19 October 2017

Newsletter Articles

President’s Message

The highlight for Term 3 was the Festival of Teaching. Over 200 teachers dedicated a Saturday to some powerful professional learning and professional networking. The keynote speakers were popular and the workshops provided to teachers were rich and relevant. I would like to thank the Steering Committee for their hard work over the last year to make the Festival happen. I would also like to thank the Hon. Eva Lawler, Minister for Education, for her opening address. The Minister is an enthusiastic supporter of professional teaching associations.

NT professional teaching associations have GRIT. The associations I have worked with as President of PTANT have endured the ups-and-downs of educational change in the NT and nationally. I would like to pay tribute to all NT professional teaching associations for the GRIT they apply to making their voices heard across the NT. The collegial work they undertake for one another is a true investment in the educational outcomes for students in the NT. I want to acknowledge the value of professional teaching associations in my career. My involvement with ETANT provided local, national and international opportunities for me to engage with other English teachers and professionals. I grew as a teacher through my active involvement with ETANT and the professional connections I made are still there today. I will always advocate for professional teaching associations and PTANT will be stronger from the advocacy of other professional teaching associations.

It is with gratitude that I thank all those with whom I have worked as PTANT President. Stepping down after 12 years is the right thing to do as it is time for the next generation to come on board. PTANT is in a strong position and our work is now reaching across the NT to remote localities. If you are ready, please consider stepping up to a role with PTANT as it is most rewarding, professionally and personally. Many thanks to the PTANT Management Committee for their support and friendship; your contributions to teachers leading teachers has been, and continues to be, awesome.

Best wishes

John Sarev
Past-President

PTANT Executive Update

For 22 years, PTANT has been the peak body representing and advocating for NT teachers, meeting the most essential interests of teachers through structured, collegial activities in urban, regional and remote centres. Mr John Sarev is stepping down as President after more than 16 years on the management Board.

Mr Sarev was presented with a trophy at the 2017 Festival of Teaching on August 26 from the honourable Minister of Education, Eva Lawler. Mr Sarev was acknowledged for his significant leadership and support of PTANT.

A president election within the Constitution of Professional Teacher’s Association of the Northern Territory will be held at the annual general meeting in May 2018. In the interim Jenni Webber will fill the PTANT President role. Jenni is PTANT’s Vice President and will step up to President. The Vice President role will be discussed at the next PTANT executive meeting.

2017 Festival of Teaching

Key note speaker, Mr Mark Collard presenting.

The 2017 Festival of Teaching was held on Saturday 26 August at the Casuarina Senior College in Darwin. 250 participants attended including 44 presenters, 26 trade displays and 2 keynote speakers. The Minister of Education, the Honourable Eva Lawler opened the full day festival, followed by a key note address from Mr Mark Collard of Playmeo and Dr Joseph Lo Bianco. Participants had 39 informative and interactive workshops to choose from, delivered by NT teacher associations. During morning tea and lunch breaks participants networked and browsed trade displays.

The Festival of Teaching Steering Committee made up of representatives from NT teacher associations delivered the festival with funding from PTANT and the Department of Education. The following associations joined forces to host the festival;

Teaching associations funded remote delegates travel via PTANT grant funding and provided quality workshops in their area of expertise.

The festival has been held yearly however now moves to a biannual event and the next festival will be held in 2019. Each festival grows with quality deliverables and interest from remote and urban teachers including, government schools, non-government schools and corporate education sectors.

The festival delegates commented;

“Lots of information, short time. Excellent integrated demo. Great take home resource.”

“I learned a lot of teaching strategies with regards to arts integration in Mathematics.”

“I got a lot of new and innovative ideas from this workshop, and even started planning a new LAP so I could add some of what I learnt into my assessment schedule.”

“Engaging and insightful - plenty of new ideas and Mark inspired me to look at the learning environment in a new way.”

“The best 50 minutes I ever spent on any PD. I already practice most of the strategies, however, to see it being modelled and also alternative methods to practise these strategies was just amazing.”

“Well organized and delivered with good resources.”

“The book we received is great!”

PTANT on Facebook

PTANT has a Facebook page. Stay informed with the latest PTANT news, including professional development opportunities. Like our page and share the good news to your networks.

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PTANT Partnership – National Indigenous Education Forum 2017

PTANT partnered with the National Indigenous Education Forum 2017. The partnership provided association members with a 10% discount off registration costs.

Developing practical education strategies for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students to excel in life.

Education is key to realising successful life prospects. However, many Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students remain disadvantaged and often lag behind their non-Indigenous peers.

Literacy and numeracy inadequacy remains high throughout communities, and few are in a position to pursue higher education. As a result of poor education skills, the unemployment rate among Australia's Indigenous population is shockingly high.

Akolade's National Indigenous Education Forum focuses on how to effectively improve educational outcomes for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander youths. Leaders from across the nation will share their case studies and strategies, which delegates can develop and adopt into their own organisations.

AENT’s Third Annual Members’ Exhibition

AENT’s third annual members’ exhibition was a great success. The exhibition was a networking and capacity building opportunity that brought together more than 30 members and showcased almost 90 educator artworks at DVAA (Darwin Visual Arts Association) during August. The exhibition culminated in an official opening celebrating the collective creative talent and skills amongst current territory art educators. Check out the following link for images taken by DVAA on the opening night.

ALEA – International Literacy Day

ALEA members Georgina Gunson, Jemma Rust and Ranae Graham took time out to read to kids at Palmerston Library during National Literacy and Numeracy Week.

Every year the Australian Literacy Educators Association (ALEA) celebrates International Literacy Day (ILD) on September 8.

ILD was proclaimed by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) on November 17, 1965. The aim of International Literacy Day is to highlight the importance of literacy to individuals, communities and societies and each year, UNESCO reminds the international community of the status of literacy and adult learning globally.

In Darwin ALEA reached out to the community in two ways;

• Simone Timms delivered books and T-shirts captioned ‘Read to me’ to Royal Darwin Hospital for babies born on International Literacy Day.

This is a practical demonstration of a commitment by ALEA to raise the standard of literacy in Australia. It promotes the importance of encouraging parents to share the joy of books, spoken language and literacy as early as possible with their baby.

• Pam Adam donated books from local authors to Casuarina Family Centre:
  ‘No Way Yirrikipayi!’ written by Alison Lester and illustrated by the students at Milikapiti School on Melville Island

‘Too Many Cheeky Animals’ by Johanna Bell and Dion Beasley

ATESOL Action

The Association of Teachers to Speakers of Other Languages, NT (ATESOL NT) is active and busy!

ATESOL NT presented three professional development workshops to packed rooms at the Festival of Teaching and were very proud to introduce Professor Jo Lo Bianco to NT educators.

ATESOL NT are updating the website to increase capacity and capture “member voice opinions” as Professor Lo Bianco discussed at the Festival of Teaching. The upgraded website should be completed by the end of 2017.

We are NOW on social media! Find us on Facebook at:

ATESOL NT last symposium was in 2013 "Kids, Classrooms and Classrooms". It was a resounding success with participant agreement that more professional learning events of the like is critical. Thanks to PTANT grants and CDU partnerships we offered the NT a 2017 Symposium "EAL/D in the NT Research into Practice" held on Saturday 7th October, 2017. With video conferencing available, participation from all locations was encouraged. The speakers and topics were:

Robyn Ober (Batchelor Inst) Aboriginal English, Identity and Learning

Carmel O'Shannesy (ANU) Creole, Aboriginal Englishes and Mixed Languages in NT children's language repertoires

Sue Creagh (Uni Qld) Teacher judgments: Identifying and levelling Learners of English as an Additional language

ATESOL NT and ALEA will partner to host the launch of Clare Atkins's (author of Nona and Me) new novel.

ATESOL are planning to host mentorship programs in 2018 targeted at teachers who wish to professionally progress their EAL/D teaching and learning skills. If you would like further information or to register your interest please email ATESOL NT admin@atesolnt.org.au

AAEE News

Australian Association for Environmental Education NT has been undertaking some collaborative work with local environmental and community groups. One of the results has been the establishment of a dynamic executive committee at our 2017 AGM, offering a broad range of skills and expertise. This offers new opportunities to build supported pathways for non-profit organisations in the environmental education sector and explore ways to work with school groups. Responses from teachers to our survey at our stall at the Festival of Teaching indicated that this new facilitation would be welcomed.

AAEE has been working on ways to help schools and teachers understand the cross-curriculum priorities in the Australian Curriculum, especially the curriculum integration imperatives that are central to the new curriculum.

We are planning some workshops, and there is a new online professional development system that teachers can interact with to improve their knowledge in this area. If you are interested let us know. The site is at the link below. You do need a login and password to access it fully, however PTANT Members are invited to preview by using the guest login: AAEE guest with the password: AAEEg11st. We invite you to have a look and a play.

This is all part of AAEE NT’s strategy to identify new and innovative ways to help teachers keep their professional knowledge up to date, as well as find ways to enable teachers to deliver key messages or outcomes for local environmental issues.

CEANT Dinner

The Career Educators Association of the NT (CEANT) supports members throughout the year by holding professional development opportunities at meetings twice a term, and through organised professional development functions. Professional development is aligned with career development core competencies as well as the Australian Professional Standards for Teachers.

Recently 50 members and non-members from across industry, education and employment settings attended a CEANT networking and professional development dinner. The Honourable Eva Lawler, Minister for Education was a guest at the dinner and David Carney, Executive Director to the Career Industry Council of Australia (CICA) gave the keynote address. Members were encouraged to promote their important role in schools and to ensure that they maintained ICT currency in order to provide effective strategies to integrate careers.

Fifteen schools across public and private sectors were represented, including a member who travelled from Katherine High School to attend the dinner.

Stakeholder representation also included YouthworxNT, Charles Darwin University, Girls Academy, Catholic Education and Department of Education, Industry Engagement and Employment Pathways.

It was especially exciting to see that Mackillop College was represented by their Career Practitioner, VET coordinator as well as their college principal, Lauretta Graham. It was also pleasing to have representatives from Woodroffe Primary who are promoting career development in their school.

The dinner was an excellent way to engage professionally with colleagues, and community stakeholders. Within the business of the year it is an ideal way to share ideas with the view to improving practice. The dinner brought together a variety of people to promote and support career development for young people.

A rural choir, the LARCs, made up mainly of teachers sang at the dinner. Career Development is about the lifelong process of managing learning, work, leisure, and transitions in order to move toward a personally determined and evolving preferred future. In this context it was great to see how teachers engage in a passion of singing within their leisure time.

CEANT would like to acknowledge the support gained from PTANT to hold this professional development networking function.

For more information visit the link below or Find us on Facebook

AASE AGM

The Australian Association of Special Education NT chapter held their AGM on 25 September. The meeting was well attended and included a workshop.

The executive committee for the next 12 months are: Karen Wilson, President; Faye Brooks-Jones, Vice President; Virg Hughes, Treasurer; Michelle Harwood, Secretary.

The Introduction to Dramatherapy workshop was presented by drama therapist, Amanda Cross who owns ‘Playing with Spirit’. It included information about Dramatherapy and how it can support children and young people with various needs. Attendees learnt how play, movement and storytelling can help children to cope with feelings, difficulties and challenges in their lives.

AASE NT is building connections with CDU. At the AGM, CDU graduate Joan Johnstone received an award for her enthusiasm and commitment to special education.

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