Curriculum Guidelines
PT ENGLAND SCHOOL POLICY
GUIDELINES FOR CURRICULUM DELIVERY
GOALS
A balanced programme covering the seven essential learning areas including the key competencies, essential skills, attitudes and values, and process and product.
Active participation by students
An integrated approach to learning and teaching where appropriate.
A co-constructivist, metacognitive approach to learning & teaching
Opportunities that match student needs, interests and learning styles
A supportive learning environment that encourages enquiry and collaboration
Flexible grouping of students - ability, needs based, interest and social
A variety of appropriate technologies to support learning
THEMATIC LEARNING
This learning is integrated and is delivered following the Pt England Learning Model. It incorporates Science, Technology, Social Studies, Health/Physical Education, The Arts, te reo Maori, English and Mathematics and may be integrated further across the curriculum as appropriate. These subjects are planned and delivered as school wide units of work, with each unit lasting one school term. Coverage of curriculum strands is monitored and planned for so that over the 8 years of primary schooling balanced coverage is ensured and each subject is taught each year. (See Curriculum Coverage Table) Units of work are assessed formatively at the end of each unit against rubrics that were designed in the planning phase and made public to children during the learning phase. Summative assessment is carried out annually against selected learning outcomes. All learning is conducted via the Learn, Create, Share pedagogy.
FOUNDATIONS LEARNING
This learning/teaching cycle is designed as a result of student needs analysis and carried out in a micro-teaching cycle using direct instruction followed by consolidation, practice and related learning experiences. This learning is delivered following the Pt England Foundations Learning Model and comes from the development work carried out with Dr Gwenneth Philips, Dr. Jannie Van Hees, Dorothy Burt and the Tamaki Achievement Pathway in the Literacy area and from DMiC with Drs Bobbi & Jody Hunter in the area of mathematics. Subject areas covered in this delivery are English; -Oral, Visual, Reading, Writing and; Mathematics.
Classroom teachers are released from class to plan in teams along with curriculum leaders for the planning of both Thematic and Foundations Learning.
Information from the following is used to plan these learning/teaching cycles:
Students' needs
PES Learning Site & Keeping to the Pt!
Curriculum statements
School charter/goals/analysis
Special events that will be occurring
analysis of student achievement data
Information from external facilitators/developers
The New Zealand Curriculum
Research direction from Woolf Fisher Research Centre & the Manaiakalani Research & Development Team
OTJ's
Intuition of teachers
THEMATIC UNIT PLANS
These will generally run for the duration of a school term. The purpose is to ensure students achieve specific learning outcomes that are based upon identified needs over a series of sequential and meaningful lessons. Outcomes may include attitudes, skills and knowledge & understandings.
Teachers need to spend time on the following;
select achievement objectives/identify learning outcomes
identify compelling focus questions
designing effective rubrics
seeking resources/organising resources
developing a variety of engaging learning activities that are genuine rich tasks
checking Education Plan requirements
organising create tasks for groups, individuals or classes as required
design activities that will focus on assessing student achievement by providing evidence of achievement
designing creative and engaging ways to share what has been learned
decide which learning outcomes will be assessed
Teachers evaluate student achievement as well as programme achievement.
FOUNDATIONS UNIT PLANS
These will generally be of 5 weeks duration towards the end of which the next block of teacher release time will be given in order to plan the subsequent 5 weeks based on fresh needs analysis of students. This planning will focus on direct instruction to bring understanding and competence in next foundational skill, knowledge or understanding required for a student to move on in that discipline. There are 2 major components to this planning:
1. Planning for direct instruction or deliberate acts of teaching in small groups
2. Planning for effective consolidation activities for the children who are not with the teacher.
SHORT TERM PLANS
These are teacher's weekly log style plans. These enable teachers to modify the plans, outline daily organisation of groups/individuals as well as resources or materials to be used. Most of this content is now available via the Class Sites, which lead learning.
ASSESSMENT/EVALUATION
CLASSROOM ASSESSMENT EVALUATION AND REPORTING
Teachers are expected to use a range of formal and informal methods to monitor students progress against the learning outcomes. References page 21 English in the NZ Curriculum.
Classroom Assessment includes:
Ongoing, continuous assessment which provides immediate feedback, enhancing the learning as it proceeds
Self-Assessment, which enables students to monitor their own progress against specific objectives and evidence from their own work
School-wide assessment against selected exemplars to provide aggregated data for curriculum and school review
Teacher assessment, in which progress and strengths are recognised, difficulties diagnosed, and strategies to overcome them planned. Methods of Assessment include:
One Month Check (5yrs) -
Parent contact
School Entry Assessment (S.E.A.)
Rubric Criteria
Record of Oral Language
Observation Survey (6yrs)
Progressive Achievement Tests & e-asTTle
New Zealand Exams
Observation
Running Records/Miscue Analysis
Checklists in Classmate
Anecdotal Notes
Work Samples
Individual Education Plans
Peer and Self Assessment
Conferences
School Review
IDENTIFY AND OVERCOME BARRIERS TO LEARNING
PROCESS FOR IDENTIFYING BARRIERS TO LEARNING
Identify individuals, groups & cohorts not achieving
Identify the goals that they are not achieving
Identify what barriers may be preventing achievement
Develop a strategy for overcoming barriers
Decide on what will be the measure indicating that the individual or group has increased its achievement of the identified goals
Put in place the strategy
Measure the achievement (Also see Education Review Office publications on Barriers to Learning)
REPORTING: PARENTS, B.O.T., COMMUNITY
REPORTING ON STUDENT ACHIEVEMENT
Information gathered about students learning is filed in their individual portfolios and is available to parents, and school management. Student work is also available to parents via the Parent Portal of the Teacher Dashboard.
Learner work or content is also publicly available via individual student blogs and class blogs where the learners are very young.
Criteria based assessment in selected curriculum areas is gathered annually
e-asTTle, PAT's standardised Running Records, New Zealand Exam Results & standardised 6 Year Surveys are analysed annually along with progress against the NZC National Standards.
This information is used as a basis for reporting on:-
- student achievement to Board of Trustees
- student progress to parents
- statements of service performance to Ministry of Education
PROCESS
Decide on the purpose for the assessment i.e. why the information is being gathered and how it will be used.
Refer to the school's strategic plan of review to identify specific areas for reporting student achievement
Select both national and local community goals that can be easily measured
Decide what information is significant evidence of achievement (indicators) and howthe data can be gathered (assessment method)
Establish a realistic timeframe
Classroom teachers gather the agreed achievement information
Classroom information is collated and a summary description of schoolwide achievement written
Include any future recommendations
Use the information for the intended purpose
SCHOOL ORGANISATION
Curriculum Delegation
Budget and Resources The Curriculum team is responsible for purchasing and maintaining resources and a programme of self-review.
Formulated: 1999
Reviewed: 2002
2005
2008
2009
2013
2015
2018
2019
2023