School History
Heyfield PS was established in 1871 with an original building, which unfortunately was destroyed by fire in 1906. The current school buildings are a marriage of old and new sites after the school undertook a few demolitions and redesigns. Let me take you on an imaginary walk...
Photo: John Hansen / Heyfield and Districts Museum
As you enter the school grounds, the front gate welcomes you to our Friendship Tree where many students enjoy eating their lunch and snacks, while chatting to their friends. In the afternoons, you can see parents waiting for their children, it is a very nice place to relax. The first building is the oldest school building from 1907, rebuilt after the fire. It holds three classrooms, which our current Junior students enjoy learning in. One of the classrooms is our Reading Intervention room, with resources focused on improving reading throughout all the year levels.
A bit further down the hall, you can see open learning spaces. These classrooms were developed during the era of the Education Revolution in 2010 and offer the opportunity to open doors between classrooms and team-teach in larger spaces. Inquiry projects and cross-curricular learning activities linked to Global Goals are often taught in the Senior year levels. These open and flexible spaces enable rich conversations and deep learning.
Walk across to the latest addition to our beautiful country school. This is our new building. You will be greeted by Ann, our Office manager; Rhonda, our Wellbeing officer or myself, as the administration part of our school lives here. Turn right and discover our wonderful new Library. We have designed it to be the heart of the building, because reading is an integral part of all learning. Reading is at the centre of our conversations with children and their families. The design of our Library enables a flow of students and parents choosing and borrowing books together. Our amphitheatre in the library has proven already to be a favourite to our reading buddies, where senior students enjoy reading to younger ones, and vice versa. We are the envy of many schools with thousands of quality books.
With an Art room and Multipurpose room on the side of the Library, students are encouraged to be creative in various ways. Our Art room is large and well resourced, with a fantastic teacher leading the way to discover new techniques and open our minds to the world around us. Mrs Merlo thrives to provide our students the best opportunities to create and think outside the box. Her Music and Art lessons are interactive and full of surprises.
Students are also encouraged to engage in physical activity and collaborative play with a variety of play facilities during Physical Education lessons. This year, Mr Fasoli took the Senior students through the learning of wheelchair basketball, which is a great way to understand the challenges of disabilities as well as learning new skills.
The outdoor areas include junior and senior adventure playgrounds, fitness circuit, rebound wall, large sandpit and the Playmart shed. Students access a number of extra-curricular programs including Cross-age Learning, Bike Ed, School Concert, Swimming, Winter Sport, Athletics, Tennis and the Sport in Schools program.