School Self-Evaluation Report
Zeerust Primary School
North East Victoria Region
School number:
4359
Principal:
Dr. Peter Farrell
School Council President:
Mr. Ken Makin
Dates of School Strategic Plan being evaluated
[2011 to 2014]
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Contents
1.
Context ....................................................................................................................................................................... 3
Introduction ................................................................................................................................................................... 3
Staff structures .............................................................................................................................................................. 3
Regional support............................................................................................................................................................ 3
2.
Methodology .............................................................................................................................................................. 4
3.
Evaluation of practice................................................................................................................................................. 5
What do we teach?........................................................................................................................................................ 5
How do we teach? ......................................................................................................................................................... 5
How do we know our students are learning ................................................................................................................. 6
How do we provide feedback to our students and families on learning progress? ...................................................... 6
4.
Evaluation of performance......................................................................................................................................... 7
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1. Context
Introduction
Zeerust Primary School, no 4359, started life back in 1928 as a result of community action. At that time it served a
rural farming community. In 2010 the number of students from farms was a tiny proportion of the children attending
the school because, for the most part, the children either came from a large local estate or from Shepparton itself;
while some families were working in town and renting local farmhouses. At the time of writing, 2014, we have no
farm-kids at all, and are attracting more kids from Shepparton and more recently, Wunghnu, a small village about 10
minutes away.
Staff structures
With few exceptions the school has been remarkable stable in respect to its staffing for a very long time. The current
staff are the same ones who helped to developed the 2011-2014 strategic plan and any variations in effective
fulltime teaching staff have mostly affected the operation of the junior class. In 2011 the school operated as a single
classroom with 1.5 teachers team-teaching the entire school and it was during this time that the teaching staff,
meeting each fortnight, began operating as a professional learning team; we worked slowly through the ‘e5 beige
book’. We had 15 students.
For 2012 we returned to a two-class model again with 1.5 teachers. The fractional teacher taught five days a week
for half a day only; she was a reading recovery teacher for the other half of each day. There were 17 students
enrolled in the school. Partway through the year, the CTTs (Classroom Teaching Techniques) was introduced by
Hume Region and we switched to this from e5 (a teaching and learning approach being promoted by the
department). Semester 1 2012 was very significant because the school was flooded, and for six weeks, we operated
out of one crowded classroom at a neighbouring school.
In 2013 the two-class model continued but this time the junior room was operating 0.8 of the time. We had 23
students and, by using contingency funds, reached almost 1:1 student to computer ratios; half of these were laptops.
The PLT continued to be strongly motivated by the CTT, using the audit tool to direct where our next piece of
professional learning should be.
In 2014 the school returned to 1.5 teachers and this time the junior room operates 2.5 days a week. There are 16
students currently at the school, one of which is D&I funded. The junior room teacher is locally funded for 0.5 of a
day to develop resources and teaching approaches to support this student. The PLT still meets fortnightly for
professional learning but the focus has been on working through the new P&D process. The staff have also formed a
curriculum committee which meets weekly and its first major piece of work was to create the Zeerust Curriculum
Folder where our approach to implementing AusVELS is documented. During term 1 the principal was on long service
leave and the classroom teacher was promoted to fulltime acting-principal. A 0.5 classroom teacher was engaged to
work in the senior class.
Regional support
During the life of this strategic plan there has been a change in government and a change in the approach to
providing support to schools. Early in the piece the school came under the direction of a regional network leader
(RNL) who worked closely with us and seven other small rural schools around Shepparton on common problems of
practice. More recently the regional office structure has been dismantled and subsequently there has been a
decoupling of the relationship and level of support. Replacing the RNL we now have a senior advisor, regional
performance and planning, whose task is quite different being more about accountability than supporting schools.
There is a sense that, as a very small school, we really are on our own now.
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2. Methodology
The first step in our journey was for the principal to attend regional briefing sessions and gain an overall
understanding of the new peer-review process. The next step was to examine the attributes and characteristics of all
the approved peer review providers and undertake a selection process. From an initial invitation to four companies,
three respondents were compared, and a choice was made. Gary Campbell of Cambridge Consulting Services made
early contact with the school and a date was set for the review in term 4.
With a timeline now in place, during the mid-year break, the principal began the process of aggregating the indices
identified in the 2011-2014 strategic plan, these included student learning outcome measures around the proportion
of students achieving above and below the expected level; a C in literacy and numeracy, and how these compared to
our targets. Semester–based data was used from Semester 1 2010 to Semester 1 2014. We also measured our
NAPLAN growth measures for those students who had been with the school for the entire life of the strategic plan.
Along with attendance data, specific measures in the parent opinion survey and/or the student attitude to school
survey were included in the student wellbeing domain. From the parents these were, Stimulating Learning,
Reporting, Homework and Connectedness to School, and from the students, Stimulating Learning and Learning
Confidence. Measures about our transitions domain came from the parent opinion survey and included, Transitions
and General Satisfaction data. These data sets covered 2011-2014 inclusive.
For the self-evaluation, the majority of the data has been presented in graph format, with the idea that a picture
saves a thousand words. Included in the graphs were the targets set for that measure in our 2011-2014 strategic
plan; no attempt has been made to compare Zeerust Primary School with other schools. As the self-evaluation
reached a draft format, the teacher was brought in to critique what had been done so far and to assist in the
preparation of an initial presentation to school council about what was going on.
For his own analysis the reviewer, Gary Campbell, has requested: This Self-evaluation; our Terms of Reference; the
2014 NAPLAN reports (including five-year trend data and relative growth); the School Summary Report; our AusVELS
teacher judgements for 2012 and 2013; the Government School Performance Report (aka, the threshold document);
the last Strategic plan; the School Details report (which has the SFO and staffing profile), the student and parent
opinion surveys for 2013; our attendance data for the period 2011 to 2103; the last Annual report, and any other
data /information thought relevant.
Other sources of data generated for this review include the responses to a request, made by SMS text to the school
community, for feedback, in writing (SMS or email), about the following: 1) What are the good things about ZPS?
and, 2) What improvements could be made to ZPS? This feedback was reviewed and aggregated into themes by
classroom teacher, Glenda Telford; who has been invited to be a part of the review panel. I have requested a parent
from school council to be involved but, at the time of writing, this person is not yet known.
The two peer-principals to be involved with our process were finalised at the end of Term 3 and Susan Olley, of
Waaia-Yalca South PS will be assisting with numeracy and David Farrell of Underra PS will be supporting us around
literacy. Appropriate documents and data-sets were provided to the two peers before the meeting of the review
panel.
On the day of the review it is intended to look for the headlines implicit in the data sets and use these to celebrate
success, acknowledge weaknesses, and inform the writing of the strategic plan for 2015-2018.
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3. Evaluation of practice
What do we teach?
At the beginning of this strategic plan the school was reliant on the ‘Six Rs’; these were reading, writing, ‘rithmatic,
researching, retelling and reasoning and are described in detail in a PDF book entitled, ‘Tips, Tricks and Pedagogy for
the Multi-level Classroom’ which is available via our school website at:
http://www.zeerustps.vic.edu.au/page/59/By-Dr.-Farrell. The SixRs was not very concerned with departmental
curriculum documents. It was more about what was good to do, and was doable, in a multi-level learning
environment. With the rollout of the new national curriculum the school needed to revise its approach, especially for
middle-years students (grade 5-9), and came up with 6WOT (Six Ways of Thinking). It is described in detail in a PDF
book called, ‘Curriculum Advice for Generalist Teachers in Very Small Schools’ which is accessible via the school
website. Both books are about teaching and learning in a very small school and there are overlapping ideas between
the two with respect to literacy and numeracy. The SixRs includes the well known 3Rs of reading, writing and
‘rithmatic, while the 6WOT included ‘thinking with language’ and ‘thinking mathematically’. The 4WOT covering
integrated topics are:




Situated thinking covers Health & PE; home economics; and financial literacy. It is about practical, personal
and purposeful learning concerning the individual irrespective of what ‘job’ they might have. It is about
personal agency.
Thinking aesthetically covers the visual and performing arts; design, construction & technology; information
& communication technology. It is about the appreciation of and for, an idea, process and product.
Thinking scientifically covers biology, chemistry and physics and it is about following scientific method and
doing experiments.
Thinking systematically covers civics & citizenship (mandated) and combines this, in turn, with economics,
environmental studies, or geography. It is about big picture thinking. It is concerned with the planet and the
people on it.
The junior class, with less comprehensive assessment and reporting requirements, is able to continue with the SixRs
approach which are, researching, retelling and reasoning.
How do we teach?
In order to accommodate the national curriculum we have grouped LOTE, ESL and history, along with English, under
the general heading of ‘thinking with language’. Time spent on learning languages like Japanese (with a teacher), and
French (on-line) are added to the time spent on literacy. ESL, is yet to come up at Zeerust, but our research suggests
it encourages a greater use of speaking & listening in a classroom than what might be considered normal; it is tallied
along-side thinking with language. History has been a difficult subject to deliver at Zeerust especially as a stand-alone
topic. By combining literacy skills with the specifics of historical research we can now use history to provide variety in
literacy.
On the three days when both classrooms are in operation literacy is usually taught in a 90-minute block before
recess. Reading is part of every session in every classroom. Big books, readers and running records feature in the F-2
class while the senior students will share something small and quickly read with each other. Writing is tackled
differently where the juniors will usually be writing every session the senior class might only visit writing every other
week, but the writing may take at least two to three sessions to complete. Senior students are expected to have in
train an extended piece of personal writing (500-3500 words), and they are expected to have a personal reading
novel ‘on-the-go’. If it is a week where the focus is on reading in the senior class then there will be a focus on one or
two pieces of text as a literacy circle with the teacher modelling one of the roles in the circle to the students.
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When there is just one teacher working with the whole school then spelling workbooks, multi-level reading
comprehension cards, and the on-line Reading Eggs are a feature of that day. All can be delivered simultaneously and
the students work at their ability level rather than their grade level. Thinking with language also happens during the
three 20-30 singing sessions, which involves the entire school; new songs are learnt by reading the lyrics projected
on a screen. Younger students are put in charge of scrolling.
Numeracy at Zeerust, be it ‘rithmatic or thinking mathematically, has heavily relied upon Mathletics to deliver an online course of learning to all our students. A unique part of our approach is to let the children progress at their own
rate, promoting them to the next level as soon as the previous one is complete. Teachers and other students act as
tutors but we do not only do this. In the senior class we have adopted a deficit model of teaching, with the regular
use of on-demand tests used to identify conceptual weaknesses in the group. In the junior class, another assessment
tool, called the Number Fluency Assessment (NFA), identifies conceptual weaknesses and strengths around number
which are then addressed by the teacher and specifically taught.
Integrated topics is the great catch-all which covers a wide variety of KLA. Early in the life of the 2011-2014 Strategic
Plan we relied upon, ‘researching, retelling and reasoning’ to do topics that were interesting to do and doable in our
context. It was and is a pedagogical document and the idea still stands up as far as the junior class is concerned
because there are less onerous reporting requirements. This is not so in the senior class where the number of
subjects to be reported upon is dramatically larger. We have also seen the introduction of the new national
curriculum and so, in fairness to students, it was necessary to identify a way in which that the curriculum could be
delivered so that Zeerrust students were not disadvantaged; that way was the 6WOT. A methodology underpinning
how we teach integrated topics is enquiry-based learning where the students identify the big questions to answered
by their investigation.
How do we know our students are learning
In June and November the teaching staff and students become concerned with testing because it is with testing that
we can measure student growth and teaching effectiveness. Plotting our students against standardised tests is very
helpful. In literacy we like to triangulate data thus a teacher judgement for reading might come from ODT-Reading,
Scholastic Lexile, BURT, Running Records, Letter-sound relations, depending on where a student is at some tests are
better than others. In writing we use the NAPLAN marking rubric, ODT-spelling, SAST, punctuation & grammar
analysis; and a 10-minute writing test. For numeracy we use ODT-number & algebra; ODT-measurement & geometry;
NFA; Mathletics coursework for statistics and data. We also make sure every senior student, and capable grade 2s,
participates in NAPLAN and we do mark every paper ourselves.
We measure effect sizes as often as we are able looking for teaching approaches which deliver above the 0.4 hinge
point identified by Professor John Hattie as what a competent teacher delivering a standard unit of work would
achieve.
How do we provide feedback to our students and families on learning progress?
Twice a year at the end of each semester school reports are written for each student and parents are invited to
arrange an interview with the class teacher. The process is fairly informal because parents are welcome to discuss
the progress of their child with us at any time, and teaching staff will instigate conversations with parents at any time
too. We have a student goal board in the foyer of our school where all students are expected to identify areas they
wish to improve upon. Many of these targets are SMART and relate to standardised test results; we recently
incorporated these personal goals into individual learning plans for each child. As the students achieve their goals we
record the event as an image for subsequent publication in the school newsletter. As many students undertake the
same standardised tests each semester we are able to provide feedback to the students on the standard achieved
and the progress made from last time; it is the latter measure which feeds into the effect size discussed earlier.
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4. Evaluation of performance
Achievement
Achievement refers
to both the absolute
levels of learning
attainment and
growth in student
learning that schools
strive to support.
While recognising
that literacy and
numeracy are
essential foundations
for students’ success,
achievement
outcomes encompass
a broader view of
learning, spanning
the full range of
curriculum domains,
as well as students’
co-curricular
achievements.
What did we set out to
achieve?
An increase in the percentage of
students assessed as above
VELS expected levels and a
decrease in the percentage
assessed as below the expected
levels by 2014 in teacher
judgments, as below:
A/B (%) D/E
Reading
60
5
Writing
55
10
Speak/Listening
50
5
Number
55
5
Measurement
40
5
75% of grade 1-6 students to
increase their own VELS level by
at least 1.0 over a two year period
What did we achieve?
Reading
With the exception of semester 1
2013 we always achieved our
above-expected level target for
reading and, except for semester
2 2012, our tail was always larger
than our goal.
What factors supported or
inhibited our success?
Non-transitioning students
Strong academically inclined
students, present for the whole
of the strategic plan, can pull
the results of a small school up
and keep them there. Let’s look
at the average performance of
our grade 6 students who have
remained in the school for the
entire time of the strategic plan.
Writing
The target of 55% of our students
being above the expected level
for reading has proved to be an
ambitious target and for the two
reporting periods of 2011-2 and
2012-1 a relatively large
proportion of students were not
reaching our targets. The tail was
long and the number of high
achievers was relatively small.
Coincidently, 2012-1 was the time
The above graph compares the
average reading scores against
the expected scores. It shows
that not only did these students
remain well above the level
expected they also improved by
4.5 AusVELS levels too. Reading
in the senior class was strongly
embedded in the ‘literacy
circles’ methodology.
The next chart shows the
average scores of the same
group in writing. It shows the
same dip as that seen in the
overall by semester results for
Where might we focus future
effort?
Very Small Data Sets
Where one student can represent
up to 6% of our data a single
student can cause our results to
fluctuate considerably.
Nuanced data
Collect data sets – that
differentiates between
transitional and non-transitioning
students.
Transition and integration
Develop a more rigorous process
to establish where new students
transition into the school are by
either:
 Doing our own testing
 Actively seeking test
results from the previous
school
Writing assessment
Develop a more comprehensive
and rigorous internal assessment
of writing where we triangulate
writing data from:
 Spelling
 Punctuation & grammar
 Authorial writing
If we are going to test it then we
need to teach it. A very recent
development is the
implementation of a school-wide
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that the school was closed for six
weeks due to flooding.
By the end of 2012 the writing
result had been turned around
with a greater focus on modelled,
shared and guided writing of
procedural texts, dictated
sentences, and ensuring their
own projects had an end in mind.
the whole school. Something
happened in this semester
which cannot be attributed to
transitioning students, the then
grade 5s, a relatively large
group failed in writing across
four data sets.
action research project, by the
principal, on punctuation &
grammar.
Students at risk
All students need to have
individual learning plans.
Students at risk may need to
become the subject of an action
plan either singularly or as part of
group.
Speaking & Listening
Things that absolutely work
Continue with literacy circles and
Mathletics.
The general trend for speaking &
listening has been upward as far
as the number of students doing
better than expected is
concerned. What is interesting
here is that the semester 2
results are less than that
recorded in semester 1 of the
same year. For a large number of
reporting periods the tail has
been zero.
Number
For numeracy the upper-end
target of 55% was ambitious
when first set but has since
proved to be achievable for most
of the life of the strategic plan.
The following semester saw a
shift in focus to more structured
writing genre, as well as the
idea of writing with the end in
mind when writing fiction.
2014-1 also shows a dip and this
might be correlated with the
restructuring of the school
during term 1 when the
principal was on long-service
leave.
The chart below shows the
same students’ data for ODT
number tests. The school has
embraced Mathletics an on-line
provider of coursework to the
point where students are
progressed up to the next
course just as soon as they
finish the previous one. Regular
testing using the ODTs for
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number & algebra and
measurement & geometry
identifies conceptual
weaknesses in the class and just
these areas are taught.
There has been a nice lift and
coinciding fall in the over and
under achieving students in the
most recent reporting period.
Measurement
It is noteworthy that
measurement ‘measures’ once
included chance & data which has
since become a separate domain,
while geometry has now been
combined with measurement. Of
all the measures this has seen the
greatest gains in students
achieving greater than expected
results while the tail has
remained relatively consistent.
On the other hand there are
non-transitioning students at
the school who are at risk in a
particular learning area who,
while making progress, will
always sit on the back of the
bell curve. The hard task is to
get them from an E to a D.
Personalised learning
A major advantage for our
school is that we can design
instruction that suits the needs
of particular students. For
example one recent graduate
was extremely weak in reading
and writing and to meet that
student’s needs we reduced the
writing load for the whole class,
Relative growth NAPLAN
Looking now at the next graph we increased the speaking &
can see that with the exception of listening component, and read
texts that were of particular
spelling and punctuation our
grade fives have for the most part interest to that student. On the
progressed at the medium rate in last report that student
measured a D for reading.
all the areas measured by
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NAPLAN. The other exceptions
are to be found in reading and
spelling (1 student), and
numeracy and grammar &
punctuation (2 students).
Transitioning Students
Looking at our data for the
period of the last plan, with one
single exception, nearly all
students transitioning into
Zeerust are generally weak
across the key learning areas or
have a specific weakness. And
so, without any chance to ‘make
a difference’ to these students,
they pull the overall grades of
the school down.
Effect Sizes for the 2013 grade 5s
from grade 3 were:
1.36 – Grammar & punctuation;
1.25 – Reading;
0.94 – Spelling;
Other curriculum areas
One advantage for Zeerust PS is
in how other learning areas can
be combined with literacy and
numeracy. For example, DC&T
generates lots of speaking &
listening events, and it relates to
procedural reading and writing.
Naturally, measurement and
other mathematical concepts are
tried and tested on an actual
project. Science produces
numerical data and generates
tables and graphs. A science
report is a specific kind of
procedural text with research as
well as the here and now.
Historical research and writing
essays are clearly linked.
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Engagement
Engagement refers to
the extent to which
students feel
connected to and
engaged in their
learning and with the
broader school
community.
Engagement spans
students’ motivation
to learn, as well as
their active
involvement in
learning.
Engagement also
refers to students
engagement as they
make critical
transitions through
school and beyond
into further
education and work.
What did we set out to
achieve?
Each student to maintain a 97%
attendance rate (maximum of 6
days absence/year)
In the Parent Opinion Survey,
improve the mean to at least 6.20
for Stimulating Learning, 5.90 for
Reporting, 5.65 for Homework and
6.25 for Connectedness to
School.
What did we achieve?
What factors supported or
inhibited our success?
Parent opinion survey
A number of indices were selected to
track our progress in this area back
when this strategic plan was
formulated. Some proved more
useful than others and were referred
to in each annual report. Others fell
out of favour.
Parent turnover and participation
With just a small number of
families involved with our school
parent turnover at our school can
be quite high, and when parents
don’t participate that means a
significant portion of the
community has not been heard.
Self-promotion
There appears to be a disconnect
between what the senior students
say and what the parents think. I
think the school has to get better at
‘blowing its own trumpet’ and not
just to the parents but to all the
students too.
In 2011 7 out of 10 parents
completed a survey.
Reporting
We need better processes for
communicating/reporting with/to
parents.
In 2012 8 out of 9 parents
completed a survey.
In the Attitudes to School Survey,
improve the mean to at least 4.7
for Stimulating Learning and 4.5
for Learning Confidence.
In 2013 10 out of 12 parents
completed a survey.
The above graph indicates a dip of
0.2 for 2013 from a very high start.
This index was reported to the
community annually as was the one
below; in 2014, parents were once
again, back on side. The data
suggests our target of 6.20 was too
modest.
In 2014 7 out of 8 completed the
survey.
Where might we focus future
effort?
Management of ‘awkward’ students
Awkwardness attributed to
misbehaviour or specific learning
needs need careful management if
they are not to hijack the culture.
It is interesting to note the
disparity of opinion about whether
the school offers a stimulating
learning environment. The parents
say we are reaching our target
while the students, the grade 5/6s
anyway, say we are not.
With respect to the reporting
measure - I think we have made
too many assumptions that we
were well connected ‘in passing’ on
this issue.
6.25 proved to be an ambitious
target for the school. From 2012 the
data suggests that parents think that
their child is not looking forward to
school quite as much as they have in
There are two dips in the
stimulating learning data as
reported by senior students and I
have a theory that the senior class
has been hijacked by individuals, in
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the past.
The next measures were identified in
the strategic plan as indices to be
watched but they were never
included in the annual reports that
followed.
one case, it was misbehaviour, and
in the other extreme
accommodation of that student’s
learning at the expense of the
other students being ‘stimulated’.
The reporting goal of 5.90 has
proved to be an ambitious target for
the school and in 2013 we were
trending the wrong way. Changes
were made for 2014 and they appear
to have been effective.
The graph looks dramatic but the
difference between 2011 and 2013 is
0.3. Homework is seen as voluntary
at Zeerust and the target was set at
5.63. The same homework process is
in place in 2014 as in 2013 and the
parent response is much more
positive. We have no homework
policy.
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Student opinion data
Turning now to student-generated
data there were two indices selected
and these were always included in
annual reports to the community.
For stimulating learning we set a
target of 4.7. The dip in 2012 can be
attributed to a single student, who
left before the end of the year, who
cast a pall over what could be done
at the school. 2014 data.
4.5 proved to be a reasonable target
for the school. Sometimes we
achieved and sometimes we did not.
By 2013 it was possible to focus on
educating rather than managing the
class. 2014 might indicate
transitioning student with low
confidence.
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Wellbeing
Students’ health,
safety and
wellbeing are
essential to
learning and
development. An
inclusive, safe,
orderly and
stimulating
environment for
learning is critical
to achieving and
sustaining students’
positive learning
experiences.
What did we set out to
achieve?
The Parent Opinion Survey
mean be at least 5.85 for
Transitions and 6.20 for
General Satisfaction
What did we achieve?
Parent opinion survey
Our transition process is quite
personalised both into and out of
the school.
What factors supported or
inhibited our success?
The comments made above
about parent turnover and
volatile data-sets still stand.
It should be noted that the
transition process here refers to
foundation students joining the
school and grade 6s graduating
from the school.
Where might we focus future
effort?
As stated above. We need better
and more nuanced processes to
better integrate those students
who join the school after
foundation.
With respect to this domain we
need to identify what it is we are
doing well – and keep doing it!
After a very good result in 2011
general satisfaction fell back to
being just above our target for
the subsequent two years. Then
satisfaction went up again.
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