This week we have had the pleasure of meeting potential new members of the Annesley team for 2023! A number of students formed a student panel (see photo below) and met candidates to ask them some prepared questions and gave valuable feedback about each potential new Annesley teacher.

Their questions included:

• Why do you want to teach at Annesley over another school?
• If a child wasn’t doing well at their learning, how would you help them?
• What is your favourite sport?
• How do you make learning fun?

Our recruitment for 2023 is to respond to our continued growth and expansion in cohorts across the Primary School, but also to replace two much-loved members of our teaching team.

Brad Sheridan next year is moving to Queensland with his family and has already won a position at John Paul College in Brisbane. Sandi Grimmett has been appointed to a teaching role at Hills Christian Community School in Verdun and while she has loved teaching at Annesley, she has sought a school where she can engage in daily Christian devotions with students and staff. Both Brad and Sandi leave with our best wishes and deep gratitude for their contribution to our community.

Janine Baker, a member of our Personalised Learning Team has resigned due to personal circumstances. We thank her for the significant contribution she has made to supporting our learners at Annesley.

We attract outstanding teachers at Annesley due to our standing in the professional sector for leading progressive education. While human resources are the most valuable asset to any organisation, our team are a clear strength in our offering at Annesley. The quality of staff and effective collaboration in our team offers a level of high level of quality assurance to our students and families. I am proud to have any of our teaching team teach my three children.

“Tell me and I forget, teach me and I may remember, involve me and I learn”

(Quotation often attributed to Benjamin Franklin)

Inquiry is the main approach to learning and teaching in the PYP and at Annesley we share the IB’s belief that inquiry is the way in which students learn best. An inquiry approach involves students actively in the learning process and empowers them to drive and co-construct many elements of their learning.

What does this type of learning look like in practice? 

Through the inquiry process students move from current understandings to new and deeper understandings. In a learning environment where inquiry is alive you will see active and empowered learners involved in the following:

• exploring, wondering and questioning
• experimenting and playing with possibilities
• making connections between previous learning and current learning
• making predictions and acting purposefully to see what happens
• collecting data and reporting findings
• clarifying existing ideas and reappraising perceptions of events
• applying concepts to deepen conceptual understandings
• researching and seeking information
• establishing and testing theories
• solving problems in a variety of ways
• taking and defending a position

(Source: IB, 2019. PYP From Principles to Practice)

This is very different to a traditional ‘chalk and talk’ approach to teaching where the student plays a largely passive role in the learning process, with the onus on the teacher to impart their knowledge on the learner.

How do teachers/mentors support inquiry learning?

One of our greatest assets at Annesley are the highly skilled teachers and mentors who can facilitate inquiry learning effectively. Authentic inquiry must be carefully planned for and scaffolded throughout. In the below video, Kath Murdoch, who writes extensively on Inquiry Learning, articulates wonderfully the role and attributes of an inquiry teacher.

Video: What does it mean to be an inquiry teacher?  – Kath Murdoch 

If you would like any further information about inquiry learning or any other aspect of our curriculum, please contact David Taylor, our Director of Learning and Teaching taylord@annesley.sa.edu.au

Part 5 of The PYP Advantage, in our next newsletter, will look at Approaches to Learning – how we implicitly and explicitly develop the transversal life skills of Thinking, Social, Communication, Research and Self-management.

References:

IB, 2019. PYP From Principles to Practice

https://www.kathmurdoch.com.au

Rory’s Lunch orders will still be available for students on Sports Day. They will be prepared to eat during the lunch break at 12.45pm. Students will need to bring a packed morning snack from home to eat during the morning’s activities in the sports fields on Greenhill Road.

Drinks and ice blocks can be purchased from Rory’s during the lunch break and the Bouncing Bean will be open for coffee and other hot drinks, with Baker Boys’ chocolate chip cookies and sausage rolls available for parents to purchase also.