Module 2

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Module 2 School context understanding,
acknowledging and responding to context
Priority Schools Programs induction
toolkit www.psp.nsw.edu.au
NSW Public Schools
Leading the Way
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• Understanding the context

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• View the video montage of contexts in Priority
  School communities.

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Understanding context is critical

• Contexts can be described in terms of the
  practices,
• activities or events that take place within them.
  Each
• context carries with it a kind of social
  contract, a set of
• obligations and beliefs about responsibilities
  and the
• actions that should take place.
• Contexts also have an emotional element. The
  responses
• of individuals to the settings and the
  relationships between
• individuals in the setting are of great
  importance when it
• comes to linking contexts and consequences.
• Bowes Hayes, 1999 quoted in Dockett Perry
  (Eds) 2001 Beginning school together sharing
• strengths, p. 78

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Understanding the context

• School context refers to
• physical aspects such as location, place, size
  and layout
• social/psychological aspects such a human
  interactions, values, language and actions.
• School contexts are never static, they are
  constantly changing
• Students come to school experiencing a
  multiplicity of contexts.
• Dockett Perry (Eds) Beginning school together
  sharing strengths, p. 77-78

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Office of schools plan

• The Office of schools planning resources
  highlight school context as a
• key element of school planning
• 3.1.1 An understanding of the context in which a
  school
• operates is an essential part of the planning
  process. To
• provide an alignment with the Annual School
  Report, a
• statement on context may include background
  information
• on the specific features of the school and its
  community
• including student and staff information, and
  significant
• programs and achievements. In responding to their
  context,
• schools in consultation with their community,
  regularly
• revise statements that outline the schools
  values, beliefs,
• aspirations or vision.
• For more support with exploring your school
  context go to
• Professional learning and leadership development
• PSP Induction toolkit Module 4 provides advice
  and support for school planning.

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The context nature ofsocio-economic disadvantage

• Priority Schools serve complex and diverse
  communities.
• Socio-economic status (SES) can intersect with
  other factors to prevent students from gaining
  the full benefits of schooling.
• These factors can include gender, geographic
  location, cultural background and literacy and
  numeracy levels/attainment/prior achievement.
• However, individual students from these groups
  can and do achieve at the highest level.

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Context the facts and figures for Priority
School communities in NSW from 2009

• Priority Schools Programs supports
• 150,000 students or approximately 20 of all
  students attending NSW government schools
• 48 of all Aboriginal students attending NSW
  government schools
• 588 Priority School communities across NSW
• 84 schools supported by the Country Areas Program
  (CAP)
• 39 Schools for Specific Purposes (SSPs)
• 27 Schools in Partnership (SIP) schools.

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Understanding the context Activity 2C

• In a school group discuss the context of your own
  school
• community.
• What qualitative and quantitative sources of data
  are available? Consider systems data about
  student learning and participation, school and
  classroom data, personnel, local histories and
  community perceptions.
• Reflect the voices of teachers, students and
  parents.
• Refer to the Activity B1(i) Module 1 and 4D(i) in
  Module 4 for suggestions on gathering relevant
  systems data.
• Use the proforma and build a picture about your
  own school context.
• Write a 200 word description of your schools
  context.

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• Acknowledging the context

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Acknowledging school context

• the context should not be seen as a
• problem. Rather it should be viewed as a
• relationship which is able to provide valuable
• links between home and school, and which
• offers learners positive and powerful learning
• experiences through which they can negotiate
• their current and future lives. (Munns, 1998 7)

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Acknowledging diversityin the classroom

• Students in NSW government schools come from
  diverse cultural,
• linguistic, social, economic, geographic and
  family contexts
• 27 (206,000) of students are from language
  backgrounds other than English
• 25 (150,000) of students are in Priority Schools
• 11 (82,000) of students are in ESL programs
• 5 (36,000) of students are Aboriginal and Torres
  Strait Islander
• 4 (33,000) of students have a confirmed
  disability
• 2 (12,000) of students are refugees.
• These differences are not mutually exclusive - an
  individual student
• may belong to one or more of these groups.
  Students in any of these
• groups may also be gifted and/or talented.

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• Acknowledging the diverse contexts in Priority
  Schools means
• recognising that students come to school with
• diverse skills, knowledge, talents, experiences
  and preferences
• specific cultural knowledge or cultural
  capital, including their particular experiences
  and prior knowledge
• understanding that culture is largely mediated by
  language, as manifested in metaphor,
  storytelling, songs, and greetings
• respecting that a groups culture reflects its
  shared traditions, which can include a common
  history, language, religion, customs, and
  literary traditions
• acknowledging that students can have multiple
  identities and belongings and these can be shaped
  and reshaped over time.
• Adapted from Brown University, 2002, The
  Diversity Kit, An Introductory Resource for
  Social Change in Education Part
• 11 Culture Ang, Brand, Noble Sternberg, 2006,
  Connecting Diversity Paradoxes of Multicultural
  Australia.

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Acknowledging context

• The following policies and resources support
  school
• communities in valuing context
• NSW Aboriginal Education and Training Strategy
• Anti-racism Policy
• Cultural Diversity and Community Relations Policy
• Cultural inclusive curriculum
• Boys and Girls Education Strategy

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Making school context work for all students

• We need to broaden the cultural resources that
• schools draw upon and privilege. An important
  first
• step is to challenge persistent deficit ways of
  thinking
• about young people, their families, and their
• communities, that may be made visible through
• teacher talk and rigid school structures. We need
  to
• make the curriculum more rewarding and more open
• to including and recognising the cultural
  resources that
• young people bring with them to school.
• ( Pat Thomson, 2002)

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Acknowledging the context of students lives
Activity 2D

• Watch the excerpt from the First day video
• Priority Schools Programs wishes to acknowledge
  the
• Australian Childrens Television Foundation
  permission to
• use an excerpt from First Day (1995).

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2D discussion activity (optional)

• What are the cultural and social resources that
  these students bring to school?
• What might schools and teachers need to consider
  in valuing the diverse contexts of these students
  and their families?
• What may schools need to do differently or
  additionally to support students to engage in
  learning that builds their success in literacy
  and numeracy?
• What are the implications for teaching and
  assessing when valuing context? In your response,
  consider the video excerpt and your own school
  context.

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• Responding to context

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Responding to context through quality teaching

• Current research about quality teaching suggests
  
• When low SES studentsreceive a pedagogy in
  the classroom
• which, through its weak connection to these
  students life experiences
• outside of the school, their background and
  cultural knowledge,
• and to other subjects, this may lead to their
  further alienation
• from schooling/school knowledge.
• The NSW Quality Teaching Modelprovides the
  explicit criteria and
• direction for delivering pedagogy that may
  improve the engagement,
• connection and substantive learning of
  disadvantaged groups.It has
• the potential to reconnect students over time,
  this in turn challenging
• teachers beliefs and expectations in ways that
  might reinforce a more
• positive cycle of increasingly high quality
  pedagogy for low-SES and
• ATSI (sic) student groups.
• Griffiths, T. et al (2007) Equity and pedagogy
  familiar patterns and QT based possibilities.
  Paper delivered at AARE
• conference, November 2007

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Quality teaching matters Activity 2E (optional)

• Download one of the school stories from the PSP
  website
• Middle years media literacy focus
• Secondary school numeracy focus
• Teacher practice in a metropolitan single sex
• secondary school
• OR
• Read Chapter 4 Visual Literacy in School is for
  me pathways to student engagement.
• Discuss how the school has responded to its local
  context to enrich student learning and
  engagement.