It is fascinating to see how the brain develops and how we can influence that development with what we do both at home and at school. The take home messages for me was that we need to give our students time to play, imagine, expose them to languages and most importantly to music as this really assists their cognitive development. We also need to consider how much exposure to technology and the times this is happening. It is very important to ensure that children are not using technology before bed as sleep is an essential part of brain development. We must allow our children to have down time, no technology, television, planned activities where they can be quiet and use the creative part of their brain.
This leads to looking at what we do at College and reviewing the programs that we have introduced. Spanish has been very successful this year, the children have really enjoyed it and have benefited greatly from this so we will be extending the program to Year 3 next year. Our music program has also been developing with a number of opportunities for students to learn and participate in ensembles and bands. I encourage the children from our Year 4 program to consider continuing with music.
We have also been reviewing our Literacy program, ‘Get Reading Right’ using the PIPS testing data from the start of Kindergarten to the end. The growth across the grade has been outstanding with many children making above expected growth. We also added resources to work with small groups of children that would not qualify for the standard learning support, but just needed a boost to help their literacy development and this has been very successful. This focus will continue in 2019.
Our staff are busy preparing reports and portfolios for each of the students in their class. Communication to parents about their child’s progress is an important aspect of schooling and parents often are unsure about what their children are actually doing in the classroom until the portfolio comes home. Next year we will be replacing the portfolios with an online program called ‘Seesaw’ that will allow parents to have access to their children’s work throughout the year and give a snapshot of life in each classroom. We are trialling it at the moment and plan to launch it to you from the beginning of 2019.
Thank you to all the parents and grandparents who could make it to the Prep – 2 Tabloid Carnivals this year. It was fantastic to see the enthusiasm of the children and the way the new facilities worked. There are many events coming up as we head towards the end of the year and I am looking forward to our two Celebration events and to saying farewell to our Year 6 students as they head into the Senior School. We are also welcoming our newest members of the College over the next few weeks, always a special time.
