Student welfare

‘There can be no more important time to reflect on teachers, their performance and their wellbeing than following the pandemic’s disruption to normal schooling.’ In today’s reader submission, Professor Jenny Gore says in addition to helping students, there must also be a focus on helping teachers recover.

In this series, we take a look at some further readings available on a particular topic, including open access research papers from various online databases. In this edition, the focus is on student resilience.

What would happen if you listened to your staff and students about what their reality is like, and then wrote a school-wide wellbeing framework and curriculum that responded specifically to their needs? At Indie School Elizabeth in South Australia, a targeted approach to addressing the complex wellbeing needs of students led to a brave reimagining of staff wellbeing strategies and processes.

Data show young people in Australia are becoming increasingly concerned about equity and discrimination, particularly on the topic of gender. Here, we share five resources which relate to gender issues including equity and identity.

Music Teacher and Deputy Principal Sarah Donnelley was named winner of the Telstra ARIA Music Teacher Award last term for the impact she has had on students at Wilcannia Central School through her use of music as a tool for engagement, and her creativity during periods of remote teaching and learning.

How can teachers go about identifying the underlying causes of a student’s behaviour, and then approach responding to this behaviour in a respectful and effective way? To dissect these questions, we’re joined by Dr Erin Leif and Russell Fox from Monash University.

Data consistently shows that students are dealing with high levels of stress and other mental health issues, and that many choose to turn to their teachers for support with these struggles. A new report published in the Australian Journal of Education (AJE) looks at how teachers manage student wellbeing concerns and academic stress.

In the final installment of our three-part series on small group tutoring, we discuss what effective small group tutoring looks like in practice, the importance of building relationships with students, and why students need to be at the centre of this work.

After the disruption caused to schooling throughout 2020, students might be feeling a bit different about the return to school this year. Here, we speak to Associate Professor Dr Anne Coffey about how to best support students transition into the new school year, and what to be mindful of.

There are many ways to approach decorating your classroom with wall displays. Here, we speak to Professor Peter Barrett about what the research says on how to utilise classroom displays to encourage student belonging and ownership.