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Springvalley Elementary School
Home of the Skyhawks
Our Learning Story
MISSION
AT SVE our mission is to engage all learners to be creative, critical thinkers, and effective collaborators who communicate with kindness, gratitude and demonstrate a growth mindset in pursuing their personal best. 
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Vision:  We work together to create collaborative, innovative, and inquiry based classrooms where children are engaged and are encouraged to set and achieve their individual learning goals. Through common language, collaboration, and personalized classroom activities, we help learners self-navigate their core competency development.

OUR LEARNING STORY

Springvalley Elementary School serves families in the Rutland area of Kelowna. Over the decades, the school community has grown and changed, and made a difference in the lives of so many that call Rutland home.  

Currently Springvalley Elementary serves 253 children spanning from Kindergarten to Grade 5.  Our diverse student population includes a vibrant Indigenous community, numerous students for whom English is a second language, and students from many other ethnic backgrounds. At the heart of Springvalley is a collaborative, inclusive community where we learn to treat others the way we would like them to treat us. 

Our school is rooted in collaborative approaches to teaching and learning.  This collaboration includes not only staff and students but also parents.  Once again this year, in recognition of the incredible power of parents to impact the learning of children, we are inviting parents to join learning conversations using evidence of learning posted on the electronic portfolio platform FreshGrade.  Students, parents and teachers are regularly having conversations about what each child is doing well, and their next steps in their learning.  Our goal is to place each child at the heart of these conversations, so they own their learning and drive their own progress.  Teachers are also learners at Springvalley Elementary, and to promote growth, teachers will be collaborating together regularly to further their effectiveness in meeting the needs of all students. 

Learning is not limited to just academic subjects at Springvalley Elementary.  Learning to regulate our emotions and how to best focus on our learning are critical competencies to develop.  Learners learn best when they are calm, focused and alert. 

In order to ensure that no child falls through the cracks, we use a Response to Intervention (RTI) model of support to identify and target the needs of our gifted, vulnerable and at-risk learners.  Teachers, Certified Educational Assistants, our Learning Assistant Teacher, our Teacher Librarian, our Resource Teacher, our Speech Pathologist, our Counselor, our Indigenous Advocate, our English Language Learner Teacher and the Admin team all collaborate to address the needs of each individual child.

Socrates once said "Wisdom begins in wonder."  Every day, the hearts and minds of educators and students at Springvalley Elementary are filled with wonder.  As we ask questions, together we will discover where we will go next.  Wisdom is never static.  It changes, evolves and grows as we continue to ask questions and collectively develop vision for the future.  

STAFF VISIONING: 

At Springvalley we believe to support student learning we must:

  • Provide and encourage feedback which helps students speak to their strengths and next steps in their learning
  • Have strong relationships within our community (teachers/students/parents)
  • Provide resources/tasks for students at their own levels
  • Provide consistent routines, expectations and support for students which lead to independent student navigated learning
  • Have calm environments which leads to alert, engaged students
  • Provide choice and personalization for students
  • Foster a culture of joy, kindness and gratitude
  • Use consistent, aligned language and goals across all grades and classrooms
  • Focus on a Growth mindset
  • Direct instruction in self-regulation skills which helps students understand how they learn best and self-reflect
STRATEGIES:

This is what we are doing to support this learning:

  • Response to Intervention team meets weekly to target our Tier 3 (Red Zone) students
  • Teacher collaboration centered on deepening our work in assessment and personalization of the curriculum
  • School wide interventions using Play is the Way and Collaborative Problem Solving approaches
  • Developing and embedding inquiry methodologies such as provocations & making thinking visible which help students develop agency in their learning
  • Fostering student ownership of their learning through formative assessment and digital portfolios