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Junior School

Pre-Kindergarten to Year 1

Pre-Kindergarten to Year 1 provides a stimulating, nurturing and vibrant environment for our students. The first steps are taken towards ensuring our students achieve their personal best and are willing to serve their community as an informed and active citizen.

The early years are the most vital in a child’s educational life. During this time children are entering a social world stretching beyond the family. They are trying to establish themselves as members of a peer group community. It is during this period too that they acquire the foundation skills for future learning. They form crucial attitudes in learning and to themselves as learners. By the end of these early years of education children will have reached some important decisions about their own abilities and own worth. This places a special responsibility on teachers of young children to provide a warm, supportive but challenging environment.

Additional information can be found in the Pre-Kindergarten and Kindergarten – Additional information for parents/carers of Pre-Kindergarten and Kindergarten boys publication.

Guiding principles

Children learn when they are having fun, experience success, feel secure and have a sense of belonging.
Curiosity, wonder and imagination are encouraged and developed through creativity and child centred, play based, hands on learning.
Children connect and contribute to their world through inquiry and discovery. Thinking is at the centre of all inquiry.
Children have authentic opportunities in a range of curriculum areas to develop their thinking and problem solving skills. They are actively involved in gathering and processing information using all of their senses.
Children learn to be socially responsible and show respect for others and their environment.
Children take learning risks to develop their social, emotional and physical wellbeing. They are supported in developing skills of independence, resilience and perseverance.
Children participate in the digital world positively and productively.

Curriculum

The curriculum in Pre-Kindergarten to Year 1 is based on the Early Years Learning Framework for Pre-Kindergarten and Kindergarten year groups (with a Reggio Emilia approach where relevant) and the Australian Curriculum for Prep (Foundation) to Year 1. The class teacher takes all of the core subject areas including, English, Mathematics, Science, History, Geography and Art. Specialist teachers are provided for Music, Chinese, Physical Education, Library and RAVE (Religious and Values Education). Provision is made for EAL/D (English as an Additional Language or Dialect) support and there are targeted support and Gifted and Talented programs from Prep to Year 1.

Co-curricular activities

Co-curricular activities for the Early Years students include dance, music and individual instrumental lessons (tuition fees apply).

Special features

Award winning purpose built classrooms.
An onsite Outside School Hours Care (OSHC) facility for boys from Pre-Kindergarten to Year 6.
Social and Emotional Learning (SEL) curriculum delivered from Pre-Kindergarten to Year 5, incorporating personalised learning principles.
Separate play spaces, including a loose parts play area, and phased in participation with older students (Year 1 students).
Regular access to the onsite bush play area for outdoor play and learning.
Regular excursions to nearby Lambert Park.
Evidence based, best practice approaches and resources utilised for early literacy development.
Whole school participation for certain events (e.g. assembly, cross country and other events)
Informal buddy system with Junior and Senior School students.
Chapel for Pre-Kindergarten to Year 2 once a week.
Regular assemblies for students and parents/carers, throughout each term.
Links with our co-operating girls’ schools, St Michael’s Collegiate and Fahan School, for combined social/learning opportunities.
Opportunities for Prep and Year 1 students to play a sport for the School on a Saturday (e.g. soccer).

ACECQA (Australian Children’s Education and Care Quality Authority) – Exceeding National Quality Standards

Rated Exceeding National Quality Standards

The Hutchins School Children’s Service, including Pre-Kindergarten, Kindergarten, OSHC and Vacation Care have an overall rating of Exceeding the National Quality Standards. The National Quality Framework offers a national approach to regulatory requirements, the assessment and rating of services and quality improvement processes across the early childhood education and care sector, including OSHC and Vacation Care.

Our rating of Exceeding highlights that as a service, we have gone above and beyond what is expected of a service to meet the quality standards. It shows that we have demonstrated consistently high-quality practice, commitment and understanding across all seven Quality Areas, and have shown our practice is embedded in all service operations, is informed by critical reflection, and that practice is shaped by meaningful engagement with our families and community.

The Exceeding rating demonstrates our ongoing commitment to children, families, and education, and that our service is dedicated to maintaining the highest quality learning environment.

Years 2–5

The Junior School is a welcoming, vibrant place with clear behavioural expectations, providing a reference point for boys as they develop further on their pathways. In Junior School there is a focus on becoming active, contributing, caring and compassionate citizens, and learning to be critical independent thinkers.

Primary focuses

A continued emphasis on basic numeracy and literacy skills.
Building character, confidence and independence – encouraging boys to be responsible and accountable for their actions and choices and to be resilient.
Learning to be active, contributing, caring and compassionate citizens knowing that what they do matters in terms of people and their environment locally and globally.
Learning to be critical and independent thinkers with inquiry learning at the core of all learning experiences.
Differentiated learning because every student learns differently and at different rates and has different levels of understanding.
Providing a wide, varied, exciting and challenging curriculum so that all students can cultivate a lifelong love of learning.

Curriculum

The Australian Curriculum is delivered in the Junior School. Classroom teachers teach the core subjects of English, Mathematics, Science, History and Geography. There are specialist teachers in the areas of Physical Education, Library, RAVE (Religious and Values Education), Music, Art, French (as well as Chinese in Year 5).

Co-curricular activities

Co-curricular activities include dance, debating, winter and summer competitive team sports, choir, orchestra and individual instrumental lessons (tuition fees apply).

Special features

Regular weekly chapel for Pre-Kindergarten to Year 5 students.
Massed Singing for all students two mornings a week.
Get Active program led by Year 6 students three mornings a week.
Pride Choir (100 students from Years 3–5).
Outdoor Education program, with a day at Southport for our Year 2 students and overnight camps from Year 3–5.
Continuation of support programs and Gifted and Talented programs (including subject acceleration).
Continued links with our co-operating girls’ schools, Fahan School and St Michael’s Collegiate, for social and learning opportunities.
Sport lessons are timetabled once a week. Summer sports are offered in Terms 1 and 2 and include bushwalking, t-ball/softball, modified cricket, touch rugby and triathlon training. Winter sports are offered in Terms 2 and 3 and include Australian Rules Football (modified rules), basketball, soccer, table tennis, hockey, half-field hockey, cross country and waterpolo. It is compulsory for students in Year 5 to represent the School in rostered competitions during the winter sport program.