Junior Journeys

Developing a place to belong

By Kellie Osborn Email this article

Connections, engagement, and real world experiences to amplify learning.

One of our main objectives is striving for all members in our community to feel a sense of belonging. This is an ongoing process, and one we take pride in undertaking. Instilling a sense of belonging, and fostering an ongoing feeling of hope and personal value, directly influences how we feel about ourselves and others, how we interact with others, and how we engage and interact with the environment. Research reveals that achieving a sense of belonging to a school environment is an established protective factor for children, favourably influencing adolescent health, education, and social wellbeing.

Belonging is something that we focus on each day in the Junior School. Our students regularly show ways in which they accept each other and enable others to flourish. This term as one of our focus areas, Student Leaders in the Junior School will be considering the many ways we already foster belonging and connectedness, and ways we can further develop this within our Junior School.

There are some wonderful examples of how this occurs daily in the classroom and the yard. Over the next two weeks, there will be opportunities for our Reception and Year 5 buddies to connect for some fitness, and our Year 12 buddies to engage with our Receptions, Year 1 and Year 2 students in the lunchtime Junior School Craft Club. We want to shine a light on these as well as promote some new opportunities for students.

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Connecting with your child’s classroom learning through Seesaw
Through Seesaw in the Junior School, families can see student learning and be engaged with the activities of our learning environment. Seesaw posts, samples of student learning and assessment are an integral part of our communication and reporting processes.

We live in exciting and challenging times. Our united goal, both as parents and educators, is to best prepare our children for their future. We know that our young students will need collaboration skills, creativity, and the ability to solve problems and deconstruct and construct information, based on growing understanding of how the brain works and how the world works.

So much of life is also dependent on emotional intelligence, and it is paramount that we pay attention to our children’s development of resilience and grit. Recently, whilst leading a College Tour, I paused to have a conversation with students during NAPLAN week. I was impressed by how our Year 3 and Year 5 students managed the challenge, testing conditions and assessments. Their encouraging words towards each other, the calm and measured manner with which they approached these days and the focus and determination they demonstrated were a credit to them.

Recently, we have had some Senior School students completing community service in our Junior School. Each of these students approached this opportunity with great enthusiasm and a genuine interest in being supportive and of service. In speaking to these students, it is clear that they ae making the most of this learning experience and looking for the opportunities when life doesn’t go as planned. Conversations with, and observations of them, provide a reminder of the fact that we develop students who are not only academically successful, but also creative, resilient, strong, and grounded.

We believe in growing our students to be successful in all areas of life. I encourage you to spend time with your children in considering the PYP Learner Profile attributes. These are powerful and life-building components of learning at Mercedes College.

We are a Junior School that believes strongly in the constructivist theories of learning. We believe that children learn best through experience and reflection on experience. We want you to sense the excitement and know the learning that your child is engaged in. We are developing learners, not for the world which we were educated for, but for the changing world in which they are and will be living.

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Year 4 Service Learning at Brownhill Creek
This year our Year 4 classes are visting the local Mitcham area inlcuding Brownhill Creek, Mitcham Reserve, and Carrick Hill fortnightly. This experience is giving them opportunities to develop and enhance their learning experiences from within the classroom. The activities give students an opportunity to apply their learning in a setting that adds meaning and purpose to the curriculum outcomes developed in the classroom through their Units of Inquiry. Each week the activities they undertake shift focus. Examples include planting trees, pulling weeds, cleaning litter, and making environmental observations. Thank you to our wonderful Year 4 parent volunteers who joined classes for their first walk last Wednesday. We look forward to hearing more about our students’ experience of this in the coming months. 

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Kellie Osborn
Head of Junior School