teaching staff. “For me as an elementary/primary
specialist
science teacher here I recognise that we have a set course of study,” says Peter Damroth. “We use the Next Generation Science Standards, Next Gen. That is takes into account the explicit curriculum that I’m going to be teaching students, the knowledge that they need to know and the understanding I want them to get out of it.” But as Peter Damroth is also
keenly aware, equipping students with STEM skills for the future world of work is about more than just implicit course content. “With the explicit and written curriculum, in grade four for example I want students to understand that we are going to find evidence from patterns of rocks and fossils,” Peter explains. “That’s the explicit curriculum I am teaching them. “But implicitly I also want them
Above & right: Students from The American School of Milan
environments for colleagues to build social capital, have those serendipitous conversations and avoid proximity bias have already got HR thinking at a time when emotional intelligence, inclusion, collaboration, communication are critical to solving big global problems. “We need to prepare students to
be both digital and physical natives and able to interact socially and able to learn in various environments and modalities,” says Chris Briner. For Jane Segre, having the
school’s more than 800 students back working together on campus shows why physical school communities are so important. “We’ve just had a very intense week last week where there was this musical where over 30 students participated in this amazing extravaganza of joy. We had sports events going on and Model United Nations, MUN, and all of these things with students being together cannot be replaced online. It’s certainly made us think, what is the purpose of education?”
IMPLICIT AND EXPLICIT CURRICULA FOR LIFELONG LEARNING From a curriculum perspective, STEM subjects are preparing students for a more technologically advanced age. It is an area the school takes very seriously with modern laboratories and expert
48
to know how to navigate technology; I want them to be able to be good communicators; collaborate with each other and understand
the
social and emotional learning that is really important. These are the kind of skills that are going to be transferable through all their subject areas and throughout their lives. “We are not preparing them for
a specific career, but getting them interested in what may be, and getting them open minded and having these foundational skills so that they can be successful no matter what.” This outlook underpins some
of the reflection educators at the American School in Milan have been doing since 2020 when the pandemic hit. “We certainly came out of the pandemic thinking a different way,” says Jane Segre. “It turbocharged our thinking about education and it fast-forwarded us quite dramatically. “We spent a lot of
the school
year 2020-21 thinking about lifelong learning skills. With our department coordinators, we identified five different areas we wanted to integrate into subject learning. These are being a ‘self- knower’ – understanding yourself, your strengths, weaknesses and knowing how to set goals that are realistic and focusing on a growth mindset. We also focused on self- management; the ability to organise yourself, your materials and your learning time. We also looked at communication and collaboration
and then we looked at thinking. We are building that growth mindset for future learning and reflexivity into our school programmes. “We have done so much work
with our teachers, particularly our upper schoolteachers, in helping them help students learn these lifelong skills alongside quadratic equations or anatomy or learning about Hamlet or whatever it is,” continues Jane Segre. “It was really interesting a couple
of weeks ago when we spoke to our year one IB candidates, who are about 17 years old. We asked them about how school had changed for them this year. They talked about some wonderful things. About how their teachers had made them more reflective than they used to be and making sure that once students’ tests are returned, students are encouraged to reflect on what went well and what didn’t go so well and set goals for future learning.”
IGNITING PASSIONS The American School of Milan is also supporting students develop the skills they need to take ownership of problems, communicate and collaborate to resolve them in an ever more complicated, connected and fast-paced world. “I do believe that in the past there
was a time when a person could have read every book and be a polymath like Leonardo Da Vinci who was an expert, as in one of the world’s experts, in multiple disciplines,” says Chris Briner. “As knowledge has grown exponentially, the ability of a single human to understand it all has diminished. “It’s the collaboration between
people with expertise and passion that allows human beings to do more than one individual could do. We have to give students concepts and the inner workings so they can build on them. But we also have to push the envelope for their level of specialisation. They need those critical thinking and collaboration skills to fit the pieces together and identify the problems that need solving.” “We call our subject matter ‘units
of enquiry’ because we are trying to get our students to really wonder and delve deeper into provocations that they are thinking about,” adds Peter Damroth. “With those problems sometimes the solutions are just understanding sometimes we don’t fully understand it yet.
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56
