St. Mary’s College School Improvement Plan Literacy September 2013-16
Summary of main strengths as identified in last SSE in May 2014
- STen scores for reading among First year students are above the national norms.
- Students engaged in the DEAR programme liked reading for pleasure.
- Teachers are using teaching strategies to improve literacy and 50% are actively building a classroom based subject specific library.
- There is a broad curriculum to meet the needs of students. (WSE-MLL report 2013).
- Students are enabled to reach their potential in the school by a team of dedicated teachers who collaborate in subject department teams. (WSE-MLL report 2013).
- The attainment in the majority of subjects at JC and LC is at or above the national norms.
Summary of main areas requiring improvement as identified in last SSE
- Teachers to focus on the development of literacy as well as knowledge and skills by increasing expectations in standards of writing (sentence and paragraph formation).
- Increase the number of students taking higher level in certain subjects in the LC examination to replicate the levels in the JC examination.
- The development of the library as a resource and reading room.
Improvement targets
- Embed the DEAR programme for First Year students
- Increase the reading age of students in First Year by at least one year
- Enable the acquisition of subject specific vocabulary in Year 2 to ten words per subject per student
- Focus on development of sentences, word sequencing and paragraph formation in Year 3.
- Increase the attainment levels of students in LC and JC exams from C grade to B grade at higher level.
- Develop the library.
Review Dates May 2015.