Wellbeing

Yarning Circles

Yarning Circles have been used as an important process within Aboriginal Culture to learn from a collective group, build respectful relationships, and to preserve and pass on cultural knowledge. Since the start of 2022 Mr Relouw and Mrs Sharples have been running a yarning circle, to celebrate and provide learning around Aboriginal Culture. Each week our Koorie students have the opportunity to be part of our yarning circle, during this time the students have a chance to connect with each other and learn aspects of their culture they may or may not have known about.

For 2023 the Yarning Group has added an extra focus of recognising the important dates, events and celebrations that are connected with aboriginal culture. Through the first 6 weeks there have been many important dates to acknowledge, celebrate and provide information to the students. 26th January - Australia Day/ Survival Day, 13th February - Anniversary of National Apology Day and 21st February - International Mother Language Day are the three dates which the Yarning Circle have acknowledged and/or celebrated. Outside of the important dates through the first 6 weeks the students have participated in a number of activities including building a garden with indigenous plants, cooking using indigenous ingredients, crafting an acknowledgment of country and playing indigenous inspired sport games. 

 TEAMs

Together Everyone Achieves More

You might have heard your child mention this recently. It is an acronym that stands for together everyone achieves more. We have recently re-instated our TEAMs program; our first session was Friday 17th February.

TEAMs are cross-age pastoral care groups that children are assigned to when they begin school. Grade 6 Buddies and Prep students are in a TEAM together along with at least one other student from each year level. One teacher is responsible for each TEAM, and generally, that teacher will stay with the same TEAM as long as they are a teacher at BNPS.

We are thrilled to be able to gather in our TEAMs after such a long time. We know the TEAMs initiative has many benefits for our students and the sense of community. Some of these benefits include building strong relationships across the school between all students, promoting our school values and providing opportunities to learn how to put them into action in practical ways, building a trusted relationship with a staff member that lasts for the duration of primary school, and it develops and promotes leadership responsibilities in our senior students. Our buddies program is enhanced within TEAMs, and our Grade 3, 4 and 5 students begin to experience the feeling of being buddies by supporting the Grade 1 and 2 students. 

This year TEAMs will meet fortnightly on Fridays, for an hour. Each meeting will have a Wellbeing and Engagement Focus. All students will undertake a lesson from the Smiling Minds program and then be involved in a task, discussion or experience focusing on an area of personal, social or community capabilities. Throughout the year, we also plan to celebrate a range of special events with our TEAMs. Make sure to listen out for some of the great learning that will be taking place in these sessions.