Year Level Information

 From the perspective of our students, here is a little summary of how each year level is unique at Templestowe Park Primary School.

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Prep

Starting school is an exciting time for us and our parents.  After being a part of an extensive transition program, we start school at Templestowe Park feeling confident, comfortable within the school’s surroundings and eager to learn. From day one, we are easily recognised, as we wear the trademark orange hats as part of our Sunsmart policy.  We are very lucky to have our own playground including a sandpit and cubby house to explore during break times.

In addition to our classroom program based on developing Literacy and Numeracy skills, we are involved in other exciting and innovative programs. Examples of programs and highlights for the year include:

• being involved in our weekly specialist programs of Chinese (Mandarin) Physical Education, Visual Arts, Performing Arts, Library and a visit to the Discovery Room (our new Science facility).
• participating in the weekly PMP (Perceptual Motor Program). PMP helps develop our motor skills and coordination through a range of activities in a ‘gymnasium’ based setting.
• an exciting buddy program with the Year Five children. Each Prep child is paired up with a Year Five child. We form special friendships, meet and complete activities together in the classroom and sometimes play with each other in the breaks. Everyone involved in the buddy program benefits positively from it.
• visits from important people in the community such as the ambulance, the vet and police and the local fire brigade.
• the use of a class set of notebook computers.
• parental involvement in all areas of the school, including the classroom program. Our parents assist in the classroom during our literacy block with learning centre activities and writing or with Maths. The teachers run parent programs to educate our parents in our current teaching methods to ensure we have a partnership of helping each child on their learning journey.

It is very exciting being a Prep student at Templestowe Park. There are always engaging experiences offering us many positive opportunities to succeed. Learning is fun, challenging and develops confident young people, ready to face the future! >>return to top

Year 1

Year One is a very exciting year for us - we're no longer the babies of the school!

Some of the things we like about Year 1 is how we:

• participate in Physical Education and Visual Arts with specialist teachers. We also learn Chinese in our Languages Other Than English (LOTE) program.
• work in Learning Centres, which is where we develop our Reading and Writing skills. We often have some of our mums and dads in our classroom for Learning Centres, which means we can get extra help when we need it.
• learn about writing and reading for different purposes, through real life experiences, such as following instructions to do some cooking or experiments, sharing narrative stories and making lists.
• have Maths every day with lots of exploration of numbers. We measure with all sorts of equipment, make estimates and then check our answers. Open-ended problems help us to all work on the task at our own levels.
• visit Lego Land to learn more about creating and building communities.
• begin our Swimming program with a five day intensive program. A Water Safety program is studied back at school to make sure that we are all well educated about safe practices around the water.

In Year One, our teachers are amazed at how much we learn and develop. We have fun and always enjoy the activities we do.

Year One at Templestowe Park is an exciting learning experience, isn't it? >>return to top

Year 2

Year 2 is an exciting time where we are in our third year of school and are more independent in all that we do. By now we are good at talking about how we learn by discussing different strategies that we use to learn, and understand that making mistakes makes learning easier.
Some features of year 2 that we like include:

• having a lot of mums and dads helping us with our reading, writing and maths in our rooms. We are now very used to working in different groups in our classroom.
• our dinner and evening at LaTrobe Sports Centre where we work together to complete activities that need us to plan, think and move in lots of different ways.
• choosing to read more novels as a part of our take home reading program. We can now read a lot of chapter books all by ourselves.
• learning about concepts such as identity, sustainability, social justice, creativity and community.
• continuing our Swimming program.

While there is a lot to do, we are still happy in year 2! >>return to top

Year 3

Year three is an exciting year for us, as we move from junior school into middle school.
In year three we take on more responsibility for our learning and are able to choose our own home reading books from the collection in our classrooms or from the Library. We are also responsible for recording our reading in our diary and ensure that our diary is up to date and available to give to our teacher each day. We are encouraged to be independent readers and to think critically about our reading.

Some of the highlights of being in year three include:

• participating in Junior School Council and becoming competent at organising our class meetings.
• joining in the year three and four sport program with the older children. During year three, we learn the rules and skills of soccer, football, bootball, bat tennis, basketball, rounders, newcombe, cricket, netball, T-ball and athletics. We play in mixed groups with year four and each week some of us are nominated for the Good Sportsmanship Award which is awarded at the end of the year.
• our Inquiry topics such as Community – Indigenous Inspirations, Change, Necessity, Curiosity, Identity, Sustainability, Social Justice and Creativity. 
• embedding Information and Communication Technology into the curriculum to allow us to engage in a range of learning experiences.
• learning to use computer programs to help make us skilled cyber citizens.

Year Three is certainly the "learning through fun" place to be. >>return to top

Year 4

Year Four is an exciting year where we assume more responsibility for the development of our learning. Through the curriculum, opportunities are provided for us to develop thinking skills, information literacy and technology skills.

Some of the features of a year in year 4 include:

• attending a dynamic four day camp in Anglesea. Whilst on camp, we learn how to better care for the environment, experience nature first hand and build strong relationships with staff and peers.
• integrating Information and Communication Technology (ICT) into all areas of the curriculum. We regularly use ICT to access interactive sites, present our work or develop our ICT skills.
• incorporating more Public Speaking opportunities into the English program.
• us becoming leaders and mentors in the Year Three and Four Sport Program. For the first time we join our senior school classmates for inter-house and inter-school sports programs such as swimming, cross country and athletics.
• making stronger, deeper connections to the texts we are reading and the ever changing world we are part of.

We like being a part of a challenging learning environment which caters for our different interests, abilities and learning styles. We respect individual differences and encourage tolerance and understanding for everyone.
There is a whole lot more that we could say about year 4! >>return to top

Year 5

Year Five at Templestowe Park is seen to be the start of our preparation for secondary school - there's only one year to go after this! We aim to develop greater levels of responsibility and independence as well as learning strategies to cope with the demands of the final years of our primary school experience.  Some highlights of a year in year 5 include:

• the Buddies program. In Buddies, we each have a prep student assigned to us from the start of the year and we work with them in a variety of activities throughout the year. We also look out for them in the playground during lunchtime. Even though it is six years ago, we remember how lost and confused we sometimes got when we started school. It's nice to think that we can help this year's Prep students to deal with their first year at school in a way that helps us learn too! 
• our first opportunity to represent our school on the sporting field in the Year 5 & 6 Interschool Sport program.
• our combined four day camp to Alexandra Adventure Resort one year and then Sovereign Hill the next, with our grade 6 friends, is a highlight of the year. Alexandra Adventure Resort includes activities such as a flying fox and a high ropes course.  
• exploring and learning about the Environment, Government, Space, Australian and Asian History, Indigenous Australians and Natural Disasters.

Each day in year 5 is an opportunity to learn and strive! >>return to top

Year 6

Year six is where we identify our strengths and think about the goals we might set for our lives. It is an exciting time of change as we are beginning our journey into young adult life. The activities and curriculum this year help prepare us to face our future with confidence and skills. We look beyond our own immediate environment and lives to a wider and more diverse world.

Some of the key features of year 6 include:

• exploring how our society works and how decisions are made and use this as a basis for school life.
• being elected as Captains (House Captains, School Captains, Sport Captains etc) by our peers and taking on extra responsibilities and leadership. Other opportunities arise for leadership throughout the year for all year six students. 
• our combined four day camp to Alexandra Adventure Resort one year and then Sovereign Hill the next, with our grade 5 friends, is a highlight of the year. 
• our year 6 graduation. At the end of the year, Templestowe Park celebrates our contribution to the school through a graduation ceremony. Our parents, friends and staff are entertained by us through music and ICT.

We might know all the tricks, but now it’s time to put them into practise as we move on to a new school! >>return to top