FOCUSED
Caulfield Grammar School recognises that the greatest impact it can make is through the provision of quality teachers.
Research indicates that one of the biggest influences on your child’s learning outcomes is the quality of the teacher and their teaching practice. A distinguishing feature of Caulfield Grammar School’s approach to teaching is to provide weekly, professional learning for all teaching staff. Quality teaching, for quality learning.
Educators are encouraged to share practice across learning areas and share their strategies across campuses to design effective environments to maximise student learning. Ultimately, our formative practice model, FOCUSED, empowers students to understand and be active participants in their own learning. Our students are encouraged to voice their thinking openly and to share and critique one another’s understandings – fostering responsible, active learners.
Professional Learning
With a focus on evidence-based quality teaching, all teachers are engaged in a comprehensive professional development program which incorporates weekly sessions for all teachers.
Our professional learning is shaped by our long-standing formative practice foundation, FOCUSED, the Australian Institute for Teaching and School Leadership (AITSL) Standards, and our Strategic Plan 2031. Formative practice refers to the process of creating effective teaching and learning. Our model of formative practice sees teachers and learners actively engaged in the construction of their learning, with a focus on data informed decisions, deep thinking and improvement. Teachers draw on a body of international education research about what constitutes the most effective teaching and learning with a focus on ‘how’ they teach and ‘what’ individual learners will need to learn.
Every member of our teaching staff is introduced to our FOCUSED (formative practice) model of learning, a practice that actively engages both staff and learners in their own learning.
This model is designed to develop teacher agility and student agency by continuously improving feedback, ownership, collaboration, understanding students, ubiquitous use of technology, specific learning intentions, experiential learning opportunities and data-informed success criteria.