Curriculum
Our curriculum encompasses the essential areas of learning.
The St Joseph’s curriculum is based on “The New Zealand Curriculum”, Ministry of Education (2007) and is integrated with our Religious Education that aims to teach values inherent in our Catholic faith. Our curriculum encompasses the essential learning areas of:
• Mathematics and Statistics
• English
• Science
• Social Science
• Religious Education
• Technology
• Health and Phys Ed
• Music and The Arts
• Learning Languages
As a Catholic school we believe all children have been blessed with gifts and talents from God and it is up to us to recognise these and offer opportunities for all to reach their potential.
Learning Support
We are proud of our robust assessment schedules which inform us of progress and development of each and every child. Students requiring assistance are given it at the appropriate time and for as long as it is deemed necessary. We have many intervention programmes we use to meet the needs of our students. Our rigorous system is a key contributor to our ERO results exceeding the national average.
Home Learning
We believe that home learning must be relevant to the classroom programme and appropriate to the class level. Home learning can be a major cause of stress for families and should not affect family dynamics. Busy parents need quality interactions with their children, not arguments about homework. To this end we endeavour to set regular, manageable home learning that can mostly be completed by the student.
Home learning will usually involve daily reading, learning of basic mathematics facts, spelling words, Religious Education home activities, and for Years 5 & 6 completing or reinforcing learning from class.
Parents are encouraged to support home learning activities, but we do not expect you to ‘do the home learning’. This does not foster independence. Teachers will follow up students who are not completing the required tasks.
Please read more about the Computer science programme.