Gleeson College’s Stage 2 Modern History Class recently engaged in a creative activity with playdough designed to deepen their understanding of World War 1 battles fought along the Western Front.
An approach inspired by the thinking of Dr Gary Stager, an internationally recognised and leading thinker in educational practices was used. Stager asks the question, “Is there less we the teachers can do and more the students can do?” It encourages the design of learning opportunities that require students to take more responsibility for their learning and can mean students engage at a deeper level with concepts and skills because they are architects of their own learning.
So… how did this apply to the Year 12 History Class and World War One’s Western Front? The class spent the afternoon, in small groups, selecting key information from a WW1 battle. They then transposed this onto post-it notes: reading, selecting and note-taking and at the same time developing critical inquiry skills. These notes were then strategically placed onto a piece of A3 card. Onto this card, using playdough and gummy bears to represent soldiers, the students made models of key features of their allocated battle, creating a visual representation of conditions, features and outcomes.
History Teacher, Mrs Kate Pill, said this activity created a supportive learning environment with a production-centred objective and shared purpose. “ However, it didn’t end there! In their next lesson, each group, after reviewing their model, filmed a short instructional video based on their battle. From this, each video was hyperlinked to its respective battle on a map of the Western Front, creating a learning resource and revision tool for the class to which future World War One concepts can be hooked “, she said.
Four Catholic schools across South Australia have been awarded $6.34 million in grants for capital works to improve learning spaces, increase opportunities for disadvantaged students and cater for more diverse learning needs.
The State Government grants — $6.34 million for Catholic schools and $6.38 million for independent schools — are for building projects to commence over the next year.
Introduced in 2018 to ensure all students have access to a first-class education, the latest funding under the scheme has been approved for four projects at Catholic schools and 103 smaller projects at independent schools.
