This year, Blackwood High School, like all other 8-12 Secondary Schools in South Australia, is considering how best to take on the challenge of bringing year 7 students into the Secondary School environment. The opportunity for our whole school to review its approach to learning design, curriculum and assessment, catalysed by the intake of year 7 students in 2022, is one which must be shared by the families, the teachers and the wider community of Blackwood High School.
After consultation with colleagues at Blackwood High School, we have decided to share this journey through a blog on our website – Our Learning Futures. In this space, we will share with the students and families of our Blackwood High School community the leading voices in educational philosophy and research, those that influence our education systems at local, national and international levels.
This Blog isn’t designed to ‘replace’ any particular communication system or process that currently exists within our school and over time, other staff will contribute and share the many and varied resources about student learning and education that we have access to. As we progress, we hope to have the voices of our students reflected in this space. After all, it is their learning futures that we are all responsible for shaping.
In deciding on where to start I have reflected on my own professional career and my role in leading innovations in curriculum and pedagogy at Blackwood High School. Whose voice stands out in recent memory as one that has reverberated throughout educational institutions around the world? Sir Ken Robinson.
Sir Ken Robinson’s initial TED Talk, coinciding with the start of my teaching career, is the most watched video of all TED Talks to date. His follow up video provides a slightly more succinct addressing of some of his key concerns, challenging us to bring on the Learning Revolution.
Sir Ken Robinson has also provided a powerful evaluation of a broader education system in crisis. This video has been adapted to include a fantastic pictorial representation of his key message.
To provide some local context, our current year 12 cohort started reception in 2007 and have lived their entire school career within this changing paradigm.
If you want to discuss this, or any other matters relating to our students’ learning futures, then please get in touch. As this is the first post, I will monitor responses here to see if this is a workable discussion forum. Otherwise I will seek alternative mechanisms to facilitate conversations regarding these and many more topics.
