Middle School

Based in our dedicated Contemporary Learning Centre, the Year 7 and 8 students have their own unique and agile learning spaces deliberately designed to be fluid and flexible. Multimodal spaces, are student-centred areas, that empower our students, along with our transdisciplinary program, to be effective lifelong learners who engage in deep learning, being more likely to persist on complex, non-routine, unfamiliar problems in an authentic environment. It is this learning that best reflects the skills, competencies and character traits that we want our Strathcona graduates to have, and that will best meet the needs of a range of pathways and the world of work. The requirements for success in the 21st Century are broader than reading, writing and arithmetic. In a report by the World Economic Forum called The Future of Jobs, the most highly ranked skills for employability in 2020 included Complex Problem Solving, Critical Thinking, Creativity, People Management and Coordinating with Others.

Our light and open areas have a range of workstations with adjustable and moveable standing or sitting desks, writeable surfaces, curved couches, beanbags, cushions, breakout spaces, smaller quiet nooks and sound-proofed pods. The popular Socrates Space, otherwise known as the Conversation Circle encourages collaboration and discussion. The most significant difference is that learners move around, both inside and outside the classroom and into the adaptable spaces, exploring many different types of settings and experiences, sometimes within the same day, making many connections across and beyond their year level. The pedagogy and activities being embraced are also intimately linked to individualised learning programs and digital technologies. Given that all Years 7 and 8 students have their Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) laptop this too enables multiple points of focus and diverse teaching and learning strategies to suit all students.

#coLAB is an important part of this vision. This week-long intensive program allows students to reach beyond the constraints of the curriculum and produce rich problems that can have an impact beyond the classroom, to build deeper knowledge and skills that are vital in the new world of work. In #coLAB, students work collaboratively through the Design Thinking process to develop solutions to open-ended, real world problems.