FROM THE ASSISTANT PRINCIPAL

The last two weeks have been quite busy at Hennessy. Our senior students will start or have started receiving their assessments for this term and will need to ensure they have adequate time to complete these to the best of their ability. What they need most of all is time and must balance commitments outside of school as poor time management is often cited by students as a reason as to why they don’t perform as expected. 

There will be a Year 12 study next Wednesday from 3.30-6.00pm in D block which will provide students with assistance if needed and students should check with their teachers if they will be available. Normal afternoon study will still go ahead in the library. 

Year 10 have commenced the Minimum Standards tests for NESA in Reading, Writing and Numeracy. Students can have up to 6 attempts to meet the standards each year but hopefully will not need that many. They may also do practice tests first so they know what to expect. Students must m,eet these standards to be eligible for the award of the Higher School Certificate. For more information about the Minimum Standards see: https://educationstandards.nsw.edu.au/wps/portal/nesa/11-12/hsc/hsc-minimum-standard

Year 10 (and Year 11 students who missed this last year) are in the process of completing the All My own Work program for NESA. This is required to be able to enter subjects in Year 11 for students and is a vital program focussing on honesty in assessment. The students were fantastic and worked through the program very efficiently. 

Years 7-9 appear to be settling well into the school year. Teachers are working with students developing both:

• Learning Intentions - what am I learning and why am I learning it?
• Success Criteria - how do I know I have learnt it? What can I do to show I have learnt it?

Year 7 have completed their PAT tests which have provided useful information about their strengths and areas for development over a variety of skills. 

Our ongoing assessment program in Years 7-10 is well underway and many students have already received their common task for this term. Remember common tasks are merely a snapshot across multiple classes to look at the student performance of a cohort. However all tasks can be included when assessing student performance. There’s also no such thing as FAIL - because FAIL standards for:

What’s more important is that students listen to and act upon feedback so they can improve their work. Students also have a number of tools at their disposal to assist with skill development and Education Perfect, Mathspace and Stile are all platforms that can intuitively design quizzes to address areas for improvement. 

We are now half way through Term 1 and it's wonderful to be back to normal. Thank you to all staff and students for following the COVID restrictions for the first four weeks which meant we were able to have a solid start to the school year.

FROM THE DIRECTOR OF STUDIES

Thank you to staff and students who participated in the PAT testing, which was very smooth. 

Information regarding the Year 7-12 Parent/Teacher/Student Conferences will be available soon as we will be using Compass to book these. Year 12 students will have normal classes but will be able to book appointments before and after school and when they have study lessons. We will again be using a model of face to face meetings in the morning and online meetings after school. More information will be forthcoming shortly. 

For the diary: Parent-Teacher-Student Conferences Semester 1

Thursday 31 March 2022

Assistant Principal - Teaching and Learning                    Director of Studies

SHARON HIBBERT                                                            IAN MERGARD