Impact of Teaching and Learning

This week I was fortunate to present at the 2024 Leaders Roadshow in Townsville. I was asked to present the reading improvement journey at Bowen State School and the impact we are having for the learners on this journey.  I spoke about the significant investment to build teacher capacity along the way and linked my presentation to the new Queensland governments reading position statement.  

At Bowen State School we keep our priorities true to the school’s number one priority being that All students reach their full potential in English. I spoke in Townsville around the range of effective practices such as investment in releasing staff each week to discuss the students in their class, purchasing of decodable readers and a highly efficient reading room. Differentiated support was unpacked and articulated to the audience around how we ensure all students can access the curriculum. The questions I shared is ‘How will we know if we have had the desired impact’ and ‘Do our tracking and monitoring check points support the clarity for the learner’?  

I was proud of all our staff and students and the opportunity to share our unique story with pride. 

Recently we hosted 30 leaders across the community for the term 2 Inclusion forum. Part of the visit was seeing the learning in 16 classes. We used the Bowen State school “Walks” protocols and enjoyed hearing the students respond to questions around how they are going in their learning and what feedback they were provided for their next steps.  

Some of the comments back to the staff from our guests were: 

“Engaged learners with the learning walls, students eager to be chosen, enjoyment for writing, excited learners, students voice, confidence in responses to the questions, pride from teachers & Impressive observation culture” 

Congratulations to the staff. It's great affirmation and acknowledgment of the hard work and impact of teaching and learning. Looking forward to sharing more great news stories of all the happenings here at Bowen State next fortnight.