Learning and Teaching
All staff at St Gerard Majella are dedicated and committed to delivering a world-class educational experience for all students, every day. To do this, staff continually participate in relevant evidence-based professional development, including implementing the current version of the Australian Curriculum. All learning is informed by the Diocesan Learning Framework which describes the essential elements, which inform curriculum planning and decision making, along with the delivery and evaluation of curriculum in classrooms.
Australian Curriculum
The Australian Curriculum sets goals and expectations for what all Australian children should be taught and learn as they progress through their school life. The curriculum is made up of eight key learning areas.
- Religion
- English
- Mathematics
- Science
- Humanities and Social Sciences (HASS)
- The Arts
- Health and Physical Education (HPE)
- Languages (Japanese)
- Technologies (Digital and Design)
In the early years, priority is focused on literacy and numeracy. As the students move through year levels, they focus more on the knowledge, understanding and skills of all eight learning areas. Parent information sessions are held early in Term 1 to assist parents in their understanding of the curriculum implemented in their child’s year level.
There are three dimensions in the Australian Curriculum
- Learning areas – contain content descriptors with detailed knowledge, understanding and skills to be taught
- General capabilities – skills and abilities intended to help prepare young children to learn, live and work beyond their school years
- Cross-curriculum priorities – priorities that build across the curriculum that allow students to connect the content of different learning areas
For further information visit The Australian Curriculum
Technologies
At St Gerard Majella, students are supported in the teaching of digital literacy and digital citizenship by a specialist teacher, who assists classroom teachers to integrate technologies into the Curriculum.
Years 3 – 6 have access to 1:1 ipads and Prep – 2 access class sets when necessary.
The Australian Curriculum, Technologies includes two distinct subject areas, Design and Digital Technology.
Through these subjects, students use design thinking and digital technology skills to generate and produce design solutions through relevant and authentic opportunities.
Health & Physical Education
At St Gerard Majella, all students are taught the Physical Education (PE) component of the curriculum by a specialist teacher with 1 hour of PE each week. The Health component of the curriculum is delivered by classroom teachers. This curriculum aims to develop and provide action to protect, enhance and advocate students’ own and others’ health, wellbeing, safety and physical participation.
The Arts
The Australian Curriculum, The Arts includes learning about and using knowledge, skills, techniques, materials and technologies to explore arts practices and make and communicate ideas and intentions. Students at St Gerard Majella are taught the five strands of the Arts curriculum. Four strands (music, media, drama and dance) are implemented by a specialist teacher for 1 hour per week. The Visual Arts strands are implemented by classroom teachers.
Languages
Students from Prep – Year 6 at St Gerard Majella have the opportunity to learn a second language, Japanese. A specialist teacher implements the Languages curriculum for all students for 1 hour per week. The Languages curriculum is designed to enable all students to engage in learning a language in addition to English.
High Potential Learners
At St Gerard Majella, students are given the opportunity to extend their learning in various ways. A High Potential Learners teacher implements extended learning opportunities both within and outside of the classroom environment, through small groups of differentiated instruction. Additionally, students have the opportunity to participate in a range of experiences including, The Sleek Geeks Eureka Science Prize; The Bebras Mathematics Challenge; the QAMT Mathematics Quiz; the “How Cool is My School” Mapping Competition and Opti-MINDS. HPL at St Gerard Majella aims to foster critical and creative thinking skills.
