Teaching and Learning

Curriculum

At St Mary’s, our curriculum is built around the needs, passions and strengths of our learners. We construct and design learning in collaboration with the learners and their whānau, with a focus on learning contexts that are authentic and relevant to the children. As a multicultural Catholic school, learning contexts integrate aspects of our special Catholic character, in particular social justice and environmental themes, with learning that is responsive to the cultures of the many ethnic groups in our community, as well as incorporating contexts that enable all learners to gain an understanding of our bicultural heritage in relation to te Ao Māori.

In the junior school (Years 0-2), we are developing authentic learning with a focus on play as a means of enabling our children to acquire the oral language knowledge and skills that will support them in developing the numeracy and literacy foundations that they need to be successful in their current and future learning. The authentic learning contexts are inclusive of the wider curriculum and we believe in giving children access to a broad curriculum, incorporating all of the New Zealand Curriculum learning areas. Digital technology learning is an important aspect of our curriculum and we are well-resourced in this area.

Alongside authentic learning, we also have an integrated approach to the teaching of literacy and use a phonics and early words programme, in conjunction with explicit teaching of reading and writing through small group and whole class sessions, as appropriate to the identified needs of
the learners.

In the middle and senior schools, our authentic learning is developing further with a focus on a ‘learning without walls’. approach. ‘Learning without walls’ allows the learners to use their interests and wonderings to inquire into areas of interest to them. Again, it is our intention to ensure that every learner has access to a broad and relevant curriculum, incorporating all of the New Zealand Curriculum learning areas. The digital technology learning area is an important aspect of this learning, as is ensuring that the learning undertaken is relevant and meaningful for all learners, acknowledging and valuing their language, culture and identity, as well as our New Zealand bicultural heritage.

Learning Support

St Mary’s has a Learning Support Register that tracks and monitors students with high learning, health and behaviour needs. This is monitored and facilitated by the schools SENCO (Special Education Needs Co-ordinator).

The learning of all students is monitored and tracked throughout the year in order to ensure all learners are able to achieve in the breadth and depth of the New Zealand Curriculum.

Read Recovery

We have a part time reading recovery teacher who works in the junior school each morning. She works 1:1 with students for a ten week period. This intensive reading support program has had great success in supporting Year Two learners to make accelerated progress in their reading.

Quick 60

The Quick60 programme is a prevention / intervention program designed to bring groups of up to five struggling students to the expected curriculum level for their age in reading in 60 quick lessons or fewer. We have a number of Quick 60 groups running for learners from Year Two to Year Four. These groups are in addition to classroom reading groups and are run in hub spaces by teacher aides.

Early Words

Early Words is a programme of one-on-one systematic five minute word-focused lessons. During the five minute lesson, children are taught, or retaught, a high frequency word at both word and sentence level. A teacher aide runs the Early Words programme in our junior classes four days per week. This is 1:1 support for learners who are identified as needing extra literacy support.

Phonics

A teacher aide runs phonics groups in the junior school four days per week with learners identified by classroom teachers. They work through the Yolanda Soryl phonics programme. This is in addition to classroom phonics programmes.

“Children with phonological awareness are aware of the sounds in speech. They have the ability to hear and discriminate the sounds around them. They can hear rhythm, rhyme and alliteration and understand that spoken words have parts.” Yolanda Soryl

Maths

A teacher aide runs maths support groups across the school four days per week with learners identified by classroom teachers as needing support in their maths learning. This is in addition to classroom mathematics programmes.

Digital Immersion

At St Mary’s School we have iPads for junior classes at a ratio of 1:2 and BYOD for senior classes almost at 1:1 used by students to increase their digital fluency. Teachers and students use devices and other digital technologies in various ways, integrated across the curriculum, to support thelearning that is happening in the class.

Digital Citizenship

Digital Citizenship is taught across the school, throughout the year. Senior students are taught about topics like their digital footprint, digital bullying and copyright to grow them into great digital citizens who can learn safely online. Junior students are also taught the “koala hug” to learn how to carefully handle their devices. They are also taught about online safety at a level that is appropriate for them.

The School has a proactive approach to ensuring its children are safe online and has set up Hapara for BYOD devices for teachers to ensure that students are safe online.

This also serves to reassure parents that teachers are able to manage the digital content students will be exposed to while learning online.