Mount Gambier North Primary School will deliver Equine Assisted Learning as part of the Australian Curriculum through the subject of Health starting next year.
The school will be the only facility in the region offering the program, which started around 18 months ago through vital funding from OneFortyOne and Stand Like Stone Foundation.
There are schools in Victoria and New South Wales delivering the program to secondary students, but none offering it within the state or at a primary level.
The program was created as an intervention for students who required extra support, regardless of their year level, but will now be offered to junior primary students, with North Primary School special options classroom teacher Judy Jenkin training in Equine Assisted Learning before implementing it in education.
Despite what the name may suggest, Mrs Jenkin brings in a range of animals depending on the needs of the session, such as horses, calves, chickens, ducks and canines including a therapy dog.
Mrs Jenkin said as the program developed she created more awareness around what animal assisted learning was.
“The staff have become really supportive in what it can do in teaching the kids strategies around self-regulation, body awareness, personal development and language development,” she said.
“We are actually teaching the kids strategies to support self-regulation; we are teaching them habits they can use in everyday life and in the classroom.
“The staff got more curious about it and this last semester we have actually been delivering the program to class cohorts.
“It has got a lot of momentum.”
The school has already seen a correlation between students participating in the program and a decrease of recorded negative instances within their educational environment.
Mrs Jenkin said there had also been reports of increased language development for Equine Assisted Learning participants.
“We are seeing a lot of language development, so they can actually communicate better, tell people what they need, tell people what the problem might be and then find a solution,” she said.
“When they lack that language development, that is where it makes it challenging to meet the needs of these kids.
“Rather than try to intervene when students are potentially at risk, we are trying to intervene early and get those skills embedded so their communication is there, and they can get the support they need.
“They are really engaging in the learning and activities we are putting in place and they are developing that language to be able to describe what they are feeling and where it rests in their body which is a big part of them being able to get the support they need.
“There is so much they are learning from all the animals. One of the biggest things we look at is calm body, so we look at the animals to see what a calm body looks like and whether they are showing us a calm body, then we look at strategies on how to get back to having a calm body.”
Mrs Jenkin said Equine Assisted Learning was already complimenting the existing programs and interventions put in place at the school.
“It is not like we are teaching kids something new, we are developing what is already in place and expanding it,” she said.
“The big challenge has been how to adapt it and deliver it in an accessible way for our students.
“I was pretty confident through the networks and the people I have trained with; I had a lot of faith in what it could achieve.
“It has evolved fairly naturally, and the kids’ engagement has been fairly natural so whilst it was a challenge theoretically, in practice it has actually come together really well.
“Do It Yourself Fencing has donated a portable yard that we use and OneFortyOne have continued a portion of funding going forward for us for another two years, so that will hopefully ensure our longevity to really embed the program.”
