Primary School - Stonehill

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Primary School

Overview
Stonehill recognises the importance of preserving the innate curiosity of early childhood throughout the primary years. Research shows that children at this life stage can develop a positive attitude to learning if they are given opportunities to use what they already know to make connections and construct new meaning and understanding. The Stonehill curriculum for students aged 6 to 11, provides a framework for the school to build its own, unique curriculum with concept-driven units of inquiry. Traditional academic subjects of mathematics and language arts are taught throughout the primary grades using programmes developed externally and adopted by international schools around the world.

The Stonehill Primary Curriculum
At Stonehill, the primary curriculum is implemented by teaching the traditional subjects of mathematics and language arts using structured curricula selected for their wide acceptance as outstanding programmes in the world of international education.  Mathematics is delivered using the "Everyday Maths" programme developed by the University of Chicago, while language arts utilises the "First Steps" programme developed in Australia.  Specialist teachers take the primary classes for modern languages, Spanish, Mandarin or Hindi and for music and physical education.

The primary classroom teachers are responsible for the stand alone curriculum in mathematics and language arts and for developing and delivering the six units of inquiry. These integrate social studies, science, personal/ social development and the arts in six transdisciplinary units which at each grade level address the following big questions:

    * Who we are
    * Where are we in place and time
    * How we express ourselves
    * How the world works
    * How we organise ourselves
    * Sharing the planet

Each year, a guiding question from each of these six themes is selected and used by the teacher to direct all students to inquire into issues related to the guiding question. These inquiries are developed on site, according to a set planning framework, thereby allowing themes of local and global relevance to be incorporated, leveraging the particular expertise of teacher and specialist delivering the units. The spiralling set of units that develop the six themes from year to year make up what is known as the Stonehill Programme of Inquiry. This programme is reviewed by Stonehill to ensure that the units cover the scope and sequence of topics of the six traditional disciplines: language, mathematics, science, social studies, arts and personal and social development.

Assessment
Assessment is an important part of each unit of inquiry and integral to the development of a new unit. It is the first thing planned by the team (comprising teachers from the grade level, a specialist(s) and a teacher(s) from a different grade level) after the guiding question for the unit is determined. Assessment tasks allow students to demonstrate understanding of the unit and show the use of skills and concepts appropriate to the subject areas covered.

At the end of each unit, time is given for reflection and for the teacher to give feedback to the student, so that a student can become more competent and develop a better understanding of what is needed to improve their learning.