HSPA are currently moving towards a Mastery Learning System for stages 3, 4 and 5. Once in place, this will provide outstanding transparency and 24/7 reporting of student achievement to parents and students.
What is Mastery Learning?
Mastery learning is a way of designing units of work so that each set of tasks focuses on a particular learning objective and students aim to master a process, skill or their understanding of content, before moving on. By monitoring student progress through informal and formal assessments, teachers can provide additional support, enrichment or feedback to students depending on their level of mastery.
Mastery Learning places a much higher emphasis on feedback and levelling up, than on marks or grades. Students are encouraged to regularly review their feedback and current level of mastery, then consider ways they can 'Level Up'. It encourages students to exercise greater agency over their learning journey. HSPA students will earn Digital Badges which indicate their current level of mastery in any outcome for any subject, as well as general capability skills. Teachers will be analysing the auto-generated data and providing students with alternate learning opportunities for areas where they may require further support or extension.
The infographs below provide advice on the HSPA Mastery Process as well as how HSPA students and parents can maximise their learning opportunities.
What does this mean for the HSPA community?
HSPA teachers are aligning syllabus outcomes to activities and/or assessment via rubrics in Canvas. Teachers are able to analyse student proficiency at a granular level as well as from an overview perspective. This data is being used by HSPA teachers to design and differentiate learning opportunities for students.
From term 2 2023, year 7 to 10 students and parents will begin to gain access to their Learner Profiles. This is a dashboard available through Canvas which communicates student Mastery achievement for every outcome of every course (these are referred to as Curriculum outcomes), as well as general capability skills measured across subjects. Skills such as Critical Thinking, Creativity, Communication, Collaboration (these are referred to as Cross Curriculum Outcomes).
The HSPA Canvas based, Learner Profile Dashboard aims to become the primary method for reporting to Y7 parents from mid 2023. This will provide HSPA parents access to their child's learning progress anytime anywhere. As opposed to the current twice per year model.
These achievement levels will be represented by DIGITAL BADGES. Once awarded, badges remain the property of students, for life.
This means badges can be forwarded onto prospective employers when applying for work, or used to gain entry to tertiary education.
Staff from HSPA are currently liaising with industry and tertiary education providers to develop Stage 6 Badges and Credentials which can provide HSPA students access to post school opportunities. This work will become the Mastery Learning Development focus in 2024.
The HSPA Mastery and Badging Site provides comprehensive detail of outcome criteria, enrichment and corrective activities, and a full list of all badges available. This is a constantly evolving resource.
The infographs below provide details of the Mastery Levels as well as how these progress across year groups/Stages.
The video below from Kahn Academy succinctly communicates the benefits of a Mastery Learning approach to education.
