“That ICPA Qld lobbies the Department of Education (DoE) to adopt the sequencing of content within the Australian Version 9 Curriculum across the new Curriculum Support Materials (CSMs), the Curriculum Gateway and Home Tutor Hub to better support Schools of Distance Education (SDEs) multi-age/grade classrooms.’’
The vertical expansion of content sequencing within the CSMs, Curriculum Gateway and Home Tutor Hub across SDE year levels or bands (e.g. F–Y2, Y3–4, and Y5–6) would better support multi-age and multi-grade SDE classrooms by enabling teachers and Home Tutors to deliver single-strand concepts concurrently across multiple year levels where appropriate.
This would result in improved use of time in the school room timetable and increase morale of students working together. The one resource would facilitate easy access to information to instantaneously support learners from a foundational level, provide revision and consolidation opportunities and extend gifted learners where necessary, to increase their engagement and interest.
Given the release of V9 Curriculum is highly compatible with multi-age/multi-grade classrooms, we would like SDEs, with the support of the department, to explore the potential of some of the multi-age benefits within their schools (as outlined in QCAA Multi-age education resource), with a view to implementing this strategy within the rollout of resources.
These resources could also potentially be shared with other small rural schools with multi-age/multi-grade classrooms and be available for supply teachers at any Queensland school. In geographically isolated situations, we can join students together in and outside some of their school rooms in meaningful and mutually beneficial ways.
This strategy would be more efficient, ethical and learning enriched, as opposed to students becoming even more dependent on technology, running their own lessons solitarily, often without the Home Tutor having capacity to oversee and support them while managing others in the school room separately. Due to lack of resources, including time in an ever-growing school day, we are starting to make young families believe there is “no other way” than to plug their child in for their individual lesson, simply because there is “no time” to get through everything for every individual child.
The overburdened timetable in the home schoolroom, which includes on-airs, self-paced EduVenture online courses, rewatching of missed lessons, testing, assemblies, and other extracurricular activities, is seeing unnecessary and excessive screen time for students that is not conducive to learning, emotional and mental health and physical wellbeing. No one, besides their parents, are taking audits or responsibility for the number of hours each student is spending on a screen per day.
This adding-on effect is a natural and automatic progression that is not sustainable or healthy.
With the rollout of V9, the strands in a Unit for each subject are more aligned to make it easier for multi-age/multi-grade classrooms in small, rural schools. We have multi-age/multi-grade students in our Distance Education school rooms and can see great potential for these benefits to flow into our schools as well.
