St Agatha’s Clayfield Primary School Religious Education ... Web viewStudents develop their understanding of Catholic Social Teaching through critical thinking and reflection on

St Agatha’s Clayfield Primary School

Religious Education Program

St Agatha’s Religious Education Program Page 1

Our CommunitySt Agatha’s Clayfield is a co-education Primary School on the northern inner city rim of Brisbane. As a school we cater for children from Prep to Year 6 and our current enrolment is 350 students. St Agatha’s values each student as a learner and places a great deal of importance in developing the whole child.

Vision for Religious Education

St Agatha’s shares and promotes the Vision for Religious Education articulated by Brisbane Catholic Education and the wider church. This vision includes the two dimensions of formation- namely, of students’ religious literacy and their personal faith.

St Agatha’s Catholic Parish Primary School is a community that values excellence, diligence and creativity developed within an ethos of belief, justice, service and integrity.

Our mission at St Agatha’s is to give each student the opportunity to be successful in and out of the classroom and to enable the children to become lifelong learners through three main dimensions, The Spiritual, Academic and Personal. Each dimension provides every child with the support and opportunity to make meaning of their own personal world.

The Spiritual Dimension:

We nurture

- Catholic faith traditions, liturgies and values- outreach to others through service- prayer that develops our relationship with God

The Academic Dimension:

We offer a curriculum that is

- both contemporary and futures oriented- relevant and informed by data- supportive of different learning abilities and styles

The Personal Dimension:

We support each other to develop

- healthy relationships based on friendship, compassion and respect- self-awareness through reflection- a range of talents and skills


In the traditions of the Presentation Sisters we strive to enable each child to reach their full potential spirituality, intellectually, physically, socially and emotionally. This is achieved by relating all areas of their schooling life around the Gospel Values of the Catholic Church. We strive to foster and create a community spirit where growth and renewal go hand in hand with school and parish.

Our community at St Agatha’s promotes an environment of growth in Catholic faith linking school, parish and community. We encourage staff development by reviewing values, attitudes and expectations in order to provide a firm basis for work in our school setting.

At St Agatha’s we live by the traditions and values of the Presentation Sisters. Like all charisms, the Presentation charism is a gift spread through the Holy Spirit in the Church and in the world.

A charism is a deep awareness of a Gospel value or values linked to a special need in the world. The Gospel value or emphasis remains constant over the history of the group throughout history. The area of need also remains constant but the specific expressions of the need may change over time, place and culture. Charism is always at the service of mission.

As a Presentation School our mission is about;

Seeking out,Uncovering,Building on, andCelebrating God’s presence.

Our StudentsEngagement in God’s mission calls us to conversion. The goal of mission is to bear witness to and to proclaim God’s Kingdom within us, among us and in the whole community of life.

St Agatha’s Clayfield is a co-education Primary School from Prep to Year 6 and our current enrolment is 350 students. 94.2% of our students are Catholic, with 4.3% belonging to other Christian religions and just over 1% stating no religion at all.


Year Level Current Year Level Enrolment

Number of Catholic Students Enrolled

Percentage of Catholic Students

Prep 56 55 98.2Year 1 56 53 94.7Year 2 53 51 96.2Year 3 53 50 94.4Year 4 61 57 93.5Year 5 25 20 82.8Year 6 35 33 94.4


At St Agatha’s we are conscience of our high Catholic population and when planning for Religious Education we ensure that the use of non-presumptive language given the high percentage of enrolled Catholics as we are aware that not all students are currently practising.

CONTEMPORARY CONTEXTS OF SCHOOL RELIGIOUS EDUCATION

At St Agatha’s, recognition is given to the four contexts identified as having significant impact on Religious Education in contemporary Catholic schools. They are the Societal Context, Ecclesial Context, Educational Context and Digital Context.

Societal Context

St Agatha’s operates in a complex and ever-changing environment. Our students are immersed in a global world and from an early age are exposed to a range of values represented through diverse media. As a result of this, our school is continually challenged to engage families in Religious Education in rich and relevant ways. We respond to that challenge in a variety of ways including:

Informing parents of the Religious Education program at St Agatha’s School During the enrolment process. During Prep Orientation days. Parent Information Evening. Parent Teacher Evenings Parent Portal. At parent information evenings at the beginning of each year. Through the school newsletter. Through our website. Hand in Hand Parish Publication. Year Level Blogs and Twitter feeds.

School behaviour expectations Creating and raising awareness in our community of the hardships and injustices on a global scale through guest speakers, year level and whole school initiatives such as;

Walk for Water, Mini Sleep Out, Injustice Olympics, Walk to School for Social Injustice, Fund Raising for Caritas, St Vincent de Paul, Children’s Catholic Mission though such events as;

Shrove/Pancake Tuesday, Fun Fridays, Project Compassion Money Boxes,

Ecclesial Context


Engaging our community with the parish is a major challenge at St Agatha’s and trying to integrate faith, culture and family life is something which we continually work on with our parish and parish community. We strive as a Catholic school to be a conduit between family and parish by demonstrating Catholic Mission, pastoral care and Catholic Community Spirit by constantly connecting and drawing links to the rituals, traditions and symbols of our church and faith.

At St Agatha’s this includes:

Daily whole school prayer to begin the school day. Daily class prayer rituals. Year Level and Class Buddy led parish masses. Weekly prayer assemblies led by year levels Year 3-6 Class Reconciliation. School masses to celebrate and commemorate feast days and special

events such as Feast of St Agatha, Ash Wednesday, Mothers’ and Fathers’ Day and end of school year.

Whole school Friday hymn practise. Celebrations to acknowledge ANZAC Day, Commissioning of School

Leaders and Holy Week. Weekly staff prayer led by staff members. Staff participating in Sacramental program. Year Level and whole school led Sunday

service Classroom and school foyer sacred spaces. Visible sacred spaces and icons throughout

the school. Promoting parish led initiatives and activities throughout the school

community. Parish & School Community Fun Day.

Educational ContextAt St Agatha’s we place a great deal of importance on the teaching of Religious Education in the classroom and that it is given the same academic rigor and teaching experiences of all the other areas of our curriculum in regards to philosophy, structure, content, reporting and assessment.As a community we strive to empower our students to live their lives with integrity, compassion, empathy and justice modelled on the Gospel Values of our church. All units/programs of work at St Agatha’s are based on the Model of Pedagogy which has been implemented and adopted throughout all BCE schools.

We focus on this educational context by:


Full day release to prepare units for upcoming term. Cross curricular connections and links where possible. High quality assessment and reporting. Ongoing professional development for teaching staff in the area of planning and

pedagogy. Ongoing monitoring and evaluation of learning and teaching strategies when

planning and reflecting on past and present units. Making explicit connections and links with Religious Life of the School and

Religious Education Curriculum Planning. Model of Pedagogy incorporated in planning unit/programs. Using digital technologies to compliment and reinforce teaching and learning of

Religious Education.

Digital ContextAt St Agatha’s we strive to engage our students to be critical, creative, reflective and responsible users of digital learning tools and to educate them to be ethical digital citizens with a skills and knowledge base to make just decisions. By doing so our learners are given the opportunity to articulate their learning in explicit, rich and relevant forms which are connected and embedded in our Religious Education Program and also our wider community.

At St Agatha’s this includes:

One to one laptop program Yr 4-6. Class iPads P-6. 64” Classroom Interactive TVs P-6. Opportunities for students to use digital devices to present learning

achievements. Students model how they use digital technology to support, complement and

enhance their learning. Unit planning documents which incorporate digital integration. Teachers use online resources such as Bible Gateway and other websites to

support class teaching. Teachers and students use online resources available on the Religion Portal. Professional Development for staff on how to use different ICT to best support

high quality learning in and out of the classroom. Parent Portal is used by our parent community to share information, events and

celebrations about our Religious Life of the School. PowerPoints and Multi-Media Tools

are used for Mothers’ and Fathers’ Day


Masses, Leadership Celebration, ANZAC Day Ceremony, CEW and Feast Days throughout the school year.

PD on Resource Link to promote confidence with staff.

Beliefs About Learners and Their Learning

At St Agatha’s we believe that every student is created in the image and likeness of God and that all learner’s achievements should be celebrated. All Religious Education programs are aligned with the BCE Religion Curriculum P-12 and we strive to make each unit of work rigorous, challenging and relevant to our learners and their needs. Our Religious Education programs caters for all the needs of our learners which exist in our community.

The meet the needs of our diverse learners we ensure:

Religious Units are planned collaboratively with year level colleagues, APRE and EORE to ensure learners’ needs are catered for and differentiation is achieved.

Students are given multiple ways to demonstrate learning and understanding through various forms of assessment mediums.

Additional support, time and resources is given to those with IEPs. Provide opportunities and resources for students to extend depth of their

learning with specific content. Connections and link are made where possible with other subject areas to

compliment and reinforce learning. Negotiated assessment tasks with students to reinforce learning and provide

greater class buy in with content. Give opportunity and flexibility when planning to make adjustments with

Learning Intentions and Success Criteria so students are better suited to demonstrate their understanding and learning.

Impact of System Initiatives on Religious Education

At St Agatha’s we have dedicated our focus on identifying the Learning Intentions and Success Criteria in all planning documents and have placed a high level of importance of providing relevant feedback across all curriculum areas. Walk and Talks has been a focus of the leadership team and this has given us an insight of what and how the


children learn in the classroom also how they see themselves as learners. There has been a gradual release of responsibilities associated with the DELT Project to ensure all staff are confident and have a strong understanding of what is involved. At St Agatha’s we have introduced five dispositions which we use across all areas of our teaching and the dispositions of Resilience, Persistence, Engaged, Reflective and Self Directed have become common language throughout the school in all areas of our students learning in and out of the classroom.

At the end of each term teaching staff are given a planning day to prepare for the upcoming term. Part of this release time is dedicated to Religious Education for teachers to develop and prepare units of work which ensures all the mandatory requirements are being met by each year level and that there is continuity across all classes and links are made with the Religious Life of the School. Teachers are also given opportunity to work with our EORE for additional support and guidance.

The APRE and CST work with teaching staff each term to ensure they are adequately supported during the planning process. Further time is also made available to work with EORE during the year to help to provide feedback and extra guidance with planning and use of resources to compliment learning.

Teachers are given opportunity to reflect on unit of work taught and are encouraged to make adjustments, seek feedback and add additional resources which complement and improve the quality of the work they produce for the following year.

The scope and sequence document is continually referred to and renewed each year by year level staff and APRE to ensure that all mandatory requirements are being met and all planning, teaching, assessing and reporting of the Religious curriculum is of the highest quality.

Each unit of work is a working document and all teachers are encouraged to continually make adjustments to unit when and where necessary.

The scope and sequence document is used when planning for each term.

Communicating to our parents and wider community.

St Agatha’s invests heavily in being very open and transparent with communication in all areas of school life including Religious Education with what is being taught in the classroom and how it is being taught, assessed and reported.


At the start of each term the Religious Life of the School calendar is attached to the School Newsletter and also the Parish Newsletter.

Each class sends home overviews and unit outlines for the term which highlight what is being taught which included Religious Education.

Our school Website includes scope and sequence for that current year. Photos, video clips and film of whole school, year level and class events, celebrations and ceremonies are all posted on the school’s numerous social media pages to keep parents informed in the area of Religious Education.

HIGH QUALITY LEARNING AND TEACHING IN RELIGIOUS EDUCATION

Curriculum Structure and Organisation

A Catholic View about Learning

At St Agatha’s a Catholic view about learning and teaching is reflected in the two dimensions of religious education;

The classroom teaching of religious education The Religious Life of the School

The four key themes anthropology, epistemology, cosmology and the Catholic Christian tradition are foundational to our Religious Education Program.

Anthropology- we recognize that each person is created in the image of God as such we teach an RE curriculum that is characterized by inclusion, holistic and relational learning and action in our community.

Epistemology- At St Agatha’s we encourage our learners to acquire knowledge through the connection to real life experiences beyond their immediate community. We endeavor to develop a holistic approach to learning

Cosmology- relates to how we understand our place in the universe and the choices we make to live within the integrity of creation. We recognize our role as co-creators with God and as stewards who are charged with caring with creation.


Catholic Christian Tradition- We value and recognize the personal story of each individual and their experiences. We recognize the communal experience of our St Agatha’s story and we celebrate our connection to the larger Catholic Christian story.

At St Agatha’s the learning and teaching of Religion Education is cantered around two main dimensions which are the teaching of the Religious Education Curriculum in the classroom and the Religious life of the school. At St Agatha’s, we strive for a holistic approach to learning to make all student’s lifelong learners who are able to make connections between beliefs and values and the importance of knowing the religious traditions of the Catholic Church and how these can be lived in and out of the classroom. We encourage religious dialogue in our classrooms and the importance of being able to reflect authentically on those from other religions. Our teachers are committed to not just transfer knowledge, stories and facts but being role models of the beliefs and values of the Church. At St Agatha’s we have a strong belief that the Religious Education curriculum develops and understanding of stewardship and sacramentality which allows each student to be co-creators and experience God in their day to day existence.

At St Agatha’s throughout the course of the school year as a community we demonstrate Prayer and Worship, Catholic Christian Traditions, our own Catholic Identity and Culture & Social Justice and Action through;

Whole School Assemblies and celebrations-led by our Year 6 leaders. Year Level Assemblies which help to create awareness and reinforce

themes and initiatives which are being promoted around the school such as Walk for Water, Project Compassion, Walk to School for Poverty and Injustice, Rice Only Day, Living Off $2.50 a day, Recycled Olympics and Yr 6 Mini Sleep Out.

Whole School and Year Level Masses which are celebrated throughout the course of the school year. Catholic Feast Days and Church celebrations such as the Feast of St Agatha, Ash Wednesday, Lent, Easter, Pentecost, St Mary MacKillop’s Feast Day, Advent and Christmas.


The teaching of explicit prayers across all year levels such as St Agatha’s Prayer, Hail Mary, Our Father to provide students with the opportunity for a deeper understanding and connection with our faith.

Supporting and fund raising for such organisations as Caritas, Catholic Missions, Orange Sky Laundry and SVDP and educating the students on what they do and how they do it.

Religious Education Units are aligned to the Religious Life of the School to help compliment and reinforce the students learning.

Year Level and Classroom timetables are observed to ensure that the mandatory 2.5 hours of Religious Education is taught each week.

Year Level Scope and Sequence are viewed and tailored to meet the changing needs of the school.

NET and UPP Teams working with our Year 6 leaders.

The St Agatha’s Religious Education Program strives to understand and incorporate the two dimensions of the holistic education and formation of our students. Religious Education Curriculum and the Religious Life of the School work jointly in giving our students the tools to follow the belief, values and traditions of the church and be responsive to religious diversity while still being able to identify with the charism of St Agatha’s. Social Justice plays a major role in their formative development and creating awareness of the needs and hardships of communities around the world are given great importance. Students develop their understanding of Catholic Social Teaching through critical thinking and reflection on social justice issues and through the participation in whole school or year level initiatives.

At St Agatha’s we ensure:


Where appropriate units of work focus on making links and connections to Catholic Social Teaching which provides opportunity for critical reflection on social justice initiatives and guest speakers who support the teaching of social justice issues - Caritas, SVDP, Orange Sky Laundry, St Edmund Rice Foundation, Visits from Presentation Sisters and Access Australia.

Classroom sacred spaces reflect the Charisms of the school and support the liturgical life of the school.

Religious Education Units link the RE Curriculum and Religious Life of the School.

Enrolment packs for all new families which have the St Agatha’s Handbook, St Agatha’s Prayer Card and information about the history and charism of Presentation Sisters.

St Agatha’s Religious Education Program articulates a reconceptualised approach to learning in the Religious Education Curriculum through teachers who embrace a pedagogy that ensures assumptions about a student’s faith development based on their particular religious affiliations are avoided. To support this we ensure the use of non-presumptive language in our planning and teaching of Religious Education. St Agatha’s Religious Education Program give students the opportunity to explore their own traditions while gaining and understanding and empathy of others traditions, beliefs and values. Students are given the opportunity and resources to explore and investigate their own faith and engage in interreligious dialogue to enhance their own faith development and that of other religions.Our community embraces BCE model of pedagogy to the teaching of religion also in conjunction the principles of Visible Learning, including learning intentions and success criteria to improve learning outcomes for all our students.

Planning in Religious Education

Scope and Sequence

St Agatha’s Religious Education scope and sequence clearly outlines the progression of what is taught and when over a yearly cycle. Built from our line of sight documents the RE scope and sequence is a working document which outlines the learning each year and is tailored to suit the changing demands throughout the school. The scope and sequence includes fertile questions that link to the core content descriptors, mandated scripture, explicit prayer, School Charism and the religious life of the school. The document is crucial for the overall planning across the school and allows for alignment with the visible learning practises which are currently in place at St Agatha’s.


https://kweb.bne.catholic.edu.au/LandT/LearningTeaching/Pedagogy/Pages/default.aspx

All teachers at St Agatha’s are given a day’s release at the end of each term to plan collaboratively with their year level colleague for the upcoming term. These year level planning days enable teachers to plan units of work and ensures consistency across the school with how work is being planned, taught, assessed and reported. There is a clear focus on the line of sight for each year level planning, year level descriptors, achievement standards and content descriptors. The whole school planning template also highlights the mandated scripture and explicit prayer to be covered for each unit of work taught throughout the course of the school year. Teachers are able to clearly state the teaching and learning sequence through an inquiry approach which also reflects the visible learning principles. Students are given a variety of assessment tools to show level of understanding and achievement during each unit of work. The planning template also allows for teachers to differentiate their teaching to best reach the varying learning styles and abilities which exist in the classroom. The planning template also gives the teacher the opportunity to make links and connections to the religious Life of the School.

Whole School Approach to Learning and Teaching in RE.At St Agatha’s the leadership team places a great deal of importance on consistency throughout the school is all areas of the students’ education across all year levels. Consistency and a collaborative approach to an agreed curriculum, pedagogy, assessment and reporting is the cornerstone learning and teaching at St Agatha’s. A great deal of importance is placed on consistency with assessment items across year levels and how achievements are reported on.

Professional Learning and Development at St Agatha’s


The leadership team ensures that all teachers of religion meet the accreditation requirements to teach religion in a Catholic School and that all teachers have the opportunity to engage in high quality Professional Development throughout the year. As part of their professional learning all staff are required to engage in the required number of hours of professional learning every five years.

St Agatha’s staff are given numerous opportunities throughout the course of the school year to attend professional development in the area of Religious Education. At St Agatha’s this includes;

Religious Education Planning, Assessment and Reporting with EORE Three Worlds of the Text PDs with EORE Scripture PD with Parish Priest

At the start of the school year one pupil free day is set aside for Religious Education Professional Development and each term staff meetings are held to help with supporting the needs of the staff in the area of Religious Education which are facilitated by the EORE or the APRE. The content of the PDs are determined by the needs of the staff or by what is currently relevant or being rolled out by BCE to give our staff the best opportunity to successfully implement a high quality Religious Education Program across each year level and to also support and compliment the Religious Life of the School.

Teachers are given access to a variety of online resources to help enhance and compliment what they are teaching in their year level and classrooms.

St Agatha’s invests a great deal of time and energy to ensure that there is continuity in the pedagogical principles which teachers use in the teaching of Religious Education in the classroom which are framed by the Visible Learning practises. Fertile questions, learning intentions and success criteria for Religious Education Units are made explicit to ensure that high quality learning and teaching is being achieved in all classrooms throughout the school. These Visible Learning practises underpin St Agatha’s approach to planning, teaching, learning assessing and reporting and help to ensure that there is consistency of teacher judgement across each year level and throughout the school.

An inquiry approach is used by all teachers at St Agatha’s when planning each term in Religious Education and units are complimented by a variety of different information technology resources to help engage the different learning needs which exist in each class and reinforce what is being taught.

Use of Quality Resources in Religious Education


St Agatha’s values the quality of the resources which are used in the classrooms across the school to enhance the quality of the teaching and learning. Teachers are very skilled at navigating the BCE RE Portal to find resources which are relevant to the needs of their students in Religious Education and provide additional support in such as areas as scripture via Three Worlds of the Text and prayer via Ways We Pray Calendar. Each year the Religious Education budget is used to purchase items which will best support classroom learning and teaching and this can vary from online resources and subscription to Jewish artefacts and books all of which support and compliment what is being taught and helps to make the students learning more meaning and create deeper and wider understanding. Teachers have been given online subscriptions such as Bible Gateway, LabOra and a variety of other links to charities such as SVPD, Orange Sky, Catholic Missions, Caritas, Access Australia, Gone Fishing Australia to help enhance, engage and reinforce learning.

The Religious Education Program is supported by quality resources that are easily accessed by staff to support learning, compliment teaching and provide meaningful connections across all areas of the curriculum.

TEACHING SCRIPTURE – Three Worlds of the Text

The study of Scripture in a classroom context takes the reader into the world of Jewish and Christian believers. In order to discover the author’s intention, the reader must take into account the time, cultural context, literary genres in use at that time, and the modes of feeling, speaking and narrating then current.

There are some important educational principles teachers need to keep in mind when engaging students with scriptural texts in the classroom learning and teaching of religion:

Catholics do not read scripture from a literal perspective. The Catholic Church’s understanding of scripture accepts the Bible as the inspired Word of God and as the work of human authors who were conditioned by their time, place, culture and worldview.

Teachers avoid teaching something that has to be untaught at a later time. In other words, teachers of scripture need to have a solid understanding of the texts to be explored. Students need to be taught how to apply the same skills they are developing in critical literacy to their interpretation of scriptural texts.

A student’s prior experience and familiarity with scripture generally will significantly influence their capacity to effectively engage with scriptural texts. It is vital therefore that students engage with scripture in a wide range of settings, both within the classroom teaching of religion and in the religious life of the school. (Religious Education Curriculum, p. 26-27)


The Religion Curriculum supports this view of teaching Scripture through the inclusion of core and supplementary texts for each year level. Texts are explored and interpreted through the framework of the Three Worlds of the Text.

Monitoring student progress and achievements.

St Agatha’s uses the Visible Learning principles across all subject areas to improve student learning which includes Religious Education and it is expected that all learning intentions are explicit and feedback to students is authentic. This approach provides the students with greater opportunity to become more independent with their own learning.

St Agatha’s uses the inquiry approach to learning when units of work are planned and developed in Religious Education. This approach provides for greater depth in student understanding and critical thinking skills.

Learning intentions and success criteria are created for each unit of work and are made clear to all students.

Social media such as Twitter is used in year levels across the school to give instant and immediate feedback.

When planning, teaching and assessing, St Agatha’s uses the BCE model of pedagogy across all areas of the curriculum. This is used with formative and summative assessment and in conjunction with the context/text model and the gradual release of responsibility process. This practise ensures that students are given high quality learning and teaching experiences and assessment tools.

By using content and skills, teachers are able to gain insight into where the students learning is currently situated once assessment tasks have been completed. This process will highlight the strengths and weaknesses of each child and provides opportunities for the teacher to differentiate when planning future units of work to cater for the different learning needs of their students to improve further results and achievements.

Assessment has three purposes in the classroom:

Assessment for learning;


Sharing learning intentions. Criteria for success. Providing feedback

Assessment of Learning; Gathering information to make professional judgements

Assessment as learning; Student self-assessment.

Using this, teachers plan with the different learning abilities in mind and cater for the different learning needs and styles which exist in their room and use a variety of different assessment tools and strategies to provide opportunity for each student to articulate their knowledge and understanding of the work taught. St Agatha’s uses student folios to gauge and track student learning and these are used as evidence when reporting and also providing feedback to students and parents.

St Agatha’s Religious Education Program identifies and articulates how accurate feedback is used throughout the school to better enhance the students’ learning progress, development and achievements. Teachers are very conscious of how vital feedback is in regards to the Visible Learning pedagogy which is in place at our school. Teachers provide students with feedback across all areas of the curriculum including Religious Education and this feedback can be either formal or informal depending on the setting and circumstance and student needs. Criteria sheets and annotated work samples are used to provide meaningful and authentic feedback in regards to the work covered against the Religious Education curriculum achievement. This feedback gives both teacher and student the opportunity to adopt strategies and make alterations to learning and teaching so improvements can be made in areas of need. Informal feedback takes the form of classroom talks and one on one discussions.

Consistency of Teacher Judgement ProcessesAt the end of each term teachers are given a day’s release to reflect and respond to previous units of work taught and to review the learning and teaching sequence and make necessary adjustments. Teachers are involved in an ongoing process of consistency of teacher judgement to ensure high teaching and learning is achieved in the classroom. This process includes reviewing teaching pedagogy, assessment criteria and monitoring work samples.Intra and Inter school moderation processes also ensure consistency in religious education.

Processes of Reporting Student Learning


Religious Education, like all subject areas is reported on to parents three times per year in Term 1, 2 and 4. Term 2 and 4 are a more formal process with an overall achievement which is made against the Religious Education Curriculum achievement standard. Parents are also given the opportunity to meet with teachers in Term 1 and 2. Term 2 meetings, parents and students are given the opportunity to meet with teachers to discuss achievements and listen to teacher feedback on the achievements gained throughout the semester, while Term 1 is more informal where progress and understanding of work taught is discussed. The sharing of work samples both written and digital is conducted in these sessions and is a vital part of the meetings as it provides the evidence behind the achievements received.

St Agatha’s reporting processes include:

Term 1 informal Parent Teacher Interviews. Semester 1 (Term 2) formal Parent Teacher Interviews. Student Reporting System SRS, which outlines each students’ achievement

across all year levels including Religious Education for each semester work against the achievement standards in the Religious Education Curriculum.

The use of student work folios which allows for annotated assessment items with authentic and meaningful feedback.

Throughout the course of the school year work and assessment samples are collected which demonstrate a student’s understanding and progress against the achievement standards from the Religious Education curriculum. These samples provide evidence on how the student has developed over the course of each semester so judgements can be made about their learning. These folios provide the evidence which teachers then use when planning following units of work so they are better able to cater for the different learning needs which are present in their classroom.

Monitoring and Evaluation in Religious EducationSt Agatha’s Religious Education Program outlines how each students’ progress and achievements are monitored and evaluated to ensure that there is high quality work being achieved and the expectations which are in place in regards to student learning is being met. Through the use of data, teachers are able to adjust, refine and develop different pedagogical practises and as a result better meet the needs of their students to ensure high quality results are being achieved in the area of Religious Education.

St Agatha’s uses a variety processes which align with school wide pedagogies and practises in monitoring and evaluating student progress and achievements. Data is used to inform the practises used and is critical in the decision making for the future direction of the school including:


Staff participation in professional development in assessment and reporting designed to improve effectiveness and understanding.

Intra and Inter-School moderation sessions where student work is moderated for consistency.

Professional development on how to use the BI tool data and how this information can be used in the classroom in regards to student learning in Religious Education.

Teachers providing high quality feedback and annotations to students on their progress and achievements to assist with learning.

Release time provided each term to work discuss with APRE, PLL and EORE assessment, evaluation and monitoring tools to be used in the classroom.

Term overviews which clearly identify the expectations in all subject areas including Religious Education.

School renewal reflection to monitor and evaluate effectiveness of Religious Education practises and the religious life of the school which provides better focus and direction for future.

Data and conclusions drawn from evaluations and reflections help shape the future annual goals, development and direction of St Agatha’s.

Processes for Monitoring Planning in RE

At St Agatha’s the scope and sequence chart is used when all year level planning is carried out. It helps to map out what and when is being taught in the area of Religious Education and ensure that there is consistency with planning and also so there are no gaps or double ups with specific subject areas when planning is being conducted. The Scope and Sequence chart is a working document and is continually being reviewed, modified and reflected on with the APRE and year level teachers, so as the needs of the learner are better accommodated. All units of work are uploaded to the staff portal on completion and the scope and sequence charts for each year level are also uploaded to the school website so parents/caregivers are able to view what is being taught in each year level.


St Agatha’s Religious Education Program identifies and articulates that changes are constantly being made to units of work and planning to better adapt to student needs and learning outcomes. Data is constantly being reviewed and acted upon which results in differentiation to the year level curriculum content and achievement standards for some learners.

Processes for Monitoring the Religious Life of the School.

At St Agatha’s there are formal and informal process in place to ensure the religious life of the school continues to be a valuable part of this school and culture. All class units are uploaded to the school portal and are viewed each term by APRE and members of the leadership team. Each term there are key areas of focus starting with Caritas-Project Compassion, Catholic Missions,

Orange Sky and SVDP. During each term these agencies are discussed and highlighted in class lessons, school assemblies and community initiatives. Creating awareness throughout the school of the many hardships faced by communities here and abroad is a key focus at St Agatha’s from Prep to Yr 6.


Documents

St Agatha’s Clayfield Primary School Religious Education ... Web viewStudents develop their understanding of Catholic Social Teaching through critical thinking and reflection on