Full Engagement

A key goal of Seven Oaks is to engage each student in their learning as fully as possible. This not only makes learning rapid and deep, but it also makes learning an enjoyable and successful experience. How do we do that?

The Seven Oaks Full Engagement Learning formula has a number of important ingredients working together. These include:

  1. The 12:1 student to educator ratio gives each educator an opportunity for meaningful personal interaction with each student
  2. Learning programmes are individually developed between each student and the educator, with appropriate parent involvement. Thus students have a say in their programme.
  3. As every student has their own learning programme, they are instrinsically motivated to learn, i.e. for the sake of their own growth and enjoyment. This is substantially more relevant and empowering than the extrinsic fear of failing in the eyes of others.
  4. In addition to the usual range of compulsory subjects such as literacy and numeracy, students are given choice to learn other things of personal interest to them.
  5. A key role of educators is to work with each student’s interests and passions to support the learning of academic basics.
  6. Every student has a unique learning profile. Boys and girls generally have different learning styles and interests, especially until they reach adolescence. Girls are often audial learners and boys are often visual/spatial learners. By studying and working with each student educators discover how best they learn.
  7. Whenever possible, we endeavour to ground academic learnings in real life experiences so that the subjects go beyond concept and become imbued with practical meaning for each student. To support this, students experience regular outside and off-site learnings.
  8. Students are practically involved in the operational processes of the school. This gets them appropriately engaged with the real world at the most formative stages of their life. In the early years, this involves simple activities such as cleaning and gardening. As they grow, they engage in more advanced activities such as administration and decision-making.
  9. Children learn rapidly and effectively through play, because this is when thought, feeling and action are all engaged. We give children time to play each day and make learning ‘playful’ whenever possible.