School Fete
The School favors restorative school discipline. Restorative school discipline gives students opportunities for insight and learning when behavior is unacceptable. I found this to be a positive method of managing disputes between students, particularly during yard duty. When exercising restorative discipline to resolve a yard duty dispute, the teacher would ask questions such as:
- Who has been harmed by this incident?
- What needs to be done to repair the harm?
- Who is responsible for fixing the problem?
This allows the student to be self reflective about their behavior. I found the Restorative school discipline method a little more difficult to use with disrespectful and disruptive behavior in class however, because the children saw little to no ramifications to their actions. As such, I resulted in using graduated warnings and then "time out's" during class for misbehavior.
During another practicum, the "time out tactic" was also used. In this instance, student's often respond to hands on activities and visual learning, I extended this to the time out sessions using timeout out bottles: filled with 3/4 water, one bottle of glitter glue, & other fine glitter. I would then send the child with the bottle to watch it settle and they would often become much calmer in the process. See an sample of such bottles below:
Leadership
The School has various leading teachers looking after specific domains such as Literacy, Mathematics, Social Science wellness and Religious Education. Each planning session requires that a leading teacher be present from at least one domain.
The School is currently in a position of senior leadership transition, with a new Principal in place. As such, many of the rules and regulations were being changed whilst I was completing PI.
My Class:
My class consisted of 26 students of mixed ages, as it was a composite 1 and 2 class. Within the class, there was a myriad of different abilities, learning styles and interests though most of the students enjoyed hands-on, authentic, active learning experiences. My planning process for this class took into consideration the student’s interests and preferred learning styles. Planning was also directed by the children’s prior knowledge which was ascertained through pre-assessment activities that identifed growth points for learning. Though only one child had been officially diagnosed with a learning disability, I was conscious that at least 4 more were in the process of being tested and as such individual learning plans were developed for those children with special needs.
