ALL THINGS PYP 

The Interim reports, which went home in Week 5 for K-4 and tomorrow for Years 5-6, you may have noticed are now referenced against some of the International Baccalaureate's Approaches to Learning (AtL).

In IB, the Approaches to Learning develop skills that help students “learn how to learn”. AtL skills can be learned and taught, improved with practice and developed incrementally. They provide a solid foundation for learning independently and with others. They also provide a common language that students and teachers can use to reflect on and articulate the process of learning.

The IB identifies five AtL skill categories, expanded into developmentally appropriate skill clusters. These categories are:

1. Communication (written, oral or visual communication)
2. Social (collaboration skills, respecting others)
3. Self-management (organisation, work-habits or reflection on learning)
4. Research (information literacy or media literacy)
5. Thinking (critical or creative thinking).

At Holy Trinity we recognise the importance of the development of these skills and therefore aim to explicitly teach them to our students as part of each Unit of Work.

Working here at Holy Trinity we are so blessed to be in an environment where our students are invited to ask questions, versus being in a learning environment where it is the teacher asking most of the questions. From my first day working here, I saw how quickly students were so excited to learn because they felt like what they were learning came from their interests and their questions. This so quickly helps change the culture of 'why are we learning this, because the curriculum says we have to learn this' to students being excited to learn because they were the ones that asked questions and wanted to further their knowledge in that area.

I challenge you to change the dinner table conversation from 'how was school today?' and 'what did you learn today?' to 'what questions did you ask at school today?'

Let us all be curious together!