Specialist Programme

Our specialist teachers bring a wealth of experience, developing strengths in individuals and encouraging high standards and depth of understanding.

Visual Arts

Through engaging in the visual arts, students learn how to discern, participate in, and celebrate their own and others’ visual worlds. Visual arts learning begins with children’s curiosity and delight in their senses and stories and extends to the communication of complex ideas and concepts.

In our visual arts education, students develop visual literacy and aesthetic awareness as they manipulate and transform visual, tactile, and spatial ideas to solve problems. They explore experiences, stories, abstract concepts, social issues and needs, both individually and collaboratively. Experimenting with materials, using processes and conventions to develop their visual inquiries and creating both static and timed-based art works are part of their art programme. Students view art works, bringing their own experiences, sharing their responses, and generating multiple interpretations.

The visual arts develop students’ conceptual thinking within a range of practices across drawing, sculpture, painting and printmaking.

Spanish

Learning a language other than English means learning how to communicate in that language and having the opportunity to experience another culture. Students also learn the structure of the language which enables them to reflect on how their own language works.

Language students have the opportunity to:

•be active participants in the global village
• become better communicators
• expand their literacy skills
• develop intercultural understanding and empathy
• increase their cognitive flexibility, that is, think differently
• learn new languages and adapt to new cultures more easily, and broaden their vocational options.

Girls have weekly specialist Spanish lessons and continue their learning in the classroom between classes. Our Spanish curriculum is differentiated to suit beginners through to advanced language students. Lessons focus on gaining confidence through conversation as well as learning to read, write and spell. Spanish is chosen because, with over 480 million speakers, it is the second most common language in the world. It is a Latin based language which transfers easily to other languages such as French and Italian.

Music

Music enables students to communicate in ways that go beyond their oral language abilities. Students are given opportunities to discover a broad range of music experiences including listening to a wide range of music, classifying and analysing sounds, composing, exploring body percussion, playing instruments, singing, harmonising, notating and reading music. In creating, students use their imagination and musical experiences to organise sounds natural and technological – into various forms that communicate specific ideas or moods. In responding, students are given the opportunity to respond to different styles of music, as well as to music from different times and cultures. In addition to our music programme, instrumental orchestras, ensembles and choirs provide specialised extension experiences.

Physical Education

Physical Education promotes the development of personal, social and physical well-being. The programme develops skills across a range of physical disciplines including:

Individual pursuits– developing basic motor skills and movement through a range of athletic activities; recognising a high level of achievement and how to improve performance.

Adventure challenges – developing critical-thinking skills in individuals and/or groups.
Games – developing skills and strategies; recognising the importance of rules; modifying existing games and creating new games; teamwork.

Health-related fitness – recognising and appreciating the importance of maintaining a healthy lifestyle and developing physical fitness. In 2023 and 2024 Selwyn House will partner with FMS Schools. FMS is a school-based programme that will assist teachers in evaluating students for movement efficiency and allow the creation of functional movement plans specific for each student.

Performing Arts

In dance, we transform, communicate, and interpret ideas, feelings, and experiences. Dance is a significant way of knowing, with a distinctive body of knowledge to be experienced, investigated, valued, and shared. Students become increasingly literate in dance as they explore dance forms, develop dance ideas, and articulate understandings about dance works in various contexts. Education in dance promotes personal and social well-being by developing students’ self-esteem, social interactions, and confidence in physical expression.

Drama enables us to understand ourselves, the people around us, and the world in which we live, enriching the lives of individuals and giving voice to communities. They investigate the forms, styles, and contexts of drama and recognise that it can affirm or challenge attitudes and values. They work collaboratively to develop ideas, to express feelings, to experiment with sound and action within a dramatic space, and to reflect on live and recorded drama. Students appreciate that drama, whether intended for audiences or not, provides significant opportunities for expressing cultural and personal identity.

STEAM

STEAM is an educational approach that uses Science, Technology, Engineering, the Arts and Mathematics as access points for guiding student inquiry, collaboration, and creative and critical thinking.

Our STEAM Hub provides every student from Year 1 to Year 8 access to state-of-the-art equipment. We have a variety of workshop tools, a kiln, art equipment, a laser cutter, multiple 3D printers, and sophisticated camera equipment to inspire the creative mind.

The dedicated Food Technology kitchen is purpose-built for the age of our students.

Science provides the opportunity for in-depth exploration of the living, physical and material worlds, as well as planet Earth and beyond. To explore these areas, students are immersed in a well-resourced, dedicated laboratory led by specialist teachers.

Mechatronics is taught across all year levels, to ensure that each student is fully prepared to lead in a future that is heavy in technology. Girls learn the foundations of mechanical and electrical knowledge through activities such as creating robots, coding and building from upcycled materials.

Students have the opportunity to utilise the practical technology skills they have acquired to design and build their own projects as well. These have included bending wood to make skateboards, trialling exotic new plastic filaments to 3D-print flexible pencil cases, coding micro-controllers to create wearable electronics, making hydraulically controlled robot arms and creating fun new games for the playground.

Senior students explore the importance of Artificial Intelligence (AI). Mixing both theory and practice, the girls discover what AI is, what it isn’t, and how it affects them in their daily lives.

Future Problem Solving

FPS is a highly regarded and well-researched international educational program that develops creative, critical and caring thinking skills in students from Year 5 – Year 8.

Students grapple with global and community issues, identify underlying problems and create positive solutions to those issues. Above all, it aims to give young people the skills to design and promote positive futures as citizens of the 21st Century.

Educational Technology

At Selwyn House School, our educational technology programme enables us to ensure our students are developing the knowledge, skills and attitudes necessary to contribute to and thrive in the world beyond school. Devices are used to supplement teaching programmes along with enabling non-traditional learning environments. They inspire creativity, communication, collaboration and critical thinking, extending the students’ experiences beyond the classroom unlimited by barriers of time and distance.

Students in Years 4 -8 participate in the BYOD (Bring Your Own Device) progamme. This promotes the concepts of self-motivation and organisation by giving the girls access to their own powerful learning tool which enables them to learn seamlessly between home and school. Selwyn House School helps foster the creation of personalised learning.