At Worawa we implement strategies to help students take responsibility for their actions, building positive resilience and encouraging them to remain engaged in the education program. The College uses Restorative Practice which addresses incidents that harm the school community by involving the people most affected and helping them to address productively what happened, how they have been affected, how they affected others and how to repair the harm. The College encourages students to take responsibility for their own actions and decision making. This includes awareness of negative peer pressure and aiming for positive relationships of trust and respect and making decisions which help them to stay disciplined and engaged in the education program.
Worawa has developed a comprehensive understanding of the complexities of Indigenous education. The Worawa model focuses on both the effectiveness of the overall education provided and also to the recruitment, professional development, support and retention of teaching and non-teaching staff. A Council of Elders oversees the culture curriculum and the College resident Elder provides cultural guidance to students and staff. This unique approach delivers educational outcomes through an Aboriginal perspective which has been carefully developed to ensure culture and well- being are core to a rigorous educational program. The curriculum is based on the Australian Curriculum and provides an integrated education model of education, culture and wellbeing so that all students develop academically, culturally and socially.
Personal Learning Programs
At Worawa personalised learning ensures that every student’s education is structured and tailored to their needs so as to support high levels of student engagement and success. Upon entering the College students undergo a diagnostic assessment. The assessment, along with reports and referrals are the starting point for a students personalised learning journey. Students are then placed in groups to cater for their social and academic development and learning activities are designed to cater for individual learning needs. Personalised learning plans include development of students’ talents in the creative and performing arts, in sport, ICT and in other pursuits for which aptitude and interest have been identified.
The Worawa curriculum has been designed to educate the whole person across all domains of their development—social, emotional, physical, spiritual, cultural and cognitive/academic. Worawa curriculum is developed and implemented within cultural themes and five LEARNING CENTRES:
- Literacy
- Creative arts
- Numeracy / maths
- Science and environment
- Health/ sport/ physical education
The College theme CARING FOR COUNTRY and the associated Term Themes provide links between Learning Centre activities. Each term, within each Learning Centre, students are provided with a challenging and stimulating unit of work which is designed to deliver essential standards as outlined in the Victorian Essential Learnings Standards (Australian Curriculum). Personalised Learner Profiles (PLP) are developed and travel with the student as they progress along the Worawa learning continuum. PLPs provide a focus on learning to learn, the purpose of learning and record student success in learning.