Dawson School

Summary

Dawson School, in Otara, South Auckland, provides children with an attractive and well-resourced learning environment. The school roll currently comprises 72% Pacific and 22% Māori students. The long serving principal and deputy principal have well-established expectations for staff and children.

Parents feel welcome in the school and take opportunities to engage in their children’s learning. The extensive garden to table programme is well supported by community members. Children’s report evenings, cultural performances, numeracy and literacy information programmes are well attended.

Children are engaged in well organised classroom learning. They interact confidently with peers and teachers and enjoy a broad curriculum that supports inquiry approaches, cultural dimensions and English language learning. However, student achievement levels overall are persistently well below national expectations.

Since the last ERO review in 2014, school leaders have sought external expertise to review teaching and learning practices, and strengthen teacher appraisal. The school is currently involved with Ministry of Education advisers in a project designed to extend learning partnerships with parents and whānau.

How well is the school achieving equitable outcomes for all children?

The school has inclusive and responsive approaches to addressing children’s learning and behaviour needs, but is not yet achieving equitable outcomes for all children.

Over 50% of children are achieving below the expected standards in reading, writing and mathematics, and overall achievement is below that of schools of a similar kind. Māori children as a group achieve less well than others, particularly in writing and mathematics. The school analyses some data, for example the results of the standardised STAR assessment, to show comparisons between groups of different Pacific learners.

Many students make good progress particularly those that attend consistently and regularly between Years 1 to 6. In 2016, 68% of Year 6 children were at or above the expected standard for reading.

Teachers are implementing a new play-based learning approach to assist new entrant children transition into school, and to support their oral language development. The school is developing capacity and capability to accelerate learning for all learners, however, overall disparity in achievement for Māori and other learners remains.

ERO is likely to carry out the next review in three years.

Equity and excellence

How effectively does this school respond to Māori and other children whose learning and achievement need acceleration?

The school responds positively to Māori and other children whose learning and achievement need acceleration. Teachers use standardised tools to help them gauge children’s literacy levels and identify children’s learning needs. Team leaders continue to check the reliability of teachers’ assessment judgements, particularly in writing.

Children’s learning progress and achievement is closely monitored and shared with parents. A variety of extra programmes are used to support and extend children’s learning. As part of the school’s internal evaluation, the principal is reviewing what impact these programmes have on improving achievement levels.

Irregular attendance and high transience levels presents challenges for accelerating students’ progress and learning. Up to a third of students change school during the year, and in addition, teacher turnover is high. Trustees are concerned that these factors impact negatively on children’s progress and the quality of their learning.

The board provides additional resources to support children who are at risk of not achieving. A large team of learning assistants work collaboratively with teachers in the classroom to address the needs of individual children. As part of professional learning and inquiry teachers are looking more deeply into the impact that different approaches are having on accelerating these children’s progress.

Other key next steps to support the school’s response to Māori and other children whose learning and achievement need acceleration, include:

• using a standardised mathematics assessment tool to increase the reliability of teachers’ judgements about children’s achievement levels

• developing a school-wide understanding of accelerated learning to strengthen teacher awareness of effective practice

• enhancing children’s ownership of learning through teachers sharing more specific information with them about their learning progressions.

School conditions supporting equity and excellence

What school processes are effective in enabling achievement of equity and excellence?

Some school processes effectively support equity and excellence.

Long serving school and board leaders are committed to providing an environment that supports children’s wellbeing. Their inclusive and caring practices ensure that children and their families feel welcome in the school. The principal surveys the school community to find out how parents feel about the school and welcomes their feedback.

Parents appreciate the broad curriculum learning opportunities their children enjoy. They value literacy and numeracy evenings, and cultural events. They contribute to community based activities at the school. Some parents and children are benefitting from the recently introduced reading together programme.

The board provides generous funding for teacher development. External expertise has supported the introduction of a new teacher appraisal system, and is currently guiding the introduction of inquiry-based learning approaches in classrooms.

The significant efforts of some teachers and trustees to promote tikanga and te reo Māori are valued. The enthusiastic junior kapa haka group is evidence of recent student engagement in bicultural learning activities.

The school has developed good systems to identify and support the high number of children who are English language learners. Capable and experienced staff interact with classroom teachers to ensure that these children are withdrawn for appropriate periods, gain English language skills, and reengage with classroom learning promptly as their language progress develops.

The new inquiry learning approach is designed to encourage student-led learning. Students are exploring more relevant learning contexts and developing skills for thinking, processing information and taking action. The introduction of digital learning in Year 5 and 6 is a new initiative designed to complement the inquiry approach, and strengthen children’s digital literacy.

Sustainable development for equity and excellence

What further developments are needed in school processes to achieve equity and excellence?

To achieve equity and excellence, school leaders have appropriately identified and sought external support and expertise to continue:

• building partnerships with parents and whānau to support students’ learning and achievement

• strengthening teachers’ understanding, planning and assessment of inquiry-based learning.

ERO and senior leaders also agree that the priorities for further developments include:

• building leadership to support, sustain and evaluate new initiatives and resourcing

• developing strategies to further develop and evaluate success for Māori as Māori

• growing the capability and capacity of school trustees.

Senior leaders and ERO agree that growing leadership is a priority and should include building capability for planning, monitoring and evaluation. Improved and distributed leadership would help to embed and sustain key initiatives, including inquiry and digital learning, and increasing students’ ownership of their learning. Professional learning and coaching for leadership is ongoing and should support further development.

Currently, the board provides additional staffing resources to enrich the curriculum. This involves withdrawing children from their regular classrooms to attend specialist programmes such as food technology, gardening, art, music and problem-solving. School leaders are evaluating whether in-class support or withdrawal group support is the most effective use of this additional staffing allocation.

While goals to improve outcomes for Māori students are evident in the school’s annual planning, efforts to introduce te reo Māori and tikānga Māori are not yet well coordinated, evaluated or reported. Leadership in this area should focus on including whānau input and strengthening culturally responsive teaching practices.

The board is currently not well placed to provide effective governance. Developing a plan for the induction of new board members and whole-board training would build governance and strategic capability. Trustees could also develop a work plan to guide and sustain board operations. They should also ensure that the reports they receive focus more specifically on progress towards agreed school goals and targets including the progress of target student groups.

Board assurance on legal requirements

Before the review, the board and principal of the school completed the ERO Board Assurance Statement and Self-Audit Checklists. In these documents they attested that they had taken all reasonable steps to meet their legislative obligations related to the following:

• board administration

• curriculum

• management of health, safety and welfare

• personnel management

• asset management.

During the review, ERO checked the following items because they have a potentially high impact on student safety and wellbeing:

• emotional safety of students (including prevention of bullying and sexual harassment)

• physical safety of students

• teacher registration and certification

• processes for appointing staff

• stand down, suspension, expulsion and exclusion of students

• attendance

• school policies in relation to meeting the requirements of the Vulnerable Children Act 2014.

Going forward

How well placed is the school to accelerate the achievement of all children who need it?

The school has capacity and capability to accelerate learning for all learners. However, disparity in achievement for Māori and other learners remains.

Leaders and teachers:

• know the learners whose progress and achievement need to be accelerated

• need to build teacher capability to accelerate learners’ progress and achievement

The school agrees to:

• develop more targeted planning to accelerate progress for learners

• monitor targeted planning, improved teaching, and learners’ progress

• discuss the school’s progress with ERO.

ERO will provide an internal evaluation workshop for the school.

ERO is likely to carry out the next review in three years.

Graham Randell

Deputy Chief Review Officer Northern

Te Tai Raki - Northern Region

10 November 2017

About the school