Effective Tools for Future Planning Workshops

• Workshop 1: Analysis of Test Data for School Effectiveness
• Workshop 2: Assessment FOR Learning in the A-E Reporting Environments within the NSW DET Quality Teaching Framework
• Workshop 3: School Evaluation- Identifying Strategic Priorities and Evidence for School-based Improvement
• Workshop 4: Writing Successful Funding Applications for your School
• Workshop 5: Strategies for Dealing with the Overcrowded Curriculum
• Workshop 6: Building Strong Teams in Schools

Postponed - Rescheduled dates to be announced

Enquiries: Email , or phone 9351 6329.

This workshop, run by experts in the analysis of NSW DET test data, will provide participants with skills in analysing and interpreting BST, ELLA, SNAP and NAPLAN test data towards planning for school-based improvement in teaching and learning. It will also provide the opportunity for considering strategies for school clusters to analyse data across primary and secondary schools with a view to developing across-school-based initiatives. The program will include formal presentations and practical workshops with opportunities for discussion.

Academic Coordinator: Associate Professor David Smith

Initially there will be a presentation on the key principles underpinning the use of assessment practices FOR learning. This will be followed by workshops providing opportunities to investigate and write student learning outcomes and quality learning criteria at five levels. This provides a school and region-based strategy that is consistent with the requirement for A to E levels of reporting. The program will include formal presentations and practical workshops with opportunities for discussion.

Academic Coordinator: Associate Professor David Smith

Within the current emerging contexts of system-required school self-appraisal, review and evaluation, this workshop will begin with a presentation outlining a rationale for, and principles that should underpin any effective school-based evaluation, based on international and Australian research. This will be followed by a presentation on the nature of evidence that can be used in any school review process and practical strategies for gathering and analysing such evidence. Participants will then be engaged in identifying:

• Strategic areas for a school evaluation of their own school contexts
• The questions that might be asked about these areas, and
• The types of evidence that would need to be gathered in any school-based evaluation.

Academic Coordinator: Associate Professor David Smith

This is a practical workshop designed to assist those teachers and schools who are engaged in writing applications for state (e.g, Quality Teaching) and national (e.g, Success for Boys; ASSISTM, etc) funding.

Initially there will be a presentation on the key factors underpinning successful funding applications based on extensive experience by the presenters who have both participated with schools and clusters in writing applications and acted as panelists in selecting successful applications. The main part of the day will be opportunities for teachers collectively to work on current funding applications and to gain advice on these from the workshop presenters.

Academic Coordinator: Associate Professor David Smith

One of the constant complaints by teachers in both primary and secondary schools stems from an overcrowded curriculum that leads to superficial 'coverage' of content rather than an opportunity for in-depth learning towards deep understanding. This workshop will present practical suggestions for three key strategies in dealing with an overcrowded curriculum that are currently being used in primary and secondary schools. These are, Curriculum Mapping to identify commonalities in student learning outcomes in different KLAs/subjects, the development of Integrated Curricula based on rich tasks, and practices in the use of Peer Teaching and Assessment. The emphasis will be on Stages 3, 4 and 5, both within primary and secondary schools and across Stages 3 and 4. Teachers using these strategies will be invited to share their experience with participants.

Academic Coordinator: Associate Professor David Smith

People come together in schools with their varied experiences, personalities, work styles, skills and strengths to meet specific goals or objectives. Sometimes we lose our focus on achieving the main goals by becoming caught up in personality conflicts. Also, when groups have worked together for extended periods they sometimes become stuck in certain patterns of being and working. A school is a microcosm of the society in which we live. Effective teams within school communities support schools in maintaining harmonious environments – much like what is desired in the wider community. When individuals within a school come together to work for the greater good of the society and support multiple levels of learning among the students, they need to ensure that they themselves are able to build teams, which will help them meet the desired objectives. The foundations upon which these teams are built determine their effectiveness. This session explores the issues that are important to consider when building strong teams and looks at strategies that support team building. During this day participants will explore:

• Possibilities for new ways of working, focusing on their strengths using an asset-based model of development, and
• Ways of working that will help them to overcome obstacles in new and creative ways.

There will also be opportunities for participants to develop strategies for bridging gaps within their own learning communities and understand how they can maximize their skills and abilities to support each other in this era of rapid on-going change.

Academic Coordinator: Dr Ann Cheryl Armstrong