Roedean Secondary School SA

One of Roedean’s greatest strengths is the standard of the academic programme at the school. Roedean is a school which is steeped in tradition and, while the curriculum that is offered reflects the traditional values of the school, it is dynamic, and continues to be both relevant and exciting.

A team of highly-qualified, experienced and deeply committed teachers work to assist Roedean girls to achieve to the best of their ability. The five-year journey through the national curriculum culminates in the writing of the National Senior Certificate Examinations of the Independent Examinations Board.

There is a wide range of subjects on offer, including a number of foreign languages.

Each year, we are filled with pride when we receive the results of our Matric pupils as these are, without fail, quite superb. While we are always thrilled by a large number of distinctions, we often derive even greater joy from the achievements of those pupils who have required significant, sustained support to obtain their certificates.

While it is always gratifying that our pupils enjoy overwhelming success in their placement, in the courses of their choice, at local universities, we are also very proud of those girls who have gained places at international universities, as this illustrates the international competitiveness of the education offered at Roedean.

Although we follow the national curriculum, we do add extra value to it, striving to equip our pupils with the special skills that will be required in the 21st Century. With the present explosion in knowledge, pupils must be equipped to access, analyse and evaluate information; they require excellent cognitive and social skills. There is extensive use, throughout the curriculum, of Information Technology, and a special Cognitive Education Programme, which began in earnest in 2011, focuses on developing critical and creative thinking skills, and encourages self-directed learning. It also aims to develop responsible citizens who are aware of topical issues and are able to consider and evaluate possible solutions.

Sports

Vision for Roedean Sport:

Inspiring a life of significance

Mission for Roedean Sport:

For Roedean Sport to capture the imagination of people

Values of Roedean Sport:

Believe
Grow Respect
Build on Excellence
Empower Ourselves
Focus Areas for Roedean Sport:
Promote the passion for sporting excellence
Produced balanced elite athletes and coaches
Educate and promote sport sense
Ensure optimal performance
Celebrate success

Train to Compete:

This stage is about optimizing the engine and teaching the athletes HOW to compete. In this category, high volume and high-intensity training begins to occur year-round. They can either choose to specialize in a sport and pursue a competitive stream or continue participating at a recreational level entering the ACTIVE for LIFE stage. If children have been correctly introduced to activity and sport throughout the training stages, they will have the necessary motor skills and confidence to remain active for life.

Train to Train:

This stage is about building the engine and concentrating on the PROCESS of “play to do their best” approach as opposed to winning results as it leads to better development. It is critical that performers are nurtured and maintained correctly as it impacts on long term athlete development (LTAD). Children should establish an aerobic base; develop speed and strength and further their basic sport specific skills and tactics to feed their physiological responsiveness to stimuli and training.

Learn to Train:

This stage emphasis is on ACQUIRING a wide range of skills necessary for a number of sporting activities. The children should participate in a variety of well-structured activities that develop fundamental movement skill and include agility, balance and coordination, all related to FUN. Early overdevelopment of talented athletes through excessive single sport training and competition can have a negative effect on later stages of development if the athlete pursues a late specialization sport. Early specialization promotes one-sided physical, technical and tactical development and increases the likelihood of injury and burn out.

Cognitive Education

In 2017, Roedean School (SA) gained accreditation as a Thinking School with the University of Exeter (UK). It is the first school in South Africa to have achieved accreditation in both the Junior and Senior schools (Gr 0 to Gr 12). Careful planning and a strong commitment from the staff has ensured the successful and meaningful integration of thinking skills into the academic curriculum. Professor Lena Green, in her report to the University of Exeter, stated that:

“… the active mediation of thinking throughout the school has given many girls a ‘confident voice’ and made it more likely that girls will understand their role in the world and the choices available to them. Being aware of their own thinking dispositions and processes and possessing a repertoire of ‘thinking tools’ was perceived as important in preparing girls to “lead a life of significance”, which is a key goal of education at Roedean.”

Roedean has embraced Carol Dweck’s premise of a Growth Mindset. It states that when we believe that intelligence can grow because the brain is malleable, our behaviours change as well. Costa and Kallick’s Habits of Mind are 16 thinking dispositions that describe the characteristics of intelligent behaviour and are integral to developing a Growth Mindset. This overarching strategy permeates all areas of school life.

Roedean pupils are encouraged to develop 21st Century thinking skills such as:

developing the ability to ask perceptive and thoughtful questions;
developing higher order thinking skills, such as analysing, justifying, evaluating, and creating;
using a range of thinking tools such as Hyerle’s Thinking Maps, De Bono’s Six Hats and Visible Thinking strategies developed by Harvard University’s Project Zero.

Professor Bob Burden described a Thinking School as:

“An educational community in which all members share a common commitmentto giving regular careful thought to everything that takes place. This involves both students and staff learning how to think reflectively, critically and creatively, and employing these skills and techniques in the co-construction of a meaningful curriculum and associated activities. Successful outcomes are reflected in students across a wide range of abilities, demonstrating independent and co-operative learning skills, high levels of achievement and both enjoyment and satisfaction in learning. Benefits will be shown in ways in which all members of the community interact with and show consideration for each other and in the positive psychological well-being of both students and staff.”

Roedean School (SA) is proud to have achieved Thinking School status and is starting to see the benefits of the Cognitive Education Programme. As Jennica Frost (Upper V, Grade 10) stated: “For many, we are told facts and have to accept them blindly, but when the element of thinking, and especially thinking critically, is introduced we are not only encouraged to question the school environment and previously accepted fact, but the system questions the things we thought we knew were fact as well. Only through this metacognition can we begin to truly discover what is right and wrong for ourselves and our school. This extended thinking can lead us all to become creators of the future, because we all have it in us to be critical thinkers and through questioning our environment we can develop ourselves critically.”