Prairiewood+High+School

Curriculum Review School Visit Questions
What is the timetable structure in terms of: Period length 6 @ 50minutes Variable weeks Yes Week A and B Variable days No How many lines 6 Before and after school lessons Not timteabled. Negotiated with staff for extension subjects

Do you use a computer program for timetabling? If so what program and what would you say are the benefits and disadvantages?How does the process work? Yes Edval. Love it! Makes timetabling a lot more simple. Some manual manipulation still required

How many hours do core subjects get in junior school? English, Maths ,Science and HSIE all get above BOS hours. In last few years decision made to give HSIE significantly more hours (160 hours in Stage 5 instead of 100), School Certificate results have improved dramatically

How many electives are offered in junior school and how many can each student do?How long do they study each elective – eg. 100/200hrs Students do 2 electives. Only offer 200 hour courses

Are other subjects offered beyond the core in the junior school? E.g Literacy, learning unit, careers? No

How is your languages program organised? 100 hours of French in Year 7, 100 hours of Italian in Year 8 then students can chooose elective in Year 9 and 10. The 200 hours in Year 7 and 8 is 100 hours more than BOS requirements

How is sport organised? There is no grade sport in the zone. Sport is integrated which means each year group partipates in in-house sport competitions of traditional sports like soccer, basketball etc. There is no rec sport except for Year 11 who do rec sport not in-house sport.

How do you deliver careers?Eg. time allocated, year group? Year 10 one period per fortnight. Taught by careeers teacher. Classes are allocatted to careers from different KLAs to spread the load.

How many senior subjects are offered?What subjects are offered?Eg.Combinations of VET, Board endorsed, Board developed? Many subjects offered. Many students do TAFE on Mon or Fri afternoons. Is the senior timetable organised differently to junior school? E.g Different number of lines, start and finish times etc. No but timetabled organised so that seniors with free periods are in the morning or afternoon as much as possible.

Have you considered / are you making changes to offerings in the senior school because of the new school leaving age? Yes offerring non-ATAR English and Maths.

How do you timetable activities such as: assemblies, scripture, pastoral care/welfare programs? Monday periods are shortened for 20 minute assembly. Scripture is done in blocks - similar to Concord. No timetabled welfare programs some individual programs for at risk students. Year 7 are streamed into a low-ability/IM class and another class that is identified as having students that will have difficulty transitioning to high school - these classes kept small and the the difficult class has less teachers (teach across KLAs) and maximum amount of head teachers possible.

What are the benefits and limitations of your timetable structure? Everyone copes with 2 week cycle. Can be difficult with timetabling part-time staff

Have you had other timetables in the past – How does this compare? Moved from 8 40minute periods about 10 years ago. This structure much better.

How easily can you accommodate wishes of different faculties? E.g longer periods for prac lessons, shorter for other areas. Able to accommodate most faculties wishes. Eg no double periods for junior core subjects. Doubles for electives, PE etc. Seniors must have 1 double per cycle in order to give juniors a double in electives

What sort of feedback have you received from different areas of the school about the timetable? No formal feedback but anecdotal staff very happy.