CURRICULUM
NZ has a national curriculum that guides what your child learns at school. Your child will develop a range of values and key competencies, or capabilities, that they need to succeed in life. These are all woven into the teaching of learning areas, or subjects. Using the New Zealand Curriculum Framework as our cornerstone, WIS has developed our own robust local curriculum. With a belief that every child can succeed our curriculum has been designed to ensure high expectations for all. We believe that our learners can influence, innovate, and create the pathways for our future.
Inquiry based Learning
Inquiry-based learning is a learning process that engages students by making real-world connections through exploration and high-level questioning. It is an approach to learning that encourages students to engage in problem-solving and experiential learning. Each of our inquiry unit identifies key knowledge, conceptual understandings and skills.
Students drive the learning
An inquiry based approach is driven by students' curiosity about the world around them. It encourages connection, co-operation, and collaboration by allowing students to pose and solve problems together and with their communities in shared, authentic learning experiences.
Learning Areas
There are 8 learning areas (or subject areas) in The New Zealand Curriculum:
English / Literacy
What is English about?
Ko te reo te tuakiri, Ko te reo tōku ahurei, Ko te reo te ora.
Language is my identity, language is my uniqueness, language is my life.
Literacy is about learning to use, create and enjoy the Literacy language in all its forms – oral, written and visual communication.
How is Literacy structured in the New Zealand Curriculum?
Literacy is structured into two interconnected strands:
Making Meaning | listening, reading and viewing.
Creating Meaning | speaking, writing and presenting.
Literacy is the study, use, and enjoyment of the English language and its literature, communicated orally, visually, and in writing for a range of purposes and audiences and in a variety of text forms. Literacy encompasses learning the language, learning through the language, and learning about the language. Understanding, using, and creating increasingly complex oral, written, and visual texts is at the heart of Literacy teaching and learning. By engaging in text-based activities, students become increasingly skilled and sophisticated speakers and listeners, writers, readers, presenters, and viewers across all curriculum areas
Mathematics & Statistics
What is mathematics and statistics about?
Mathematics is the exploration and use of patterns and relationships in quantities, space, and time. Statistics is the exploration and use of patterns and relationships in data. These two disciplines are related but different ways of thinking and of solving problems. Both equip students with effective means for investigating, interpreting, explaining, and making sense of the world in which they live.
Mathematicians and statisticians use symbols, graphs, and diagrams to help them find and communicate patterns and relationships, and they create models to represent both real-life and hypothetical situations. These situations are drawn from a wide range of social, cultural, scientific, technological, health, environmental, and economic contexts.
Science
What is science?
Science is the pursuit and application of knowledge and understanding of the natural and social world following a systematic methodology based on evidence. Science is a way of discovering what is in the universe and how those things work today, how they worked in the past, and how they are likely to work in the future.
There are 4 strands in the Science Curriculum.
The Living World - Biology
this strand is taught throughout the year and examples include;
The study of native areas and habitats, living world - animal and plant studies, food chains, sustainability, environmental issues
The Physical World - eg physics
Soils, light, heat, sound, forces, motion
The Material World - Chemistry
Matter / Property (physical & chemical) change - exploration of liquids, solids, gases
Planet Earth and Beyond
Geology, weather, solar system / astronomy
Social Science
What are the social sciences about?
The social sciences learning area is about how societies work and how people can participate as critical, active, informed, and responsible citizens. Contexts are drawn from the past, present, and future and from places within and beyond New Zealand.
Aotearoa New Zealand histories and Te Takanga o te Wā
From 2022, Aotearoa New Zealand’s histories will be taught in all schools and kura. It is part of the social sciences learning area because it encourages learners to be critical citizens – learning about the past to understand the present and prepare for the future.
There are three elements to the curriculum content: UNDERSTAND, KNOW, and DO. It is structured this way to help teachers design learning experiences that weave these elements together so that student learning is deep and meaningful.
Students are provided with opportunities to:
ask questions, gather information and background ideas, and examine relevant current issues
explore and analyse people’s values and perspectives
consider the ways in which people make decisions and participate in social action
reflect on and evaluate the understandings they have developed and the responses that may be required.
Health & Physical Education
In health and physical education, the focus is on the well-being of the students themselves, of other people, and of society through learning in health-related and movement contexts.
PE and fitness lessons act as a foundation of movement and sport. We use these times to promote positive attitudes towards physical activity and as a chance for learners to engage with a range of different skills. We regularly encourage learners to get moving as a way to support their well-being and development.
Four underlying and interdependent concepts are at the heart of this learning area:
Hauora – a Māori philosophy of well-being that includes the dimensions taha wairua, taha hinengaro, taha tinana, and taha whānau, each one influencing and supporting the others.
Attitudes and values – a positive, responsible attitude on the part of students to their own well-being; respect, care, and concern for other people and the environment; and a sense of social justice.
The socio-ecological perspective – a way of viewing and understanding the interrelationships that exist between the individual, others, and society.
Health promotion – a process that helps to develop and maintain supportive physical and emotional environments and that involve students in personal and collective action.
