User:St0mpy/BEPS

Brunswick East Primary School (BEPS) is a primary school located in Brunswick East, a suburb of Melbourne, Victoria, Australia.

Curriculum
The curriculum is designed in accordance with State and National guidelines and uses the Reggio Emilia approach to create a child-centred learning environment, with an emphasis on deep inquiry, philosophy and creativity. Learning is shared through collaborative inquiry, which aims to help children develop a strong sense of belonging and connection to community. There is a focus on philosophical thinking in "communities of inquiry" which aims to promote critical thinking and requires that members of the group show respect for each other. Children work in small groups to engage in collaborative investigation and discussion, constructing understandings, skills, and knowledge shared by the group.

To support children and teachers working together as a community of learners, students are organised into flexible "Learning Communities," with core "Home Groups". Home groups consist of around 20 children and one teacher. Several home groups then form larger learning communities (usually three or four home groups per learning community). Other than Prep, each home group and learning community is multi-aged, consisting of students from a range of Grades.

In 2013, the Learning Communities are: Each home group also participates in weekly 'specialist' classes in Music, Art, Physical Educaiton and Library. A language other than English program (LOTE) is offered to the 4-5-6 Learning Community where students learn Italian.
 * Tricicolo (Preps)
 * Bicicleta (Grades 1, 2 and 3)
 * L'Alveare, also referred to as '123 Downstairs' (Grades 1, 2 and 3)
 * il Nido, also referred to as '123 Upstairs' (Grades 1, 2 and 3)
 * Su Nei Cieli (Grades 4, 5 and 6)

Throughout the year, the School run various other special events to further enrich learning, such as athletics days, musical performances, an arts expo and an annual school camp for students in Grades 1 to 6.

Location
The school is located in the inner suburbs of Melbourne. The school faces south onto Stewart Street, the northern and eastern sides of the school are bounded by Nicholson St, and the western side of the school is bordered by Cunnington Avenue. The nearest public transport routes to the school are the No. 96 tram on Nicholson Street, the No. 1 tram and No. 8 tram on Lygon Street and the 503 and 508 buses.

The school is very close to the CERES Environment Park and the Merri Creek, several local parks and the Triple R radio station.

Buildings and grounds
The main school building is a red-brick building. The school also has a hall, a free-standing Library building (currently used as a teaching space for grades 1, 2 and 3), a separate building for Preps; this building also houses the Library on the second level. The main gate leading into the school is a decorative metal artwork featuring... The grounds include an oval, two asphelted areas for games, playgrounds, sandpit, kitchen garden with chicken pen. A native garden is planted along the front of the school. The school has several water tanks and two bicycle sheds.

School community
The school uses the Reggio Emilia model as a basis for it's teaching philosophy and this model is one that extends the school community into the broader community. As such parents and other members of the local area are invited to contribute to the school community. The school has a Community Building committee which runs events for the school and wider community, such as the annual Twilight Market, held in December each year and a Building and Grounds committee who ensure that the school buildings and grounds are maintained and improved.

The school has established links with CERES and employs a gardner who runs a kitchen garden program for the students. Much of the funds raised by the Community Building committee support the kitchen garden program.

History
The school was established in 1893. It was one of a small group of sixteen large late 19th century schools which displayed a move away from Gothic-influenced design which had dominated government schools until 1885. Schools in this group incorporate variously Flemish, English Queen Anne, Romanesque and Aesthetic Movement influences. In 1922 the older buildings were refurbished and more modern additions were built in the early 1970s - a hall, library and open plan classrooms developed around a central paved courtyard. The school was refurbished in 1997 following the merger with Brunswick Primary School. In 2011, the school received funding of $1,900,000 under the Commonwealth Government's "Building the Education Revolution" (BER) program for "refurbishment of classroom". This funding was used to make extensive improvements to the main building that opened up classroom spaces to make them better suited to the collaborative inquiry based approach to learning.