School Profile

I am currently teaching at one of the most academically elite government schools in Perth.  The school has grown to be one of the largest public schools in Western Australia with a student population at present, of over 2300. Many people move into the area solely to be in the school catchment zone. As such, many of the students attending the school come from families which value high academic standards. Many families range from middle to high in terms of their socio-economic status. However, unlike elite private schools, there is a real mixture in terms of socio-economic backgrounds. The school has its fair share of students ‘at risk’ academically and regularly needs to deal with rather severe behavioural issues.

Students with families from, China, Korea, and India have been gradually increasing over the past decade. Many students are under a lot of pressure to achieve high academic standards and the school has created academic extension classes in many subject areas including languages. The language department also created a Year 6 Japanese language extension class that gave selected Year 6 students the chance to start learning Japanese a year early. This class then becomes the Japanese academic extension class and obviously provides them with some advantage if they continue learning Japanese all the way through to year 12.

There is a general culture of excellence at the school and it demands high levels of commitment and professionalism. All teachers are generally expected to put in extra effort giving up their DOTT, lunch breaks and weekends regularly to fulfill extra-curricular commitments such as study classes, interschool Japanese conversation practice days (Kiwa), exchange program activities, recess classes for students with a learning disorder, ATAR examinations, professional learning etc.

Finally, it should be noted that despite these high academic expectations the school does have a significant population of students that are not ATAR bound. The school has in place a very strong VET course as well as a specialist basketball program.

My Classes:

Note: learning a language is compulsory for students in Year 7 through to Year 9.

Japanese - Year 7: 27 Students  75% boys / 80% Asian background  

Most students have no previous knowledge of Japanese from primary school. I have four students with a learning difficulty in this class and another two students who only just joined my class from term 3.  Year 7  this year, are well known as a ‘difficult year’ at the school. The school has analysed this issue and shared the results with all teachers. The analysis stated that ‘Year 7 consists of 60% of boys and half of the students born in last half of the year, hence, high levels of immaturity’. My class has more than 60% of boys and many students have poor organisational skills, poor self-regulation and lack the independent learning skills needed for collaborative learning. This class requires me to maintain high expectations in terms of behavioural management. I have a strict seating plan and  I need to promptly collaborate with parents, the Head of Languages and the Year co-ordinator when issues arise. I also have to allow for high level of differentiation to occur and encourage various students to move through the course material at their own pace. This year I was allocated an Education Assistant (EA) for just two classes a week and I used utilised my EA solely for this class. This also allows me to spend some one on one time with various students.       

Japanese - Year 8 Extension: 26 Students  90% Asian background

All students have strong academic records and they are expected to achieve over 88% in all of their assessments in order to stay in the extension class. When I started to teach this class, I noticed that three students were very lacking in terms of their Japanese proficiency. I discussed this with the Head of Languages and we decided to transfer students to the mainstream class and replaced them with mainstream students that had been performing very well. This is a lovely class full of motivated well-behaving students, however, some students can quickly lose motivation and become bored if I do not provide extra engaging and challenging learning activities. I must be extremely organised and provide prompt feedback to students after formative and summative assessments. I prepare lessons so that most classes will utilise all language modes and include, listening, reading, viewing and speaking activities. By changing modes and activities regularly I keep the class challenging, interactive and engaging for students.

Japanese - ATAR Year 12: 13 Students  92% Asian background

My school has the biggest Japanese ATAR course in the state, 45 students in Year 11 and 33 students in Year 12. The Languages Department has consistently achieved the highest ATAR results in the entire school and hence there is tremendous pressure to maintain this level of achievement. All students are sitting ATAR exams, not only Japanese but other subjects as well.  The average semester 1 & 2 test results in Japanese were well above 75%. Most students are very capable academically. However, I have felt that some of my senior students don’t realise that learning a language requires daily consistent practice. Many students are used to cramming and often get disillusioned when this doesn’t work for Japanese. Part of the issue is that many students are simply studying for the purpose of achieving good ATAR results rather than for the intrinsic value of the subject. Hence, I have found teaching this class rather challenging because not only do I have to put in many hours of extra work marking practice exams etc.. but I am also disciplining students to complete homework and consistently apply themselves in the classroom. I regularly need to contact parents and inform them is when a task has not been submitted.

Conclusion

The school is well resourced, and there is a general culture of excellence throughout. I have been extremely impressed by the high level of professionalism from staff and their commitment to teaching. The classroom dynamics of any particular class can vary greatly. The compulsory language years can indeed be very challenging in terms of motivating students, maintaining high standards of classroom behaviour meeting the high academic standards expected at the school.

Likewise, the students completing the WACE course require many hours of work outside of the class in terms of extra study sessions, detailed written and oral feedback on assessments and tailored one on one conversation practice.

All staff are expected to be “exemplary practitioners committed to creating a balanced, challenging and exciting learning environment to prepare students with resilience and intellectual rigour in a challenging environment” (School Business Plan 2017-2019, p.3).