Dear Families:
EQAO results are one of the many ways we measure student achievement and provide a snapshot of results across our Board and the province. EQAO data, along with other data sources, is used to inform school and board improvement strategies to continue to support the needs of all our students. Each year, although the test results focus on that year's cohort of children with varying degrees of strengths and needs, it provides us with valuable information on our teaching methods in general for all grades.
Our Fossil Hill 2016-2017 EQAO Achievement Data Results are as follows:
Grade 3:
88% at or above the provincial standard in Reading
92% at or above the provincial standard in Writing
66% at or above the provincial standard in Math
Grade 6:
92% at or above the provincial standard in Reading
93% at or above the provincial standard in Writing
62% at or above the provincial standard in Math
Individual student results have arrived and are being collated. They will be sent home with students in the coming weeks. Fossil Hill teachers and staff will be analyzing these results to identify the strategies that are proving successful and further understand the areas that continue to need improvement. In the next few months, we will be unpacking the EQAO results to understand the skills our students need to continue to improve to meet curriculum expectations successfully.
The Board's focus on Mathematics, Modern Learning and Mental Health supports the needs of our students in many ways. Our School Improvement Plan for Student Achievement and Well-being is continuously being updated to better support the needs of all our students.
Mathematics is clearly an area of need for our school as well as the rest of the Board and Province. York Region District School Board is committed to supporting students in becoming confident problem solvers who use mathematical knowledge, skills and processes to be contributing members of a changing society. Math learning and teaching are responsive to students’ strengths and areas of need to support the development of conceptual understanding, procedural fluency and application of problem solving strategies. Students continue to learn basic skills and how to apply them to real world situations in their math classes and in other subjects throughout the day.
At Fossil Hill, Math and Literacy coaches support our teachers to participate in professional learning opportunities and build their own learning and teaching strategies to support student growth. Innovative strategies such as our "Math Adventure" from last year, where teachers engaged in professional development to support implementation of the Comprehensive Math program to improve students problem solving abilities, proved beneficial. We trust that these and other strategies to support math and literacy skills will continue the improvements our students are making.
Our belief in our students' abilities to continuously improve and grow is paramount to our school's vision and motivates each of our professional staff to strive for new ways to help them achieve to the best of their abilities. Developing a "growth mindset" in our students and our staff is what drives Fossil Hill. We thank our families for your support and partnership. Together we can provide an excellent education for our students.
For more detailed information of our EQAO results please go to www.eqao.com. Should you have any questions, please do not hesitate to ask us.
Sincerely,
Joanne Lomanno-Aprile Carolyn Lamy
Principal Vice Principal
