One of the great and elusive paradoxes within the Kingdom of God is that God's Kingdom is both ‘now’ and ‘not yet.’ The Kingdom can be defined as the realm over which God extends his influence and power. The whole world is in the Kingdom, and so is everything that goes on within it.
God's people are sent out into the world to advance God’s cause for the Kingdom. We are ambassadors of the almighty King of Heaven. Simultaneously, we are also sons and daughters to the living God because of Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross.
A truth in the Kingdom is that God is maturing His people so they can influence the world. In a very real sense, personal growth is an essential element of Christian discipleship. Our impact and our sense of authenticity are best served when the message that we are advocating is consistent with who we are. This growth in personal maturity is often developed as the result of dealing with the problems that we find in the world. Generally, we need to improve our skills, character, attitude and knowledge to successfully solve a problem or achieve a goal. It seems an evident truth that is too little understood that God uses the problems that we encounter as the means by which to grow these skills, character, attitude and knowledge. Our ability to one day successfully solve big problems is predicated on our ability to have learnt to solve smaller ones.
Term 3 places every student in our school in the perfect place for personal growth. During this term, every student should be working diligently to improve their grades. What generally must precede an improvement in outcomes is a commensurate development in work ethic, attitude and organisation.
As a campus, we are focusing on three important elements to support this personal change.
Firstly, we are emphasising the importance of having a goal to motivate change.
Secondly, we are emphasising that outcomes in tests and final grades are more dependent on application and effort, rather than intelligence.
Thirdly, we are deliberately focusing on identifying and developing the skills needed to achieve. During the course of this year, teachers have received some professional development in the importance of executive function as a foundation for success. Executive function refers to a set of cognitive skills that help individuals plan, organise, manage time, pay attention and regulate behaviour. These skills are crucial for goal-directed activities, problem-solving and adapting to new situations. Some of the key elements within executive function are planning and prioritising, starting tasks, organisation and emotional control.
Teachers will increasingly identifying areas of need in student approaches and coach them to self-improvement in those areas.
This is an area of student learning, behaviour and performance that parents and teachers can actually share in developing.