Gifted Education
It has been a productive year and it has been lovely to have all students back on our Primary campus. Our Gifted and High potential students have had many opportunities to think critically and creatively. They have dived deep, explored, discovered and questioned.
Snapshot of Gifted Education
- Professional Learning P-4 Teachers of ‘The Williams Model’: equipped teachers with eighteen strategies that they can infuse within learning experiences across all grades and Key Learning Areas to differentiate and provide challenge for students.
- Gifted Learning Plans: Working in partnership with parents of Gifted students is an important element in ensuring that Gifted students’ unique strengths and needs are being addressed, fostered and have the opportunity to develop and thrive. Each students’ learning plan comprises goals and strategies that have been developed in collaboration with the classroom teacher, Gifted Education Coordinator and parents and is regularly reviewed.
- Enrichment: In addition to differentiating in the classroom to provide for our Gifted and high potential learners, enrichment offerings also occurred throughout the year. This year enrichment was provided in the focus areas of Engineering, Poetry, Inventions and Mathematical Problem Solving.
Engineering: The engineering design process: asking, imagining, planning, creating, testing and improving was explored.Infants explored via the magical world of fairytale and students in the upper grades explored via series of practical activities. All students had to think like engineers to problem solve to design and create solutions.
Poetry: Students entered the Nature Writing Competition- ‘Poem Forest’ by Red Room Poetry, in partnership with The Australian Botanic Garden. This competition “breathes life back into the natural world that sustains us and invites students to use their words to make positive climate action. For every nature poem received a tree is planted to help heal habitats and create a POEM FOREST for future generations.” Students enjoyed creating poems on a variety of topics that connected with nature such as waterfalls, Koalas and other unique animals.
Inventions: Students learned about: what an inventor does, the process of inventing and explored various inventions. They thought about real-world problems that either: they, their family, communities or society on a global level experience, that could be solved by an invention. Their invention could assist the problem by making it more efficient, faster, stronger or safer. Students were encouraged to believe in their imagination and to think creatively
Maths Problem Solving: In infants, students were explicitly taught the stages of the problem solving process and developed a ‘tool box’ of problem solving skills. In the upper grades students completed challenging tasks that foster sustained thinking, decision making, persistence and risk taking. Students experienced robust learning whereby they connected ideas, reasoned, explained, justified and formulated strategies to solve problems.
- Crystal Growing Lunchtime Club: Students had fun with science and developed an interest in Chemistry whilst trying to grow crystals. We used Alum and distilled water to try and create our crystals. Making crystals was a tricky process and took a while. Whilst we were not successful in growing a large single crystal, students were successful in growing many ‘seed’ crystals that looked like diamonds!
Caddie Ruster
Gifted and Talented Coordinator P-4