Key Learning Areas
St Joseph's endeavours to provide an atmosphere in which the child will develop attitudes of caring, responsibility, achievement and a desire to learn. Within such a culture, we believe that learning occurs best when it builds on what a child already knows. Guidelines generated by the Queensland Education Department and Brisbane Catholic Education are currently utilised in designing and implementing appropriate and sequential learning experiences in the following 9 Key Learning Areas:
· Religious Education
· Mathematics
· English
· Studies of Society and the Environment
· Science
· The Arts
· Cultural Literacy and Languages
· Technology
· Health and Physical Education
All curriculum programs are in a process of review with the commencement of the implementation of the Australian Curriculum in 2011.
Our school aims to cater for all members of our learning community. Learners - whether they are ‘gifted and talented’, experiencing learning difficulties, are from a different cultural background or achieving at appropriate Year level - all have gifts, talents, strengths and abilities that must be acknowledged and catered for in order to optimise the development of potential and to maximise their learning outcomes. All students are individuals with strengths and weaknesses and they all require a rich, varied and stimulating curriculum that acknowledges individual levels of achievement and ability.
Smarter Schools National Partnerships
The Australian Government is providing significant funding to improve teacher quality and boost literacy and numeracy in the form of National Partnerships. The focus is to ensure that there is an increased focus and commitment to improving students' literacy and numeracy outcomes. The Literacy and Numeracy National Partnerships recognises that a focus on high quality literacy and numeracy teaching, together with strong school leadership and whole school approaches, are needed to improve student literacy and numeracy outcomes.
Please click here to view our Implementation Plan for 2012.
Religious Education
Religious Education at St Joseph’s has two dimensions— the educational component (content) and the faith formation (experiential) component.
The classroom teaching of Religious Education is the educational component, a formalised programme based on the Brisbane Catholic Education’s Religious Education Guidelines. Throughout the years of primary school, a strong emphasis is placed on the importance of passing on Catholic tradition to the students. The development of Religious Literacy for the students is also of great importance and acts as a strong focus throughout the years of schooling.
The Guidelines have been developed in accordance with the needs of children at different stages throughout their primary education. They provide opportunities for students to learn about and celebrate the Catholic faith traditions at a level that is meaningful to them.
The Guidelines are organised into four main areas known as Strands. These are:
* Celebration and Prayer
* Morality
* Scripture
* Beliefs
Topics covered at each level allow for the development of these Strands and link closely with similar topics in other subject areas. Throughout the years of school, the children’s understanding of these areas will be built upon at a level relevant to the child’s age and development.
This second component of the Religious Education program, faith formation, is characterised by the many ways that our faith is expressed, lived and celebrated within our community. At St Joseph’s this is done in the following ways:-
+ Prayer in the classroom
+ School Liturgies and Celebrations
+ Weekly assembly
+ Parish based Sacramental Programs
+ Liaison with Parish and Community activities.