Curriculum
Living Faith has a consistent approach to curriculum to ensure that all students experience a seamless transition as they move through the year levels.
The Living Faith has a contemporary, student-focused approach to curriculum and teaching. This means that our curriculum is designed to foster student engagement and develop key skills to help students thrive in the 21st century. We are dedicated to our educational philosophy and have designed our approach based on the latest educational neuroscience, child psychology and academic research.
We teach a wide range of subject areas from Prep to Year 6, taught by both classroom and specialist teachers.
Daily 5 is a literacy framework that instils behaviours of independence and creates a classroom of highly engaged readers, writers and learners. Daily 5 provides teachers with time and structure to meet the diverse needs of students by tailoring individualised learning goals and strategies for each student. Our students participate in activities and direct teaching instruction related to reading and comprehension, phonics and phonological awareness, spelling and vocabulary within Daily 5.
The Daily 5 activities are:
- Read to self
- Read to others
- Listen to reading
- Word work (spelling, phonics, grammar)
- Work on writing
Students also participate in weekly Writer’s Workshops sessions. They are explicitly taught how to creatively write a range of different types of texts such as recounts, narratives, information reports and persuasive texts. Students also participate in explicit lessons in punctuation, handwriting and grammar that teach them the structural rules governing the composition of clauses, phrases and words in the English language.
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Mindset Maths is an approach to Maths teaching and learning derived from the work of Professor Jo Boaler from Stanford University.
The three key ideas around Mindset Maths are:
- Anyone can learn Maths to high levels
- Mistakes and struggles are good for brain growth and brain strengthening
- Visual mathematics helps brain connections and is important for students’ learning of mathematics
Living Faith has developed a Maths program that combines Mindset Maths and project-based learning within an Australian Curriculum context. Our students are explicitly taught problem-solving strategies and Maths content through interesting projects that combine Maths with Science, Digital and Design Technology. Students experience number talks designed to develop their number sense and number facts.
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Project-based learning (PBL) is a student-centred approach to learning that integrates several subject areas into meaningful real-world projects. Over the semester students plan, investigate, prototype and produce a product or presentation that answers a big question or responds to an authentic challenge. Teachers serve as facilitators providing strategic instruction, scaffolding and guidance. At Living Faith, our students develop knowledge and skills in subjects such as History, Geography, Science, Economics and Business, the Arts and Civics and Citizenship through semester-long PBL units. These subjects are combined through an extensive school-wide scope and sequence that ensures that the Australian Curriculum is addressed in all areas. A sample of our PBL units can be found below.
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End of semester Exhibition Evenings showcase student products created during Project-Based Learning (PBL), and their learning processes to authentic audiences. Families and community members come into school to not only see their own children’s presentations but the presentations of other students across the school. Products range from manufactured goods such as sustainable coffee cups designed to raise funds and begin a conversation about rainforest conservation, to prototypes of recycling systems. As our most successful biannual community event, these evenings:
- showcase the inspiring work of our students
- enable our students to develop their confidence and presentation skills
- provide an opportunity for families and carers to role model their love of learning and curiosity
- demonstrate to our community our beliefs about learning in a consistent and powerful way
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Christian Studies is a fundamental learning area at Living Faith with allocated time provided in the weekly program at all year levels. In Christian Studies students learn about the Christian faith through a Project-Based Learning (PBL) approach that enables them to explore their beliefs, pose questions, deeply investigate areas of interest, and understand how the Bible is lived out in modern-day society.
Teaching is based on the beliefs of the Lutheran Church and recognises that children come to the school from a diverse range of Christian or other religious backgrounds. Christian faith is not judged nor assessed at Living Faith. In Christian Studies students engage in service-learning projects that challenge them to grow as caring, responsible citizens who can recognise and respond to the needs of others and the needs of our planet.
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Service-Learning at Living Faith
Learning an additional language helps prepare students for their place in a global community. In the lower year levels, students learn language and culture through play. They engage in games, songs and dances to learn numbers, colours and greetings. In the upper grades, students learn language concepts through a project-based learning approach. They are immersed in a rich array of cultural experiences such as calligraphy, cuisine, dance, music, literature and games.
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Performing Arts incorporates Dance, Music, Media Arts and Dramas into one exciting subject.
Performing Arts aligns with many classroom PBL projects in order to link content and further deepen student understanding whilst catering for the performance, reflection and design foundations of the Performing Arts curriculum.
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All students participate in skill-based Health and Physical Education lessons. These lessons endeavour to develop within students not only physical skills but social and emotional skills also. The sporting opportunities at Living Faith are enhanced by a 300-metre running track, tennis courts, cricket nets and a multi-purpose indoor Sports Centre.
Art and Design combine all the creativity and limitless vision of visual and media arts along with the inventive logic and engineering components of design, tech and science. This subject helps cultivate some of the Living Faith Contemporary Competencies such as initiative, decision making, collaboration, systems thinking, communication, service, innovation and creativity. Henri Matisse said that 'creativity takes courage' and we hope to foster in our students the courage to take risks, think outside the box and let their imaginations guide them.
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