School Renewal Action Plan - St Thomas More College

Priority 2 – Learning and Teaching
Priority Goals for 2012
Implement Phase One subjects from the Australian Curriculum.
Work towards the embedding of the Australian Curriculum General Capabilities in teaching units.
Work towards a greater alignment of curriculum, pedagogy and assessment as we move towards
implementing the first phase of the Australian Curriculum.
The College has continued to provide a quality and inclusive Catholic education to all students. This year we
have continued our focus on improving student learning outcomes. Following our Curriculum Review in
2010, the College curriculum has undergone significant change. This change has been focussed on the
elements of ‘what’ and ‘how’ we teach. To this end we have continued to review our curriculum offerings
and the pedagogical practice in our classrooms. Most significant to these elements has been the inclusion
by the end of the 2012 school year of twelve new subject offerings in the Senior Curriculum and the
implementation of Dimensions of Learning as the College learning framework.
Senior Pathways and Curriculum Change: Our 12 Year 2012 students will be the first cohort who will
benefit from the changes implemented following the Curriculum Review of 2010. In addition to the nine
new subjects offered for the first time in 2011, the College will offer Graphics, Japanese and Chinese as
subjects in the Senior Curriculum in 2013. These changes have provided this cohort of students a much
broader curriculum than in previous years. This broader curriculum recognises that as an inclusive Catholic
learning community, we value the learning of all students and recognise that students have strengths and
needs which require a broad range of academic and vocational offerings. As at the end of term three, there
are very positive indications that the changes implemented will result in better learning outcomes for this
cohort than previously experienced.
Dimensions of Learning: In 2012 the College continued to train staff in Dimensions of Learning (DoL). Other
the course of the year 22 staff attended a three day training program on DoL. The training of staff in DoL
has been the largest aspect of the College funded Professional Learning budget as we continue our goal of
improving teacher capacity in this area. DoL training was first offered to Academic Coordinators in
Semester One and then to other staff in Semester Two. Academic Coordinators presented their DoL units to
other staff as part of the Professional Development Day at the University of Southern QLD at the start of
Semester Two.
In Term 3 the College hosted a weeklong conference on Dimensions of Learning. The presenter was Howard
Pitler from McREL in the United States. The conference was attended by over fifty educators from
Queensland as well as some from other states. The conference provided excellent publicity for the College
as well giving two of our staff the opportunity to become accredited DoL trainers. This will enable the
College to have the option in the future to do in house training of staff in DoL without the need to engage
outside consultants. The conference and our work in training staff in 2012 has been positive and the
College will continue to focus on the implementation of a College wide learning framework in 2013.
The UnitPlanner: At the start of 2012 the decision was made to re-evaluate the requirement for staff to use
the UnitPlanner to plan and record their teaching units. This decision was made as it was recognised that
staff need more training in DoL in order to fully maximise the unit writing experience in the UnitPlanner.
Some staff who were competent in DoL continued to use the UnitPlanner.
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