St Aidan's Anglican Girls School Junior School (Prep to Year
6)
St Aidan's is a Prep to Year 12 Anglican day school for girls, with a
co-educational Kindergarten. Located in Corinda, with a population of
approximately 800 students, reflecting our belief that students experience many
benefits in a smaller school.
Junior School (Prep to Year 6)
Our Junior School has a Christian and
caring environment that provides challenging educational opportunities for young
girls. Girls benefit from a blend of tradition and innovation that draws on
long-standing values of commitment, diligence, service, teamwork and tolerance,
as established by the Sisters of the Society of the Sacred Advent.
Our community is guided by the Anglican faith. We care for each individual
and aim for each girl to develop her knowledge and skills to the best of her
ability. We offer a varied range of extra-curricular activities. We value
appropriate class sizes throughout the Junior School, and endeavour to create an
intimate environment where access to teachers is enhanced for children and their
parents.
Curriculum
The pastoral care systems and curricula developed for our girls have taken
into consideration recent research into gender-based brain functioning, learning
styles and group dynamics. We provide education for girls – not just education
that includes girls.
Our curriculum learning areas include: English, Mathematics, History,
Geography, Science, The Arts – Art and Music, Languages Other Than English (LOTE),
Health and Physical Education, Technology. Religious and Values Education and
SEL (Social and Emotional Learning) are also important components
of our curriculum in the Junior School.
We progress from an integrated approach in the early years of schooling to a
more specialised, subject-specific curriculum in Year 6. We strive for a
seamless and continuous curriculum, with programs being designed to specifically
suit the needs of individual students at St Aidan’s. We recognise that students
learn differently from each other and strategies and programs implemented in
classrooms reflect that reality.
Also of great importance is the acquisition of thinking skills. We want our
girls not only to be “deliberative and clever thinkers” but also “creative and
critical thinkers”.
Extensive use of computers and information technology is made accessible for
the curriculum at all year levels - each student has a laptop for use in the
classroom. iPads are used in the early years’ classrooms and the Junior School
Library. The teachers and students make use of learning technologies throughout
the day in many subject areas. Students also complete a sequential
computer skills program so as to efficiently and effectively use the technology.
Specialist teachers
All Junior School students benefit from the expertise that is provided by
specialist staff members in Physical Education, Music, Languages
(Chinese, French, German, Japanese) and Library. Students from
Kindergarten to Year 3 participate in the Every Day Music Program and the Every
Day Languages Program. Students are involved in these specialist lessons for
shorter periods of time every day, rather than for longer periods twice-weekly.
Students from Year 3 also receive specialist lessons in Art.
Girls in Year 6 have specialist teachers for all subjects as well as a distinct
precinct of rooms closely aligned to the Secondary School. This greatly
assists girls with their transition into Year 7.
Students are also well supported by our Chaplain, Counsellor and
Learning Support Staff. Our learning support staff aim to help students
either individually or in small groups, when they require assistance with
aspects of the curriculum. The nature of this support is determined by advice
received from specialists and the resources available.
Enrichment & Extension
In addition to the modification of student tasks that can occur by classroom
teachers in a range of subjects, students demonstrating exceptional levels of
creative thinking in a variety of curriculum areas and high levels of task
engagement, persistence and commitment from Prep-Year 6, attend small group
Mathematics and English extension/enrichment lessons. These lessons offer an
opportunity for students to experience aspects of the curriculum in more depth
and to challenge or accelerate their learning. Activities are designed
specifically for the needs of academically able students, by offering an
enrichment experience which challenges the students to think critically, solve
problems and further develop their abilities and interests.
Students across the school, and within a wide range of subjects, are offered
the opportunity to participate in a variety of competitions which are promoted
as enrichment activities. Real-life experiences through the effective use of
excursions, field trips, guest speakers, workshop participation and
participation in community action and fundraising ventures add to the variety of
the Enrichment Program at St Aidan’s. Our Extra-curricular Program, with
activities such as Chess Club, , Code Club, Environmental Club, Art Club, Public
Speaking and Debating also provides opportunities for students of varying ages
in different contexts to engage with topics of interest.
Acceleration
St Aidan’s has a policy of acceleration as one of its strategies to assist
students with particular talents and abilities to move through the academic
curriculum. This form of acceleration moves students out of learning groups
composed of their age-peers, placing them with students who are older. The
strength of this form of acceleration is that it is subject-based, allowing
students to maintain ties with same age peers while forging ahead in particular
academic areas.
The purpose of subject based acceleration is that it facilitates learning for
highly able students. These students have the opportunity to be exposed to
the appropriate level of academic challenge. Limiting acceleration to subject
areas, rather than whole grades, can take into account the fact that a student
may not be ‘above their peers’ in all subjects: for example, they may be
particularly advanced in their mathematical knowledge, but not in English.
This form of acceleration does not bring major changes to students’ lives
and, in a sense, provides the best of both worlds for the able student.
Students will continue to develop amongst their peers, who mirror their own
levels of physical, emotional, and social development, and there is little
disruption to patterns of experience and rites of passage that typically
characterise those of the same biological age. In addition to this,
subject area acceleration acknowledges intellectual readiness in a particular
subject like mathematics and is a flexible approach to catering for the learner
with particular talents.
St Aidan’s was established in 1929 by the Sisters of the Society of the Sacred
Advent – an order of Anglican sisters committed to serving God through nurturing
and serving young women.
On day one, Sister Elisabeth was Sister-in-Charge at St Margaret’s, and Mrs
Christine Hartland was Headmistress at St Aidan’s. They both upheld the view
that education for girls needed to equip them for life. To this day, the
school’s mission remains the same: to encourage confidence and success in
students through pursuit of their academic, sporting, cultural and community
pursuits within a caring environment.
Our Vision
St Aidan's nurtures each student's personal aspirations within a vibrant
learner-centred community.
Our Mission
St Aidan's strives to provide excellence in education, in a caring, friendly
environment, where each individual, nurtured and shaped by the values of the
Christian Faith, has the opportunity to achieve her full potential and to
develop a passion for life and for learning.
Our Values
Our focus is to develop and promote authentic, caring, confident, creative and
connected women who value reason, imagination, truth, compassion and
responsibility.
