Gifted and Talented

The College has high academic standards and an enviable record in assisting academically gifted students to excel and reach their full potential. Gifted and talented students are identified and mentored and provided with opportunities to maximise their potential. Staff aim to foster within each identified student, a love of learning and the desire to work towards fulfilling their intellectual potential. The high quality of LJBC’s academic program and the value of the extension provided for gifted students are confirmed by the number of LJBC students who have gone on to study medicine, physiotherapy, architecture, engineering etc. Gifted and talented students can excel at LJBC!

In the Primary school, gifted students are provided with enrichment activities and accelerated courses.It includes opportunity for students to compete in a variety of challenging competitions such as Opti-MINDS and the Academic All Stars Tournament .

T: 8 9300 7444 or E: enrolments@ljbc.wa.edu.au

Secondary School Years 7-12

Our Academic Talent Program is available for students in Years 7-12 who have been identified as academically gifted and talented. This program provides opportunities for students to participate in an array of extension and enrichment activities.

Extension

Extension activities involve the deepening of students’ knowledge, understanding and skills in a particular subject area. As part of our Academic Talent Program, we provide the following extension opportunities for academically talented students:

Differentiated Curriculum

Students who have been identified as academically talented are streamed into Academic Extension classes in Years 7-10. In these classes, students are provided with a faster pace of study, open-ended activities and higher order thinking skills that will enable them to pursue greater depth and breadth in their Learning Areas.

Academic Extension Classes

All Learning Areas follow a differentiated curriculum. This is a planned, documented and challenging curriculum that matches the ability of academically talented students to learn at faster rates, find, solve and act on problems more readily and manipulate abstract ideas and make connections to an advanced degree.

Specialist Programs

Gifted students in Mathematics in Years 7-9 are selected to participate in a withdrawal program for Mathematics. This program focuses on creative and divergent thinking and complex individual and collaborative problem solving in Mathematics.Talented writers in Year 7-9 are invited to the Talented Young Writers' Program, where they enjoy the privilege of meeting acclaimed Australian authors and sit in an creative workshops actioned by these fine writers.

Future Problem Solving Elective

Academically talented students in Year 9 and 10 are invited to choose Future Problem Solving as an elective. Future Problem Solving is an international educational program for Gifted and Talented students which focuses on the development of critical, creative and futuristic thinking skills. The program encourages students to have a positive impact in the society of the future.

Enrichment

The Academic Talent Program at LJBC includes opportunity for students to expand their knowledge and skills beyond the normal classroom environment.

Gifted and Talented Competitions

Students compete in a variety of challenging competitions such as the Australian Computational and Linguistics Olympiad, Opti-MINDS, the da Vinci Decathlon, World Scholar Cup and Future Problem Solving competition.

Learning Area Competitions

Students are selected and encouraged to participate in a range of external academic examinations and competitions organised by universities and professional associations.

University Partnerships

As part of the Academic Talent Program, students will be involved in university linked programs and excursions.

Co-curricular Activities

Co-curricular activities such as robotics, coding, chess, debating, mock trails and many more, provide further enrichment and challenges for academically talented students.

Acceleration

Acceleration permits a very small number of high ability students – the outstanding and exceptional – to accelerate beyond their enrolment cohort into a higher cohort.

At LJBC, acceleration is an available educational alternative if based on a comprehensive assessment of the readiness of the individual students and their attainment of defined outcomes

Learning Support

The Learning Enhancement Centre is staffed by a team of enthusiastic learning support specialists and provides excellent programs to assist students in improving their literacy and numeracy. Students requiring support are identified by a combination of classroom teacher assessments, observation and diagnostic testing. Learning Enhancement staff operate in classrooms as support personnel, facilitate small groups of students with similar abilities to address a particular need and assist teachers in developing suitable activities to address students’ needs.

In the Secondary School, some Learning Areas (eg Maths and English) stream Lower Secondary classes to ensure that students who are struggling receive appropriate programs. Most Secondary Learning Areas offer after school subject clubs where students can receive extra assistance with work they have not understood, or missed due to absence.

For more information, contact our Head of Secondary Learning Enhancement Sarah.Ferreira@ljbc.wa.edu.au