Curriculum- Teaching and Learning
School Wide Teaching and Learning
In each edition of our school newsletter, we share with our community an insight into the curriculum being taught within our classrooms. This reflects our school's strong focus upon continuous improvement.
Each edition covers a different area of the curriculum, and is supported by our school-wide approaches to teaching and learning.
In this edition we diverge from our normal 'core' curriculum focus and provide you with some information regarding the social-emotional curriculum.
Teaching and Learning Programs across USPS are delivered through direct-explicit instruction, and are facilitated through our school-wide instructional model, the Gradual Release of Responsibility (GRR).
The academic curriculum is supported by a strong social-emotional learning culture, which is based upon the BSEM and SWPBL.
Core curriculum subjects are complemented by extensive extra-curricular programming and specialist classes consisting of the following disciplines: Visual Arts (60 mins per week), Performing Arts/Music (60 mins per week), Health/Physical Education (60mins per week), Japanese (40 minutes per fortnight).
Let’s TALK Program
At the commencement of 2022, USPS's strong reputation as an SWPBL school was recognised through the school qualifying to join the Let'sTALK Mental Health pilot program (http://letstalkprogram.org/ ).
This program is supported through WorkSafe, Inspire Health and Medical (formerly Yarra Ranges Psychology) and the Melbourne School of Population and Global Health, Melbourne University. USPS applied for this pilot program to complement the school's SWPBL Framework and to increase student connections returning from Remote Learning.
Let's TALK provides staff and student leaders with mental health toolkit to hold supportive conversations with the aim of increasing connections, engagement and mental health support across the school.
Rather than us tell you about it with ‘educational speak’ we have taken an extract from the speeches which were delivered by our 2022 SWPBL Leaders at the launch of the program.
Hello everyone, we are your SPWBL Leaders and we are proud to be working alongside the Year Three- year Six Junior School Council Representatives. Together we form the Let’s TALK Team at Upwey South Primary School.
We are what’s known as Let’s TALK buddies.
Let’s TALK is a mental health program which aims to improve relationships in schools by building a culture where it’s encouraged and okay to talk about your feelings. Let’s TALK is designed for schools, universities and workplaces, with the aim of giving people a safe place to talk about their challenges and concerns.
The program is supported by Yarra Valley Psychology (now known as Inspire Health and Medical) the program is being piloted in selected schools across Melbourne.
The schools currently taking part in the Eastern suburbs pilot are:
So what is Let’s TALK?
Let’s stands for:
TALK stands for:
At Upwey South Primary School, we applied to be part of the Let’s TALK Pilot Program because our Attitude to Schools Survey showed that students in Years 4-6 felt like they needed more help to share their challenges and more people to support them with their mental health.
There are three types of people involved in Let’s TALK.
1- The buddies- that’s all of the students in this room. Our job is to be roaming the school yard in pairs, wearing these pink vests. We are out in the yard to check-in on people, see how everyone is feeling, and be available for a “Talk and Walk” if someone wants to tell us about a challenge or a problem.
We have undergone training sessions last term and this term so that we know how to start and continue conversations about feelings. We also have these pink lanyards with “conversation and feelings prompts” to help us with any difficult conversations.
There is a roster and a Let’s TALK board in the office foyer, which tells everyone who and when they are out in the school yard.
At the end of each recess we then return the vests, we also hand in any “referral notes” to the office. A referral note is when someone needs to be “referred” on for further help.
The things we do as buddies are known as “triage conversations”.
2- The Mentors- that’s the teachers and support staff such as Carvin our school counsellor. The job of the mentors is to oversee the buddies, and to hold further Let’s TALK and Walk conversations with students if needed.
3- The students at our school- they are who the program is made for. Remember, the aim of Let’s TALK is “Letting everyone talk safely”.
Wow… that’s a lot of information!!
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