2018 crescent head public school annual report · 2019-05-29 · this year submitted two dances in...

Crescent Head Public SchoolAnnual Report

2018

1681

Printed on: 30 May, 2019 of 11 Crescent Head Public School 1681 (2018)

Introduction

The Annual Report for 2018 is provided to the community of Crescent Head as an account of the school's operations andachievements throughout the year.

It provides a detailed account of the progress the school has made to provide high quality educational opportunities forall students, as set out in the school plan. It outlines the findings from self–assessment that reflect the impact of keyschool strategies for improved learning and the benefit to all students from the expenditure of resources, including equityfunding.

Cameron Upcroft

Principal

School contact details

Crescent Head Public SchoolPacific StCrescent Head, 2440www.crescenthd-p.schools.nsw.edu.aucrescenthd-p.school@det.nsw.edu.au6566 0255

Message from the Principal

2018 was an especially busy year with our school taking on many new and exciting projects. The start of the year saw uswelcome a new Assistant Principal Mr Murray Dickinson. Mr Dickinson took on the role of supervising the primary sectionof our school and taught a year 3 and 4 class. He worked alongside Miss Wickham who made the move to Stage 2 fromKindergarten. Mrs Sarah Lipscombe moved from Stage 2 to Kindergarten.

Arts and sports remained at the forefront of our school this year. Our under 10s Boys NRL and Girls 7s both made NSWSate finals and our Captain William Terrason and his cousin Tom Moffitt both representing our school at a state level. Wethis year submitted two dances in the Lower North Coast Dance Festival with our Stage 3 item performing at the regionalshowcase. Our Rock Band performed Say Anything at the MPS Music Festival with a strong contingent in both themassed choir and combined drumming groups. As always our year ended with a concert which this year was themedaround intercontinental travel.

This year our school undertook a K–6 study of the local environment including the beach, wetlands and local history. Theculmination of these efforts were made into a book called Our Crescent Head. This book contained work from all 186 ofour students and their teachers. The P&C continued to support our school and this year coordinated an art show CoastalChic where they were able to showcase the visual arts community whilst raising much needed funds for our school.

Message from the school community

Another year has passed at Crescent Head Public School, and another busy year for the P&C has nearly come to anend. Besides all the usual and ongoing fundraising and donations, for the past two years, the P&C has been on amission.

One of our major challenges has been the renewal of the playground equipment. Due to extensive ground worksrequired, this had been quoted at around $65000. With lateral thinking that comes from the input of the many, the P&Capproached this in an innovative manner that entwines with the ethos of the school's environmental policy. Researchwas conducted by two of the P&C members into the benefits from Loose Parts Play. This theory was first proposed byBritish architect, Simon Nicholson in 1971, which simply means providing random objects that supports children toinvent, problem solve and to use divergent thinking, by moving, combining, redesigning, pulling apart and putting backtogether these objects to create new purposes for these objects; new purposes that fit the imagination of children. Notonly does this kind of play support these skills of cognition, but I have also seen the social benefits of a play space thatcentres around cognitive play and not physical play of sports. This allows children, who often find the physicality ofsports–oriented play overwhelming, a safe place to play. The other social benefits are seen in sharing objects and ideas,cooperative group skills and playing with peers who might not normally play together in other activities. It's amusing tothink we have to give this kind of play a theoretical label and dissect it for all of its benefits, when many of us remember,


this was just how it always used to be when we were kids.

As good as Loose Parts Play is, there is also a need for physical equipment. Over the last two years, it has been theP&C's mission to raise funds to provide this. Finally, we have done it. The funds are in. Now it is time to plan for this nextexciting phase. I have to personally thank the fantastic team at CHPS P&C for their dedicated input with ideas and thetenacity it takes to get ideas off the ground and into reality. With last year's Spring Fair and this year's Coastal Chic ArtShow, the effort to organise these events is due to the efforts of a team.

This year is also the final year for four of our long serving members of the P&C. Jackie Terrasson, secretary; JulioGarcia, Treasurer; Pip Epplestun; publicity and myself, President; are coming to the end of our parental contracts, as ourchildren also come to the end of their schooling at CHPS. It has been my pleasure and privilege to be able to work withsuch a friendly and committed team over the years and on behalf of the P&C, I would like to thank all of the families, staffand students of Crescent Head Public School and businesses of the wider community for contributing their time andmoney to help support our school. I would like to personally thank all the current members of the P&C for their ideas,effort, support and commitment. We welcome new families to join our friendly P&C and extend invitations to all to helpcontribute in any voluntary capacity, as all the money raised allows for our students to enjoy quality equipment andexperiences to enrich their learning, physical and social development and personal growth. After all, it takes a village toraise a child, and every bit of help from our community is greatly appreciated.

Riitta Kytola

President

CHPS P&C


School background

School vision statement

Our shared commitment to learning at Crescent Head Public School is to develop highly engaged students throughinnovative, quality teaching in a positive and harmonious environment, where high aspirations, creativity andenvironmental awareness are cultivated so all students can strive to excel.

School context

Crescent Head Public School has an enrolment of 185 students in 2018, comprising of 86 boys and 99 girls. There are21 students who identify as being of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander descent.At Crescent Head Public School the students, parents and teachers work together sharing the responsibility for learningin a positive environment where excellence, high achievement and creativity are fostered. All students are encouraged toachieve their individual and collective best and this is captured in the school’s motto of I Strive to Excel.There is a wholeschool approach to student well–being through the implementation of the Positive Behaviour for Learning program withall behaviour encouraged and managed through the 5C values of the school.Crescent Head Public School has anoutstanding reputation for high achievement in the Creative Arts, Sport, Environmental Education and ICT with a focuson providing rich and diverse learning opportunities to develop high levels of student engagement with learning. Theschool provides strong programs in literacy and numeracy that address the individual learning needs of all students fromthose requiring additional support to the higher achieving students.Crescent Head PS has a comparatively low level ofsocio– economic disadvantage however under the Resource Allocation Management model of funding the school nowreceives equity funding to support students from an Aboriginal and low socio–economic background. This has enabledthe employment of additional School Learning Support Officers across the school to assist students and teachers inproviding vital learning support.The learning environment includes a very well–resourced library, a computer learningspace, an outdoor learning space, a communal hall and 2 large covered outdoor areas. These facilities are adjacent tothe council sporting fields, the community pool and a beautiful bush landscape, all not far from the beach.A strongpartnership has been developed between all members of the school community of Crescent Head Public School and withthe other schools of the Macleay Educational Community of Schools.

Self-assessment and school achievement

Self-assessment using the School Excellence Framework

This section of the Annual Report outlines the findings from self–assessment using the School Excellence Framework,school achievements and the next steps to be pursued.

This year, our school undertook self–assessment using the School Excellence Framework. The framework supportspublic schools throughout NSW in the pursuit of excellence by providing a clear description of high quality practiceacross the three domains of Learning, Teaching and Leading.

Our self–assessment process will assist the school to refine our school plan, leading to further improvements in thedelivery of education to our students.

For more information about the School Excellence Framework:

https://education.nsw.gov.au/teaching–and–learning/school–excellence–and–accountability/sef–evidence–guide


Strategic Direction 1

Authentic, engaging learning

Purpose

To enhance the capacity of all staff to identify, understand and implement the most effective, explicit teaching methods,with the highest priority given to evidence based teaching strategies. Formative assessment is integrated into dailyteaching practice in every classroom and teachers effectively analyse student assessment data to inform future teachingand learning.

Overall summary of progress

Our aims with Strategic Direction 1 were around developing common assessment processes across the school. Thisbegan with a review of assessment processes through staff meeting and analysis of teaching and learning programs.

Progress towards achieving improvement measures

Improvement measures(to be achieved over 3 years)

Funds Expended(Resources)

Progress achieved this year

Consistency in Data Collectionprocesses (currently nocollaborative sessions scheduledin place for CTJ)

As we move into 2019 we have in place somecommon assessments in spelling, numeracy andwriting and used staff meetings in term 4 to developa stronger understanding of the grammar scopeand sequence in order to develop better, formativeassessment and learning activities around this.

The school is able to evidencegrowth from delivering tosustaining and growing in theteaching domain element DataSkills and use, EffectiveClassroom practice and in theLearning domain element ofAssessment.

We aimed to build out knowledge of the LearningProgressions in order to replace the outgoingContinuums. 2 of our staff formed a team and weretrained in the use of the Learning Progressionswhilst simultaneously another 2 staff worked withthe Early Action for Success team to learn moreabout instructional leadership around thisdocument.

Next Steps

Whilst we finished 2019 with a much better understanding of the Learning Progressions there is still much work to do inthis area around making these documents a useful tool to drive learning and differentiation for all students. At thebeginning of 2019 our next steps will be to regroup as a learning community around the Learning Progressions as weneed to gather some data on what methods are best going to deliver progress in this area. In addition to this we need tofocus on the Numeracy section of this document.



Building a culture of shared responsibility for learning

Purpose

To create and enhance systems and protocols for the shared implementation of school improvement and collaboration.With a significant proportion of our staff new to our school, there is a strong need to ensure that the collegiality andcollective efficacy that has been a major strength of our school is retained and enhanced.


We began the year with training for all staff around Collective Efficacy delivered by Principal School Leadership.





Collective Efficacy is improvedacross our school as is evidentthrough collaborative pratices,teacher leadership and anawareness of collective efficacywhen compared to baselinesurvey data around collaborativepractices.

We collected data from staff about how they viewedthe concept and it's effect on our school. Westudied and revised both out staff Window ofCertainty and our Values Statement to find thecommon goals we all had for our students. Throughmeeting and consultation we then developed awhole school project. This was the researching,writing and publishing a school–wide text about ourlocal environment. The end result of this was abook which was published and delivered in time forChristmas.

Increased distributed leadershipof PBL resulting in leadership ofimplementation by a team whoare trained in and have athorough understanding of theseprocesses compared to ourbaseline data.

Our other project was around the re–introduction ofPBL processes in our school. This coincided withthe implementation of a new student trackingsystem through the EBS On–track software suite.

Next Steps

Our next step in the building of a strategically coherent school culture is to use our Scope and Sequence documents todevelop and implement common strands of History, Geography and Science units across the school to encourage thesharing of resources and more collaborative practices across classes. Our next step for PBL really is going to require analmost complete overhaul as new staff are trained develop strategies that staff take pride in and have a sense ofownership of in our school.



Developing efficient, effective procedures

Purpose

To build the capacity in our school to develop the procedures and processes that will enable efficient management ofresources. This will ensure that curriculum, wellbeing, work health and safety and financial obligations are aligned toDepartment of Education requirements and are of the highest possible standards.


The LMBR software began implementation at the end of Term 3 2017 with all software available being utilised by the endof 2018.





Teaching and learning programsshow measurable improvement inNESA curriculum delivery,differentiation and formative andsummative assessment. This iscompared to baseline data ascollected in 2017.

Teaching and Learning programming checks wereput into place and through collegial planning days agreat deal of collaboration around the developing ofprogramming and assessment occurred thataligned us with NESA requirements.

LMBR systems are successfullyin use by all relevant staffmembers who have increasedlevels of confidence andcompetence with these softwarepackages compared to baselinedata.

For this reason 2018 was the first year these manynew software packages were used. Whilst this wasa very steep learning curve, especially for our officestaff, the end of 2018 saw great confidence andcompetence in using our new finance and studentmanagement packages.

Next Steps

Uncertainty around the financial systems earlier in the year left us with a surplus of unspent funds at the end of 2018 thatis planned to be spent consolidating LMBR practices throughout 2019 with the addition of a second SchoolAdministration Officer who is trained. 2019 will also be used to learn the WBS/IO systems and to integrate strategicspending into our Milestoning using SPaRO. We will also require more work to finialise the Scope and Sequencedocuments and further streamline the Programming Requirements analysis processes.


Key Initiatives Resources (annual) Impact achieved this year

Aboriginal background loading Budget – $23,948

$16148 –SLSO, $3,000TPL, $4,800 – teacher

2 Teachers trained in Connecting to Country,all Aboriginal students completed PLP.

Low level adjustment for disability Budget – $19,753

$19,753 – SLSO in classsupport

Multi–Lit and mini–Lit programs now runningacross Stage 2 and 3. in class supportcoordinated by the LST in ES1 and St1.

Quality Teaching, SuccessfulStudents (QTSS)

Budget – $31,338

0.318 staffing allocation

Executive working across supervised stageswith teachers in order to successfullycomplete Professional Development Plansthrough meeting personalised goals alignedto the Professional Teaching Standards. .

Socio–economic background Budget – $48,889 spent onSLSO support 4 hours perday 4 days per week.

In class and specialist program interventionwith Additional Multi–lit and mini–Litimplemented where needed.

Support for beginning teachers 2 hours per week additionalsupport

Second year teacher working towards thecompletion of accreditation at proficient level.


Student information

Student enrolment profile

Enrolments

Students 2015 2016 2017 2018

Boys 84 94 86 81

Girls 96 98 97 97

Enrolment in 2018 got us just above the threshold for 8classes. Kate Fair was employed in the role ofclassroom teacher for year 2 as a result. With a largekindergarten enrolment we formed both a kinder andK/1 class this year and utilised the F block of rooms tocater for common lessons across adjoining classrooms.We have a small year 6 group of 24 studentsgraduating at the end of the year but also a smallnumber of predicted kindergartens for 2019 making theforming of an eighth class again an unknown event.

Student attendance profile

School

Year 2015 2016 2017 2018

K 90.6 94.2 93.6 89.9

1 92.8 89.4 94.1 90.5

2 89.7 92.4 91.1 92.1

3 92.9 91.5 92.8 89.3

4 92.6 93.7 91.1 90.4

5 93.3 93.7 92.2 91.8

6 91.7 93.2 92.9 89.8

All Years 91.8 92.5 92.4 90.5

State DoE

Year 2015 2016 2017 2018

K 94.4 94.4 94.4 93.8

1 93.8 93.9 93.8 93.4

2 94 94.1 94 93.5

3 94.1 94.2 94.1 93.6

4 94 93.9 93.9 93.4

5 94 93.9 93.8 93.2

6 93.5 93.4 93.3 92.5

All Years 94 94 93.9 93.4

Management of non-attendance

This year we began using the EBS ON–TRACK systemto collect data on student attendance. This enabled usto gain instant information about student attendance

that could be acted on. At the end of term 1 studentswith a lower than 80% attendance rating receivedphone calls home to ascertain a reasoning aroundnon–attendance and in many cases this improved as aresult. Our attendance data also suffered this year as aresult of several families with multiple students takingextended leave for a term or more with their children.These were approved by the Principal in consultationwith families but still had adverse effects on ourattendance data. We implemented a rewards programat the end of 2018 and students with 98% and aboveattendance for 2018 were awarded as part of our finalIcon Assembly.

Workforce information

Workforce composition

Position FTE*

Principal(s) 1

Assistant Principal(s) 2

Classroom Teacher(s) 6.94

Teacher of Reading Recovery 0.32

Learning and Support Teacher(s) 0.5

Teacher Librarian 0.4

School Administration and SupportStaff

2.12

*Full Time Equivalent

Our teaching staff consist of all teachers who are bothqualified. All but one of our staff is accredited asProficient with one staff member working towardsProficiency. We have one Aboriginal full time classroomteacher and one 0.8FTE SASS staff member who isalso Aboriginal.

Teacher qualifications

All teaching staff meet the professional requirementsfor teaching in NSW public schools.

Teacher qualifications

Qualifications % of staff

Undergraduate degree or diploma 100

Postgraduate degree 5

Professional learning and teacher accreditation

All teaching staff took part in the ProfessionalDevelopment Plan process. Through this they set theirwon professional improvement goals that were alignedto our school's strategic targets and to relevant aspects


of the Australian Professional Teaching Standards. .

Financial information

Financial summary

The information provided in the financial summaryincludes reporting from 1 January 2018 to 31December 2018.

2018 Actual ($)

Opening Balance 226,765

Revenue 1,926,081

Appropriation 1,811,953

Sale of Goods and Services 29,314

Grants and Contributions 82,310

Gain and Loss 0

Other Revenue 0

Investment Income 2,505

Expenses -1,895,080

Recurrent Expenses -1,895,080

Employee Related -1,686,580

Operating Expenses -208,500

Capital Expenses 0

Employee Related 0

Operating Expenses 0

SURPLUS / DEFICIT FOR THEYEAR

31,002

Balance Carried Forward 257,766

This year our school moved to the LMBR processesusing SAP to manage our financial obligations. Wecontinued to manage the finances of the MacleayPublic Schools (MPS) which accounts for $187,426 ofour unspent funds. With the setting up of an accruedspending program we had planned to keep $20,000 peryear for capital works projects and technology as it isneeded. This year we required a new photocopier andsome upgrades to office equipment which amounted to$17,079.

We over spent this year on staff professional learningdue to new staff being trained in Art of Leadership,Connecting to Country, Learning Progressions, EarlyActions for Success, Agile Leadership and Principal'sas Instructional Leaders. These vital programs wereoffered to our school after planning was put in to placeand added to our capacity as a school.

After MPS funds are expended our intention is to spend$15,000 towards the purchase of new playgroundequipment, $15,000 toward upgrades to our office

building through the installation of new windows andsome furniture upgrades. After this spending ourunspent funds will remain at approximately $100,000moving forward which will be utilised for replacement oftechnology and unforeseen operating expenses asneeded.

Financial summary equity funding

The equity funding data is the main component of the'Appropriation' section of the financial summary above.

2018 Actual ($)

Base Total 1,501,355

Base Per Capita 35,387

Base Location 7,253

Other Base 1,458,716

Equity Total 144,646

Equity Aboriginal 23,948

Equity Socio economic 48,889

Equity Language 0

Equity Disability 71,810

Targeted Total 0

Other Total 115,728

Grand Total 1,761,729

Figures presented in this report may be subject torounding so may not reconcile exactly with the bottomline totals, which are calculated without any rounding.

A full copy of the school's financial statement is tabledat the annual general meetings of the parent and/orcommunity groups. Further details concerning thestatement can be obtained by contacting the school.

School performance

NAPLAN

In the National Assessment Program, the results acrossthe Years 3, 5, 7 and 9 literacy andnumeracy assessments are reported on a scale fromBand 1 to Band 10. The achievement scalerepresents increasing levels of skillsand understandings demonstrated in theseassessments.

From 2018 to 2020 NAPLAN is moving from a papertest to an online test. Individual schools are migrating tothe online test, with some schools attempting NAPLANon paper and others online.

Results for both online and paper formats are reportedon the same NAPLAN assessment scale. Any


comparison of NAPLAN results – such as comparisonsto previous NAPLAN results or to results for studentswho did the assessment in a different format – shouldtake into consideration the different test formats andare discouraged during these transition years.

2018 Data showed that a renewed focus on grammarand aspects of writing were needed. Modest gains weremade in reading. From here a school wide focus wasmade on the grammar scope and sequence and on thestructure of sentences with all classes implementingdaily, short grammar lessons.

Our largest area of need in Numeracy was aroundworking with numbers. this is consistent with ourclassroom analysis with classes working on developingplace value strategies when doing addition andsubtraction with larger numbers.

Every Aboriginal child in our school has a developedand implemented Personal Development Pathway. Thisis designed in consultation with students, families,teachers and where necessary our Learning andSupport Team. With only small numbers of studentsinvolved in results it is innappropriate to comment ontheir outcomes in NAPLAN. However, each of thesestudents has shown pleasing results when workingtowards their negotiated learning goals.

Parent/caregiver, student, teachersatisfaction

We collected data last year from our teachers on wherethey felt they were in relation to collaboration as part ofour Collective Efficacy study. It informed us as to whereteachers felt they were valued. this data informed ourplanning around building supportive staffing processesand in the need for collaborative planning and fordeveloping opportunities for staff, students and thecommunity to work together.

We collected community data on both ourcommunication strategy and Out of School Hours Care(OOSH). The OOSH survey informed us that a servicewas viable and much needed for our community. Thesurvey on our school communication informed us aboutincluding more classroom items in our WeeklyGrapevine Newsletter and that there was still a need forweekly communication to our families.

Policy requirements

Aboriginal education

In 2018, our school remained an active member of thelocal Aboriginal Education Consultative Group (AECG)with several staff attending meetings and reporting onthe progress of Aboriginal Education across our school.Throughout 2018 all Aboriginal students in our schoolwere supported through the implementation of a

Personalised Learning Pathway (PLP). These werewritten as a joint effort between teachers,students,parents, community members and ourlearning and support team. Resources were purchasedfor the teaching of Aboriginal perspectives such ascurriculum support texts and Painting Country CDs.Staff attended training in Understanding Countryorganised by our local AECG. During Term 2 & 3 ourstage 2 students learnt about health and traditionalfoods as part of the Dhaliyi Doctors program. Term 3saw our school undertake our annual NAIDOCCelebrations where students worked with their teachersand community members on activities ranging fromAboriginal Art through to bush tucker. 2 of our staffwere trained in the Connecting to Country programwhich enhanced our school's knowledge of localcustoms, traditions and stories that have begun beingshared with staff and students.

Multicultural and anti-racism education

All teachers promoted an awareness and appreciationof the diverse multicultural nature of Australian societythrough quality teaching and learning programs acrossall Stages. Teachers ensured they used the qualityteaching elements of background knowledge, inclusivityand connectedness to provide meaningful and sensitivelearning experiences for their students to embed adeeper understanding of the different cultural beliefsand traditions that enrich our society. During Term 1,Harmony Day was staged to celebrate the multiculturalnature of our Country and to make students aware ofthe significance of living together in harmony andbelonging. All students were engaged in a number ofactivities that involved quality teaching and learningexperiences about different cultures. A highlight of theday was being able to experience and taste a variety offood from around the world in our International StreetFood Festival staged by canteen volunteers. The activeinvolvement of students, parents and staff ensured thatthis day was a great success and an effective strategyin encouraging greater awareness of and empathytowards our multicultural World. All teaching andlearning related to promoting interculturalunderstanding is integrated into the Anti–Bullying andPBL strategies of the school.


2018 crescent head public school annual report · 2019-05-29 · this year submitted two dances in...

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