Our Friendship Groups Program has been running since 2003. There are 16 Friendship groups, each with approximately 18 students from Prep to Year Six. Prep students and their Year Six Buddies are placed together in the same group.
Teachers meet with their group every fortnight for a session that typically involves a game and an activity based on a social skill and the TORCH value of current focus.
Through their participation and interaction with other students across the levels, children are taught strategies to help build resilience and equip them with social competencies that will assist them to become full and active members of the community. The program encompasses a common language and a set of shared values that are promoted and developed throughout the school, in classrooms, on the playground and in family life. Through this program students learn the meaning of our key values of Tolerance, Optimism, Respect, Confidence and Honesty, and how to apply these values in their lives.