Otama School

Te Ara Huarau | School Profile Report

Background

This Profile Report was written within 15 months of the Education Review Office and Otama School working in Te Ara Huarau, an improvement evaluation approach used in most English Medium State and State Integrated Schools. For more information about Te Ara Huarau see ERO’s website. www.ero.govt.nz

Context 

Otama School is situated in rural Eastern Southland, 20 km north of Gore. It provides education for students in Years 1 – 8. Its mission is to provide students with rich learning experiences aimed at developing knowledge, key competencies and attributes in order to develop students into responsible and inspirational citizens.

Otama School’s strategic priorities for improving outcomes for learners are:

• all students will be able to achieve to their highest potential in mathematics and literacy

• to create a safe, inclusive learning environment, with high, but realistic, expectations for behaviour and learning

• to provide engaging, rich and meaningful learning experiences.

You can find a copy of the school’s strategic and annual plan on Otama School’s website.

ERO and the school are working together to evaluate how effectively the school’s writing curriculum supports learners to meet the expectations of the Literacy Learning Progressions, which support the New Zealand Curriculum.

The rationale for selecting this evaluation is:

• the school has recently adopted the Progress and Consistency Tool (PaCT) to support teachers’ planning for and assessment of writing

• the school is part of the Eastern Southland Kāhui Ako, which is focussing on upskilling teachers to improve writing outcomes for learners

• school-wide achievement data for writing has historically been lower than achievement data for reading.

The school expects to see:

• increasingly consistent teacher judgments in writing aligned to the Literacy Learning Progressions

• teachers using high quality assessment information to inform their planning for teaching writing and to identify next learning steps

• all learners making sufficient progress against the Literacy Learning Progressions.

Strengths

The school can draw from the following strengths to support its goal to evaluate how effectively the school’s writing curriculum supports learners to meet the expectations of the Literacy Learning Progressions:

• the Kāhui Ako provides access to specialist literacy support that is upskilling teachers in effective strategies for teaching writing

• individual learners are well known, and their needs responded to through 1:1 teaching opportunities.

Where to next?

Moving forward, the school will prioritise:

• upskilling leaders and teachers in the use of the PaCT to ensure accurate and consistent teacher judgments in writing

• professional learning to continue to develop teachers’ collective capabilities to deliver effective writing programmes

• embedding curriculum developments and refreshing curriculum documents to ensure relevance and coherence so that clear guidelines are provided for teachers 

• consultation with students and parents to better understand from their perspectives what is working well in writing and what might be improved for learners

• ensuring whānau are well informed of learners’ writing goals and understand how best to support these at home.

ERO’s role will be to support the school in its evaluation for improvement cycle to improve outcomes for all learners. ERO will support the school in reporting their progress to the community. The next public report on ERO’s website will be a Te Ara Huarau | School Evaluation Report and is due within three years.

Shelley Booysen
Director of Schools

15 June 2023

About the School

The Education Counts website provides further information about the school’s student population, student engagement and student achievement.  educationcounts.govt.nz/home