Focusing on a ‘community of learning’
Taupo-nui-a-Tia College principal Peter Moyle’s new focus for 2017 is to help get Taupo’s ‘‘Community of Learning’’ up and running.
The Government initiative encourages schools in an area to get together and share knowledge so they can better support learning from primary through to secondary school.
In Taupo, the Community of Learning [COL] involves eight primary schools and both colleges.
Moyle said the schools would set common goals.
‘‘We’ve employed staff from within the community to help with certain goals – one is literacy, one is Maori achievement, and one is future focused skills,’’ he said.
The initiative’s starts in March.
‘‘The first part involves testing children across the community to work out what interventions are needed.’’
Following this, the schools involved will work with experts and formulate appropriate interventions.
Discussions with primary school staff so far had been enlightening, Moyle said.
‘‘Rather than just saying, ‘kids are at a set level when they come to us’, it’s much more of a global approach to learning in the community.
‘‘I’ve found it worthwhile to work out what their issues are, and if we work across schools, we can help shift that.’’
A second focus for Taupo-nuia-College teachers was to help students to develop and improve their ‘‘21st-century skills’’, Moyle first stage said.
We want to be producing students who are critical thinkers, good communicators, good collaborators and who are creative. Those are the 21stcentury skills that will be needed in the future,’’ he said.
‘‘Having knowledge is no longer about just transmitting knowledge and feeding it back, because all the knowledge you need is in the computer or smartphone.
‘‘So it’s using knowledge as a verb. It’s having knowledge and what we do with that knowledge.’’
Moyle said students were unlikely to have just one career and gaining these 21st-century skills would help young people be successful and adapt to the job market, regardless of what changes it underwent.