Some future thinking
At Ivanhoe East Primary School we have put a very strong emphasis on the teaching of Mathematics. We have a strong Numeracy team, we have extensive professional learning in this area and we engage the Maths Association of Victoria to support classroom practice.
The approach that is taken is to develop the skills and attitudes of our students so that they are thinking as mathematicians. A visitor to our classrooms would see this well and truly in action. Our students can explain their learning extraordinarily well. They seem to really enjoy mathematics and frequently choose their own challenge. It is heartening to see.
So why is it a good idea to make sure we engage our students in Maths? Well there has been considerable research about the way that society is changing and the skills that will be important going forward.
The University of Phoenix Research Institute have identified six drivers of change that are transforming the notion of work .They are:
- The fact that people will be living longer
- That we are using machines to augment human capability ( maths skills like coding will be valuable here) more and more.
- We are increasingly being asked to work with data and to understand it
- New media technologies will require people to understand content beyond text
- Social technologies have driven new ways of problem solving
- Increased globalisation means that diversity and adaptability will be increasingly important.
From the list – maths , the capacity to understand systems thinking and the ability to understand data are going to front and centre as ideas of value. Next week I'll provide some information about the importance of collaboration.
Three Big Ideas being explored by our staff
Our School Leadership team have spent some time identifying the areas of focus for 2021. We drew these from our Annual Implementation Plan developed in Term One. In a nutshell they are as follows:
- We will be looking to develop data protocols and feedback so that we can better help students target their next area of learning
- We will seek to embed our Student Well Being and Engagement Program throughout the school so that we have consistency in implementation and intent
- We will be investigating how we can leverage Compass(our IT platform) to share student learning with the community.
As the year progresses we will provide regular updates on our actions towards achieving these goals.
Welcome
I would like to welcome Jennette Green to Ivanhoe East as our new Performing Arts teacher. Jennette impressed our selection panel with her extensive knowledge of music education . However more than that was Jennette’s absolute passion for teaching and her love of music. We look forward to Jennette providing our kids the opportunity to develop their creativity , skills and knowledge. It will be fantastic!!!!
Thanks
Well done to all of our students, staff and parents who played a part in our Cross Country event that was held last Monday. We had great weather, a great venue and superb preparation work by Mr Bartlett our PE Teacher.
I would also like to thank our parents who helped out as marshalls on the day , and our parents who attended and supported our students. It seems a long time since we have been able to have a gathering such as this one. If conditions allow, we look forward to having a whole lot more. There will be further information around this in next week's bulletin.
Brett Millott.