Grade 5 & 6

👨‍💼School Captains Welcome👩‍💼

Welcome to the year of 2026!

We are your school captains, Knox, Lucy and Hannah, and we’re thrilled to be leading Epsom for our final year of school. We have thoroughly enjoyed being a part of Epsom’s leadership groups and can’t we wait to share more of our amazing ideas later in the year. We enjoyed our first assembly a lot and we can’t wait for more opportunities later in the year for even bigger projects.

We are looking forward to upcoming leadership events. As apart of our duties we go around to classrooms and ask advice and opinions to help our school have a good environment. Thank you for reading our summary of Term 1.

Happy Holidays! - Hannah, Knox and Lucy J

👑Student Leadership👑

Leadership in our senior years is so important and it has been pleasing to see so many students keen to step into these roles. Introducing our students in 5 and 6 who have been selected for leadership roles this year...

School Captains: Knox, Hannah and Lucy J

House Captains: Hayley, Thatcher, Hunter, Tatum, James M, Chloe, Kobe J and Jerry

Flag Monitors: Kobi, Aria, Lilah, Bentley, Harper and Liam

Wellbeing Team: Liyana, Aleryar, Paw, Carolyn, Ryan, Piper, Elli, Raymond and Khloe

Student Council: Year 5s - Chelsea and Harvey. Year 6s - Elvina and Milly

Green Magpies: Riley, Mason, Paw, Knox, Flynn, Chloe, Ivy, Emmett, Quinn, Katie, Nevi, Denny, Carolyn, Spencer, Steph, Ava and Elvina.

Sawdust and Smiles (Mens Shed): Term 1 - Kobi B, Thatcher, Emmett, Liam and Jerry

baring djumiwa - Kobi B, Willow, Jy, Delilah, Evana, Elli and Stevie Lee

Band: Knox, Willow, Elli, Lucy J, Emmett, Lexi R, Lexi M and Emme

🐦‍⬛Crow Country - Kate Constable🐦‍⬛

Crow Country is about a girl named Sadie who moved from Melbourne to Boort. She wasn't happy about the move to begin with but then started enjoying herself. Sadie discovered a ring of stones on the old lake bed and a crow spoke to her. The crow had a mission for her. She had flashbacks of events that happened in the past about her family and a Boort family called the Mortlocks.

We think it is a good story, it encourages people to go outside and explore. There are heaps of cliffhangers that keep us waiting for more. There are lots of links to Aboriginal culture that are interesting. There is a bit of gory stuff but that makes it interesting, it makes your jaw drop! It is very mysterious and Sadie has built lots of relationships with friends and the crows and the people in the past. We can't wait till we find out what happens! - Amelie and Levi

My favourite part of Crow Country was when Sadie and Walter went to the stone circle and saw Craig and his mates there riding dirt bikes. Sadie made a silent prayer to the Crow and then hundreds of them came. Everyone was looking up and they were circling the stones. - Aria

I like how much detail the story has, it goes in depth about what is actually happening, it gives me a picture in my head of what is happening. I loved the part where Sadie went back in time the first time because I was like Oh what's happening! - Finn

56G brainstorm of the character -Jimmy Raven

Aboriginal Rights

We have been learning about the history of Aboriginal rights in Australia. Students have been astounded to discover that Aboriginal people did not have the right to vote in Australia until 1962 and were not counted in the Australian Census as citizens until 1967.

The British used the concept of terra nullius to declare Australia open for settlement because they believed Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples had no concept of land ownership. The 1992 Mabo case in Australia’s High Court legally overturned this doctrine, admitting the land was never truly "nobody's" and leading to the recognition of Native Title.

We have learnt about the Wave Hill Walk Off and the Freedom Ride and how these events helped raise the profile of Indigenous rights and pave the way for change.

Australia has come a long way in acknowledging and moving towards righting the wrongs of the past, but more needs to be done to achieve reconciliation.

The land should never have been called terra nullius because Aboriginal people did live here before the white people came; it wasn't empty. Riley T

I don't understand why Aboriginal people were treated so horribly. Willow

It wasn't fair. Aboriginal people were people too. Evan

💃Community Night🕺 -Dance

A few weeks ago, we had dance lessons all week to perform at the Garden of the Future. We had a dance teacher who was amazing. Grade 6s learned Caught Up by Usher and Grade 5s learned Thunder by Imagine Dragons. On Thursday night of that week we performed in front of a crowd, our parents. I was with my friends Paw and Carolyn and we were having a fantastic time. I loved see the preps having a blast and performing their song and seeing them smile. - Harvey

I enjoyed learning the dance and catching up with some of the Grade Sixes from 2025 on the community night. Blaine H

I really liked the energy and it was really fun catching up with my friends. I enjoyed learning the chorography - there was some hard moves! - Hannah S

I loved when we practised dance and I really liked the teacher that helped us. It was really fun. We did it for a week, it was a good week - Ally

🕒Maths 🕒

During Term One, students engaged in many interesting topics including 24 hour time, powers of 10 and adding and subtracting decimal numbers. Students applied their understanding of these topics to a range of engaging activities that included students making up holidays around Victoria and the world, they needed to work out elapsed time when crossing over time zones, creating stationary order lists where students needed to use their knowledge of place value, addition and subtraction, amongst many more interesting lessons.

I like the activity when we had to work out when the plane departs and arrives. It reminds me of when my family goes on a plane to Queensland. - Flynn DG

I enjoyed adding and subtracting decimal numbers and using real life videos like Steven Bradbury's gold medal to help hook us in- Lewis B

I liked the lesson where we had to work out the time difference between different people in the 1000 meter speed skating- Victoria P

I have really enjoyed the Easter Treats activity. It was really fun looking at the recipes you can do at home and working out prices using exact measurements. For example, the butter cost $8.90 for 500g but we only needed 250g so the actual cost of what we used was half of that - $4.45. - Katie

🏊Swimming🏊

I loved swimming. I wasn't that good but it was fun to have a go. I was pretty disappointed that it was only toy little animals as inflatables on the last day though. The instructor was nice, I liked how she knew everything about everyone. Like one of my group doesn't like to jump in and that another one likes to have the teacher there when he jumps in. - Bonny

I like swimming because on Friday we got to play games in both of the 2 pools. I played basketball and tag in the pools and a couple of other groups came in with us. I did survival and free stroke too. It was really fun on the last day. - Ace B

I really like it when we had the inflatable race. I feel like my swimming ability has improved since last year and I feel more confident. I would like to have more opportunities to learning swimming techniques. - Hayley P

I really liked how the instructors were very nice, but I was exhausted after every lesson. It was a BIG week and VERY humid! - Lucy F

🚸Buddies🚸

Making board games for our buddies:

Reading with our buddies:

Having a buddy is a great privilege and so far I have loved hanging out with Henry and Nixon, eating lunch together and especially the treasure hunt. I could barely keep up with him because he was racing around! - Knox M

Our buddies are cool and very energetic but they are very fun to be around. Sometimes they are a bit too energetic! My buddy is very fast, I can barely catch up with him when he runs! - Henry

I enjoyed making the origami bears - a paper folding activity that forms into a bear, which the buddies decorated. - Nate G

I enjoyed making a board game for my buddy to play. I made a version of Monopoly which includes houses/properties that allowed you to get 2x the amount of rent you usually get. I also liked catching up with my buddy for lunch each week. - Blaine H

🧡Harmony Day🧡

I loved how most students wore orange for Harmony Day. It is a day to celebrate our multicultural country and being inclusive, accepting, kind and caring towards everyone. - James L

I liked how everyone could celebrate their differences. It's import to celebrate who they are because no matter where you come from, you are still a person. - Lexi R

Harmony Day is a day where different people from different families, cultures and races, can all be together as one whole group. If unite together, we create a better future for all. - Hudson C