The Visual Art program at Sunshine SDS provides students with regular opportunities to experience and learn through the exploration and creative use of materials. Art activities provide for sensory stimulation to promote learning and development through fun. The process of creating is often more important than the finished product. Art experiences promotes self-esteem, self-expression and sense of achievement and skill development. The Visual Arts program often complements and enhances many other aspects of the student’s educational environment, such as participation, engagement, choice making, communication, motor skills and sensory exploration, processing and integration. Through art experiences students develop an appreciation of art and additional recreational opportunities.
The Performing Arts program at Sunshine SDS aligns with the Victorian curriculum and brings together three curriculum areas: dance, drama and music.
Drama enables students to imagine and participate in exploration of their world, individually and collaboratively. Students actively use body, gesture, movement, voice and language, taking on roles to explore and depict real and imagined worlds. They create, rehearse, perform and respond using basic elements and conventions of drama. The use of dress ups, mirrors and props are an essential part of the program.
Through dance, students express and celebrate using the body for personal, social, emotional, spiritual and physical communication. Dance has the capacity to engage, inspire and enrich all students, exciting the imagination and encouraging students to reach their creative and expressive potential. Their active participation in dance activities promotes wellbeing and social inclusion. Students respond to their own and the dances of others using varied forms of communication such as Proloquo2Go.
Music has the capacity to engage, inspire and enrich all students, exciting the imagination and encouraging students to reach their creative and expressive potential. Students use tuned and percussion instruments to express and share sound as listeners and performers. Music learning has a significant impact on the cognitive, affective, motor, social and personal competencies of students. They have opportunities to experience music from a variety of genres and cultures and to choose the music that engages and inspires them. The students are encouraged to explore the skills of beat, rhythm and improvisation. Students can explore their voice using a microphone and experiment with words and sounds to communicate a message and sing songs.
At Sunshine SDS, students are offered the opportunity to be performers and members of an audience at our annual Performing Arts concert. Each participating class across the school performs a musical piece that is inspired by the talents, interests and skills of the group. A supportive audience combines Sunshine SDS staff, students and their families.
Physical Education (PE) at Sunshine SDS is about developing the child’s fundamental movement skills (FMS), FMS is important, as these are the building blocks for all sports and advanced movements. There are three areas of FMS; locomotor skills, non-locomotor skills and manipulative skills.
Locomotor skills include running, jumping, hopping and skipping. Non-locomotor skills include turning, twisting and stretching. Manipulative skills include throwing and catching, kicking and striking.
Within the Secondary Learning Centre FMS skills are taught through a variety of drill based activities as well as sports such as netball, football, basketball, yoga, and soccer.
Within the Primary Learning Centre, FMS is taught through a variety of structured play activities such as obstacle courses and skill stations or through explorative play lessons where teachers work one-to-one to develop individual skills.
A highlight of the PE calendar is Sports Day. Both Secondary and Primary learning centre have their own day dedicated to demonstrating the skills they have learnt over the last year with PE lessons. On these days, we also promote our community links by undertaking clinics delivered by a variety of VIC sporting organisations. Throughout the year classes get to work with several sporting organisations including Loops Table Tennis Centre, Special Olympics, AFL and Western Bulldogs, Tennis Victoria, Cricket Victoria and many more.
PE also aides the holistic development of the student, with cross-curricular links to many other areas including Balanced Literacy, Numeracy and community learning. During PE, students learn not only physical movement but they also develop their social skills by learning to work with a partner or play team games. Students build on their ability to communicate by engaging with others, and through requesting equipment of choice. PE also helps develop pupils’ psychological skills, they learn perseverance and to try different ways of moving until they succeed. Students begin to understand what they like and dislike and build upon their self-esteem and self-motivation.
Sunshine Special Developmental School is a Child Safe school
