TEACHERS at Sunshine North Primary School are leading the way for learning in the west, with National Assessment Program Literacy and Numeracy (NAPLAN) results showing the school ranked among the state’s top five improvers.
Principal Ken Ryan told the Weekly teachers had made changes to encourage pupils to make connections to real life through hands-on learning.
NAPLAN is an annual assessment for students in years 3, 5, 7 and 9, testing reading, writing, spelling and numeracy skills.
The annual assessments are undertaken nationally in the second week of May.
The federal government revealed last week the school’s total score had increased from 348 in 2008 to 398 in 2012 — just behind the state average of 403. It was the fourth-best improvement in the state.
Mr Ryan said the school had employed two “teaching coaches”, who teach at least two hours of literacy and an hour of numeracy each day.
Lunch was moved from 1pm to 11am after it was discovered some pupils came to school without eating breakfast and suffered from poor concentration.
A kitchen garden program also played a key part in the improvement.
“One thing we know about students in the west is that education needs to be real,” Mr Ryan said. “Students have to be able to make connections to real life, particularly students of non-English-speaking backgrounds who are learning the language for the first time.”
More than 85 per cent of the school’s 290 pupils are from non-English-speaking households.
Mr Ryan said that in addition to reading, writing and arithmetic, the school encouraged physical education, performing arts and learning a language other than English.
Pupils begin learning Vietnamese in prep.
In the 2008 NAPLAN test, 53 per cent of Sunshine North students were deemed “at or below national minimum standard” in year 5 reading.
Last year the number had dropped to 32 per cent. In numeracy over the same period, the number of pupils below standard dropped from 47 per cent to 32 per cent.
“Our goal at the school is to give the children of Sunshine the same education opportunities as children in any other part of the state,” Mr Ryan said.
