Learning and support
Our Learning and Support staff provide specialist assistance to students and teachers. Our staff consist of a learning and support teacher, EALD teacher and 5 SLSO staff. We strive to know the individual needs and achievements of all students and to support them during their high school years. We work collaboratively with classroom teachers to support the learning of all students and we particularly aim to support those students with additional needs. We are able to assess students and provide relevant and timely information to teachers and parents. There are a number of assessments we can run including spelling tests, YARC reading assessments and phonics screening.
There will be times when we provide SLSO assistance in classes to support students, we may withdraw students for intensive support or we may create funding requests for students deemed to have additional learning needs. We may provide special provisions for exams and assessments tasks and we will liaise with parents to ensure we are best supporting their student. We also support our EALD students with their English language learning needs and this support is ongoing all the way to Year 12. In order to achieve the best possible outcomes for students we work closely with our Deputy Principals, Year Advisors and Counsellors. As a team we will develop behaviour plans, reasonable adjustment plans, individual learning plans and health care plans when needed.
In our endeavour to support all students, we provide programs such as Renaissance Reading (in consultation with our librarians) Quicksmart (in consultation with the Maths faculty), Education Perfect, Intensive writing programs, and enrichment programs such as debating and public speaking. Every year we enter a junior and senior team in the Premier’s Debating Challenge and we enter a number of public speaking competitions. We also work closely with class teachers and withdraw small groups of students for enrichment programs based on their subject area. We have a bank of laptops and several breakout spaces where students can work collaboratively on projects.
Our learning Hub is a warm, welcoming place and we are ready and waiting to assist all students with their needs. So feel free to approach us and say Hi! We can’t wait to meet you.
EALD/refugee support
The English as an additional language or dialect (EALD) teacher is responsible for providing support to students from a language background other than English (LBOTE) background in all subject areas across the curriculum.
The EALD teacher also supports the classroom teachers in developing learning programs and more effective teaching practices suited to EALD programs.