Please see our School Plan 2024 – 2025 below.
Burnaby South School Goals 2024 – 2025
Goal #1 : Introducing all teaching staff to Universal Designs for Learning strategies.
Team Leader: Ms. Deena Lewis
As we move to more inclusive practices, we are finding that teachers need more understanding of the needs of our neuro-diverse students. We see them struggling to provide adaptations that help these students to access the skills and content of their courses.
We will be beginning this work with our identified neuro-diverse student population, knowing that the UDL approach is one that meets the needs of all learners, so there should be positive outcomes for all students.
We feel that the introduction of UDL practices in our Course Support Classes has helped our LSS students. We would like to now introduce UDL concepts and practices to the teachers in every subject area, as more and more of our neuro-diverse students are integrated into mainstream classes.
Goal #2: To include student voice in our assessment practices to improve student success.
Team Leader: Mr. Daryl Goeson
We believe that improved assessment strategies will lead to improved teaching practices. Research tells us that when teachers design learning opportunities with assessment in mind, learning goals become clearer and more accessible to all learners.
Learning is personal and the more that we make assessment clear and learning goals transparent, the more we can meet the needs of all learners. Consistent feedback with a focus on growth allows students to approach the learning based on their strengths.
The new Ministry Reporting Guidelines for Grades 8-12 reflect the value of Standards-based Assessment for communicating student learning. We believe that students of all grades will receive benefits as teachers, students and parents see the value of these assessment methods and they continue to be applied to older students in grades 10-12. Last year, we introduced a self-assessment and reflection tool for all grade levels and classes. This tool provides students with the ability to analyze their achievement in relation to curricular standards. These reflections took place prior to each formal reporting period and culminated in student-teacher conferences. This year, we intend to provide staff with more professional development on the importance of student voice in assessment.
This is the second year of our focus on student voice, but we also continue to support staff in the implementation of Standards-based Assessment strategies, based on the Ministry of Education’s Performance Standards. We will continue to provide our new and returning staff with professional development on the basics of SBA, including the evolving implementation of strength-based report card comments. Students will benefit from having strength-based comments on the Report Card Comments Guidelines created by the District Joint Assessment Committee and the Ministry Reporting Guidelines.
We will continue to focus on developing the knowledge of and use of Standards-based assessment strategies in grades 8-12 classrooms. We will also continue to develop our Self Reflection document to ensure that it provides a good starting point for conversations about learning between students and their teachers. We will be providing more staff development in the following areas: exploring conferencing models, encouraging student voice in choosing how to show and assess their learning, student goal setting and highlighting student voice in report card comments.