Grand Ballroom Level 3
What Great Principals Do Differently
We will be focusing and center on specific things that the best leaders do that others do not. This is so essential because everything comes down to leadership. When things go well it is the leader. When things do not go so well it is the leader. The session will center on the specific things that separates the very best leaders from everyone else.
Great leaders make every decision based on the best people in an organization. The very best people have a big picture focus and they want everyone to be successful. Others often want themselves to be successful without as much consideration to others and the organization. Great leaders as also visionary and highly effective communicators. Additionally they differentiate how they lead based on situation, circumstance and the people involved. They also understand that the key to having a great school is people, not programs.
LEARN MORE
Grand Ballroom Level 3
The interactive keynote session will further unpack the theme of the conference. The following four experts who will be discussing their experience, research and practice in this area.
Greg Whitby
Jenny Atta
Michele Simons
Tony Cook
LEARN MORE
Meeting Room Level 4
Students Articulating Their Own Literacy Learning: Year 7 Literacy Continuum
Antoinette Meade, Christine Payne, Linda Hicks
St Agnes Catholic High School, NSW
Stateroom Level 2
From Student Voice to Agency: Evidence-based Practices to Support Improvement
Gail Major, Murray Cronin
Scoresby Secondary College, VIC
Rooms 3+4 Level 1
Making Vision Reality: Solution-Focussed Strategy Canvas
Jason Pascoe, Maria Serafim
Growth Coaching International, NSW
Rooms 5+6 Level 1
Co-Creating a Culture of Innovation and Change
Unity Taylor-Hill, Amy Sackville
Anzac Park Public School, NSW
Grand Ballroom Level 3
Leading School Transformation through agency and influence
Dr Miranda Jefferson
4C Transformative Learning, NSW
Room 5 Level 2
Defining and Measuring Character and 21st Century Competencies
Dr Rick van der Zwan, Noel Thomas
Extol Analytics, NSW
Room 6 Level 2
Opening the Doors to Innovation: Leading a Quest for Improvement
Rebecca Brownhall
Toowoomba Catholic Schools, QLD
Room 3 Level 2
Gaining confidence including Indigenous curriculum content and building school culture
Mark Yettica-Paulson, Susan Starling
Australians Together, SA
Room 4 Level 2
Leading Mathematics Education: System, School and Classroom Voices Together
Dr Christine Mae, Andrea de Carvalho, Michael Manton, Lynnette Jackson
Sydney Catholic Schools
Room 2 Level 2
Embedding national teacher certification as high-quality professional learning
Erin Corbyn, Clinton Milroy, Emma Mansfield
AITSL and Macarthur Girls High School
LEARN MORE
Grand Ballroom Level 3
Assessment-Capable Learners
We all know that collective efficacy is the new number one influence on students’ learning. And there is good reason for that. In part, efficacious teachers ensure that their students are assessment-capable, which means that students understand their current level of performance and compare that with the desired level of learning. Assessment-capable learners and their teachers select direct, dialogic, and independent learning approaches they know will help attain their shared learning goals. They also seek feedback from others, provide others with feedback, and monitor their learning from acquisition through consolidation to mastery.
LEARN MORE
Janet Clinton
John Halsey
Tania Aspland
Jeffrey S. Brooks
Janet Clinton
Influencing student voice through teacher talk: highlights from the Visible Classroom
Grand Ballroom Level 3
Learners who have agency and voice will be able to communicate with others, work collaboratively and adapt to different contexts in a changing society, importantly they will demonstrate flexibility in learning. This paper focuses on the influence of teacher talk on learner agency. Using the extensive Visible Classroom data base of over 1500 lesson transcripts it will be suggested that ‘what we say and how we say it’ impacts student learning.
The Visible Classroom seeks to collect real-time, objective evidence of classroom practice that can be fed back to teachers for reflection and development. Developed by the Melbourne Graduate School of Education and Access Innovation Media (Ai-Media) the Visible Classroom uses mobile phone technology to record teacher practice and capture objective data on teacher talk. Feedback reports are used to provide opportunities for teacher reflection and practice development.
This presentation will provide an overview of the Visible Classroom, it’s key implementation components, applicability to the promotion of learner agency, and evidence of its success in shifting specific teacher practices. A high level summary of findings of factors that influence learner agency will be presented. It is suggested that variability of language across teachers and classrooms may have a differential effect on learners. It is also hypothesized that language-aware teachers will have a greater influence learning.
John Halsey
Re-framing, re-focussing and revitalising education in rural, regional and remote Australia
Meeting Rooms Level 4
The key challenge for regional, rural and remote education is ensuring, regardless of location or circumstances, that every young person has access to high quality schooling and opportunities.
There is a diversity of factors, relationships and resources required for a student to learn, successfully complete school and commence a pathway beyond school which is personally rewarding and also makes a contribution to the wider society.
In practice, the contexts, factors, relationships and resources that impact on learning and opportunities don’t exist as discrete entities. Their interactions influence the learning, growth and nurturing of students from their early years through to school graduation and beyond.
Much is already being done by individual states and territories and in partnership with the Australian Government to ensure RRR students and families do have access to high quality education and do make a successful transition to further study, training and employment.
However, much remains to be done to bridge the gap between the achievements and opportunities of RRR students and those most commonly associated with their urban counterparts.
Tania Aspland
The centrality of practice wisdom in teacher formation: Leading reform in work integrated learning in universities and educational learning organisations
Stateroom Level 2
In the contemporary critique of university graduates in Australia, it has become evident that employers in all disciplines are expecting “work ready” students. As such, the positioning of work integrated learning (WIL) as central to university professional preparation programs is becoming a priority and the scope for WIL experience in university programs is expanding (Garnett, 2012; Billet, 2011). WIL has become an integral part of the many university strategic plans and is increasingly highlighted in national agendas concerning the professions from political, educational and vocational perspectives. It is clear from the literature that WIL policies in particular respond to specific institutional and local needs, specific priorities and operational plans around learning and teaching, community engagement and research and that there is increased institutional involvement in work integrated learning from both a research and practice perspective.
In initial teacher education, WIL is no longer just about placements. It is timely that the historical policies and practices that focus on technical rationalism (practicum placements, practicum payments and assessments, theory practice divide) are challenged and put to bed. New models of WIL need to be conceptualised to value the complex interplay and integration of moral reasoning and cognitive knowledge, the agential nature of teachers’ professional knowledge, the interactive process of knowledge generation and practice wisdom (Cheung 2016) in the teaching profession and the fluid status of professional knowledge and deliberate practices as enacted by expert teachers (Ericsson 2006, Cheung, 2015). This paper will purport that such a new model is vital if university based initial teacher education is to be respected by and with teaching partners and experts in the field.
Research findings will be presented to support a newly conceptualised approach to WIL, based on the integration of practice wisdom, deliberate practice, moral reasoning and knowledge generation, that addresses the long-term problem of the theory practice binary inherent in traditional models of “practicum”. Strategies for moving forward through shared leadership across universities, schools, early learning centres and unions will be offered to the participants for discussion.
Jeffrey S. Brooks
Five Questions Every Principal Must Ask—and Why the Answers Define Leadership in Your School
Room 2 Level 2
The practice of school leadership is exceedingly complicated, but it is also important for leaders to keep their focus on the simple things that matter most. This presentation draws from 19 years of conceptual and empirical educational leadership research conducted in Australia and around the world in an effort to identify the “big questions” that lie at the core of management, administration and leadership in schools.
These five questions focus attention on the importance of:
- Creating fit-for-purpose organisational structures and dynamics that promote quality teaching, learning and engagement through empowerment
- Building and maintaining authentic relationships and learning networks
- Establishing clear, proactive and transparent communication practices
- Co-constructing education with rather than for students
- Promoting collegiality in systems that incentivise competition
- Honouring and advocating for diversity and justice in the global schoolhouse
- Adopting a bespoke rather than one-size-fits-all approach to leadership, teaching and learning in content areas and contexts
The presentation asks leaders to reflect on the ways that they intentionally and unintentionally answer these questions, and offers advice and resources for exploring the five questions in their own practice and with others in their school community.
LEARN MORE
Pre-Function Area Level 3